Very Forgettable

Rating: 3/10 (10 June 2005)

With the amount of money and resources that Troy had available there is no excuse for such poor quality. The Direction and Screenplay were lousy. Director Wolfgang Petersen, who has a wonderful move direction history, filmed this movie as though he only intended it to be formatted to fit a regular TV screen. Much of the grandeur of the letterbox format went totally unused. I also found the liberal use of digital effects to border on the absurd at moments.
The screenplay, being the adaptation of an epic that has lived through countless lifetimes didn't even have to be that wonderful to win me over. However, I found most of the characters tolerable, in there roles, at best. Casting was horrendously flawed. People no more looked their parts than Grace Jones could pass for Snow White. Since when did the Greeks look more like Celts and Vikings than Greeks? Generally speaking the Trojans looked more appropriate than the Greeks but it was still not great.
The only moment I found powerful in the whole of the movie was when Priam (played by Peter O'Toole) was appealing to Achilles. O'Toole was able to take that moment and make it meaningful.