What was everybody so up in arms about? This movie got trashed by the critics and turned in a disappointing box office performance. Why? Because Brad Pitt is handsome? Well...he is! Brad Pitt may single-handedly be the only reason I would ever consider 'switching sides'. He's gorgeous! Beyond that, he's a good actor. Not a great actor (I don't know who is) but a good one, routinely turning in solid performances in movies that range from o.k. (Ocean's Twelve) to good (Ocean's Eleven) to great (Twelve Monkeys).
Troy has stand-out performances by Eric Bana as Hector, prince of Troy and Brian Cox as Agamemnon, the fierce and hot-tempered ruler of Greece. Orlando Bloom is decent as the rather meak younger brother of Hector who wittingly sets the turn of events in motion by stealing Helen away from Agamemnon. And Brad Pitt as Achilles turns in a nuanced performance as a man at once committed to battle and loyal to no side. And for godsake, he's hot!
The story reminded me of Toshiro Mifune's role in Yojimbo (1961) as the samurai without a master who finds himself working for both sides in a war of rival gangs. That same story was remade by Sergio Leone as A Fistful of Dollars. And a third time as the Bruce Willis gangster flop Last Man Standing. Now, while I don't think any actor alive or dead has near the charisma of Toshiro Mifune, Mr. Pitt is totally believable as a warrior who sums up his life "I was born...and this is who I am." In other words, there was no choosing to be violent soldier. And his drive as a soldier is, above all, to be remembered through history.
The battle scenes are spectacular and the one-on-one fights, in particular between Hector and Achilles, are tense and gripping. And best of all, there are no gods looking down into pools of water high up in the clouds causing this or that to happen. There is a fair amount of discussion about interpreting the signs of the gods and in Hector's case, outright doubt in those interpretations.
My interpretation is that once Ridley Scott's Gladiator appeared, swept the box office and brought home a gazillion oscars, every one speculated and feared the onslaught of swords and sandals epics. By the time Troy appeared with its goddamned beautiful marquis actor, the critics were prepared to pounce and shread like hungry lions in a colloseum. And in the same way that no one cared whether or not the film was any good, those lions didn't care much whether their dinner was Christian or atheist.
I give Wolfgang Peterson's Troy starring hunk-a-licious Brad Pitt five out of six pairs of sandals and a warning to cover up those heals!
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Ironically, I watched this one recently as well, and had a similar reaction as Phil. It's an enjoyable film, whatever its drawbacks. Brad's Achilles is an excellent potrayal (and Phil's comparison to Mifune's samauri is very apt), although I'd say that, for me, Peter O'Toole's Priam is the real reason to watch the movie again. And I will confess that, unless he's playing an elf riding a horse, I don't think much of Orlando Bloom's skills as an actor.
I'd say that for my own taste, the film fell short of being sufficiently Homeric. By this I do not mean that the spectacle was not grand enough (if anything there were too damn many digital warships pasted onto the screen), but rather that too many of the characters were warped to conform to Hollywood norms rather than given their own scope. Achilles, Priam and Agamemnon survived as characters, but few others did. Also, it was annoying to see a war that spanned years depicted as though it happened in the space of a month or so.
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