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Troy (2-Disc Edition) [2004]
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Editorial
Amazon.co.uk Review
There are many reasons to recommend Troy as a good ol' fashioned Hollywood epic, especially if you've never read Homer's The Iliad. Dispensing with Greek gods altogether, this earnestly massive production (budgeted at upwards of $200 million) will surely offend historians and devoted students of the classics. But there's politics aplenty in the grand-scale war that erupts when Trojan prince Paris (Orlando Bloom) makes off with Helen (blandly beautiful German model Diane Kruger), wife of Spartan ruler Menelaus (Brendan Gleeson), whose brother, the Greek king Agamemnon (Brian Cox) prods him into enraged retaliation. Greek warrior Achilles (Brad Pitt) brings lethal force to his battles (and there are many of them, mostly impressive), and his Trojan counterpart, Paris's brother Hector (Eric Bana), adds even more buffed-up beefcake to a film so chock-full o' hunks that there's barely room for Peter O'Toole (doing fine work as Trojan king Priam) and even less for Julie Christie, appearing ever-so-briefly as Achilles's melancholy mother. The drama is nearly as arid as the sun-baked locations (Mexico and Malta) that stand in for the Aegean coast, and many critics suggested that Pitt (who valiantly tries to give Achilles some tormented dimension) was simply miscast. But when you consider that Wolfgang Petersen also made The Perfect Storm, there's nothing wrong with enjoying Troy as a semi-guilty pleasure with a touch of ancient class. --Jeff Shannon
Good battle scenes, characters are a bit so and so
Review date: 2008-04-12 Rating: 6 out of 10
If your looking for ancient battle scenes involving shields, spears, arrows and swords then this will be an enjoyable film.
The story line is preposterous involving Orlando Bloom running away with the wife of a powerful king triggering a war. The characters are okay but you watch a film like this for the action and not an intelligent meaningful script.
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Reviews
What a missed opportunity
Review date: 2008-03-31 Rating: 2 out of 10
Brilliant effects but why oh why does Hollywood feel the need to re-write a story that is strong enough to have survived 3000 years!
Can you imagine if Peter Jackson had taken the same liberties with the Lord of The Rings?
Overall this film left me feeling dissapointed and looking at what might have been ...
I lived in the time of Achilles
Review date: 2007-08-26 Rating: 10 out of 10
This film pretty much follows the story with very few exceptions and possible ending. However the few exceptions and ending is what makes this story work as a movie instead of a long poem. Stories being told may ways five different insights and there should be no conflict between the reader and viewer and both stories are real to the observer.
For you that forgot the story and you that know the story well but have not seen this movie basically we are looking at a story that you may or may not have had an opportunity to sidestep in school but can never have a grasp on social history with out it. Some call it real and lost in antiquity. Others say that homer had a Good imagination. And others treat it as an allegory with a historical background.
Brad Pitt who has played fickle people before is excellent in the part of Achilles and is sort of a heel. Nothing less was expected. It was the other actors that played their parts so well that you forgot you were watching the movie.
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Two Trojan princes are the guests of the Spartan ruler Menelaus (Brendan Gleeson). While Menelaus is preoccupied with other matters he leaves his wife, Helen of Sparta (Diane Kruger), to her own devises. The younger Trojan prince Paris (Orlando Bloom) is left alone to many times with Helen and decides against everyone else's better judgment to make her Helen of Troy and thus pilfers her from Menelaus.
As a husband Menelaus is of course miffed. However his brother the Greek king Agamemnon (Brian Cox) sees this as an opportunity to absorb Troy into his territory. Natural this spawns a war in which Agamemnon recruits Achilles an extremely gifted and charmed warrior. Achilles goes to make a name for him self. He brings his cronies, and his cousin. Together they do many bold and callous things.
I will not go into the details of the war as you either know or will soon know the details. However I will say that I thought that the Trojan horse was well and realistically designed. And you may want to pay attention to the background music as it is relevant to the film.
AN EPIC IN EVERY SENSE OF THE WORD
Review date: 2007-08-08 Rating: 8 out of 10
Troy was the first of the recent epic film wave (I'm not counting The Lord of the Rings) and it is by far the best. Alexander was too flawed, Kingdom of Heaven's protagonist was far too weak and King Arthur was... well King Arthur was just plain crap. Not only is the main protagonist of Troy very strong but the film seems much more polished than any of the two other films and the overall cast is only a few steps short of brilliant. Troy is as most people know based on The Illiad but only very superficially. Some of the characters from the book are used but overall the film is very different from the book and in my opinion it was probably for the better. Don't get me wrong the book is excellent but the God element would make the film way too complicating as the Gods would need to be introduced for it to make sense at all. Also the siege lasts about 10 years in the book but in the film it only lasts a couple of weeks and that was another thing which was probably necessary for dramatic purposes.
The cast is mainly very good. Brad Pitt is brilliant. He really conveyed the energy of the character, Achilles, very well. His sense of timing and overall presence is undeniable. He does an incredible job in the action sequences he is in and brings the menacing nature of Achilles very well to life. However, he also does a good job in the more intimate scenes where he seems to have great chemistry with Rose Byrne who plays Briseis. Eric Bana was the greatest surprise for me as he did an excellent job in bringing Hector to life. Like Brad Pitt he is brilliant both in the action scenes and emotional scenes. He matches the intensity of Pitt and this makes their final confrontation a true climax. Brian Cox and Brendan Gleeson do excellent jobs with their characters as well and especially Cox who acts in a way that makes Agamemnon seem very devious. Two thumbs up. Peter O'Toole is great and does a seemingly impossible feat in stealing a scene from Brad Pitt. Where the casting fails, however is in that of Orlando Bloom and Diane Kruger. Orlando was never a good actor but in Troy he doesn't even look the part like he does in The Lord of the Rings. He spends his time with a pathetic apologetic look on his face. Its pretty much the same with Kruger. Their chemistry is heinous. The worst I have ever seen. There is absolutely no spark whatsoever between them. I've seen better chemistry between two rocks. Aside from the two aforementioned the cast is very good. One last actor worth mentioning is Sean Bean who produces a very likable character in Odysseus.
The action is overall very well done and feels very epic. The combat scenes with Pitt and Bana are very well done and you really get a sense of the different combat styles used. Pitt has a very refined way of fighting. It almost looks like a dance whereas Bana's style seems more like he taught himself and thus looks nowhere near as graceful and this kind of difference in style is very appealing to me. There is another character, Ajax, who is all about brute strength just to name another. There are a few epic battles where the computer effects work great. The effects aren't brilliant like in LotR but they are decent and convincing enough. The true climax, however, is in the final battle between Hector and Achilles which is one of the best choreographed fights I have ever seen. Overall the action is very satisfactory and entertaining. Kudos to the director.
The story is well written and much of the dialog is both very sharp and witty and the complete refrain from contemporary expressions was in my opinion a nice touch. Instead the writers came up with other expressions like: "You sack of wine". which I found was highly entertaining. The story progresses in a satisfactory manner but after the climactic battle between Hector and Achilles the film does lose some steam. Overall I thought it was a good idea to leave out the whole story with the gods and instead focus on reality was a good thing as the including the gods would have made the film too confusing and far too long.
All in all Troy is a very good film and aside from a few glitches in the casting the film is nothing short of excellent and definitely a must-see.
More Entertainment than History
Review date: 2007-06-27 Rating: 6 out of 10
Anyone who is not tired of the two-huge-armies-face-off battles we've been seeing in "The Lord of the Rings" films and now many other films following in that trilogy's footsteps will sure love the battles in "Troy". "Troy" takes it's battle sequences very seriously and while they have an epic grandeur look about them, at the heart of the battle - men are dying, men are killing other men. It's not all about kicking ass in this film. The battle sequences are a little more graphic than you might expect, and they are certainly brutal.
Brad Pitt, looking absolutely incredible here (the months of training sure paid off), shoulders the movie with much confidence and adds layers to his arrogant, self-centred Achilles. It's refreshing that Pitt, though technically the central hero of the piece, plays the character in a less likable way than you might expect. Achilles is unpredictable and dangerous, he was "born to end lives". As the greatest warrior in history, he is most definitely convincing.
Eric Bana and Orlando Bloom play more emotional heroes, and while Bana manages to give Hector an awesome kick-ass edge, strong nobility and adds many dimensions to his heroic part, Bloom doesn't quite handle the job as well and still plays Legolas of Lord of the Rings.
Anyway watch it more for entertainment value than for your history project.
Product Details/Specifications
Actor(s):
Jacob Smith
Julian Glover
Nathan Jones
Adoni Maropis
Brian Cox
Director(s):
Recording label: Warner Home Video
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
EAN: 7321900284110
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 2
Format: Box set, Dubbed, PAL, Special Edition, Widescreen,
Release date: 2004-10-25
Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
Audience rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
Region code: 2
Running time: 156 minutes
Theatrical release date: 2004-05-13
Language: Danish (Subtitled)
Language: English (Subtitled)
Language: Finnish (Subtitled)
Language: German (Subtitled)
Language: Hebrew (Subtitled)
Language: Icelandic (Subtitled)
Language: Norwegian (Subtitled)
Language: Swedish (Subtitled)
Language: English (Original Language)
Language: German (Dubbed)