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Troy (2004)

Director: Wolfgang Petersen
Cast: Brad Pitt, Eric Bana, Orlando Bloom
Genre: Action Historical Literary Fiction

'An adaptation of Homer's great epic, the film follows the assault on Troy by the united Greek forces and chronicles the fates of the men involved.'

Overall Troy is a good telling of the Trojan war. Yes, there are major differences between Homer's Iliad and the movie, but both are fictional retelling of events that happened in the very distant past. So enjoy the film for what it is and without looking for historical inaccuracies.

At 2 hours 42 minutes it's long!..and there was a few superfluous scenes that could have been cut to move the pace along. There's also a director's cut at 3 hours 16 minutes.

Brad Pitt did a fine job as Achilles the Greek hero. He's quiet and subdued, yet strong willed, which works well as Achilles. Brian Cox as the Greek King Agamemnon, was at times over the top and quite silly. He needed to town down his performances. Especially in the all important establishing scene where Agamemnon is introduced on the battlefield, he seems almost a caricature.

The exterior shots at the beginning of the film was overexposed. Maybe the director wanted to impart a sense of heat and sunlight? But as neither was mentioned or shown, the overexposure looked bad as it was washed out.

On a BIG plus side...I was impresses that the point of view, was told mainly from the Trojans who you would expect to be portrayed as the bad guys. Also it was a good call not to make Pitt's character the 'hero'. Sure he's a great fighter, but his character isn't admirable, at least in the beginning of the film. Instead it's his revival, the Prince of Troy, Hector who is shown as the 'good guy'.

I have to say the sets for Troy with there massive walls was impressive! And from what I read they were not CG, but actually constructed sets, very cool indeed. The interior palace of Troy was interesting too, so kudos to the art director for a stylish set.

Sometimes these sword and sandal movies are a hit or a miss. Troy is a hit.