When I caught my first glimpse of the trailer of Troy, I knew immediately that I just had to watch it. I was just beginning to re-read the original Iliad for school, and that shot of the camera zooming out and panning around to showcase the thousand ships the Greeks had mustered against Troy set the tone of my expectations for the movie. Apparently, everyone around me had more or less the same expectations, because I was brought along to see it twice: once with my cousins, and the other time with my parents.
I had seen the TV movie version of the Odyssey (the one starring Armand Assante as Odysseus and Isabella Rossellini as Athena) before, and appreciated the fact that it stayed true enough to the original to earn very minimal nitpicks from me. I had the same hopes for Troy. I had hoped that it would stick to what Homer had written, down to the last spear stab and decapitation - well, not really down to that detail, but at least true enough that I didn’t have to go, ’’That didn’t happen!’’ every ten minutes or so.
However, I was sorely disappointed in that matter. This would have been a rather angry review, had it not been for the fact that at the end, they placed the blurb, ’’Inspired by Homer’s Iliad’’ instead of ’’Based on Homer’s Iliad.’’ Had it been the latter then I would have been very, very sore.
Still, that does not stop me from pointing out the many discrepancies that I saw throughout the movie. Since it would be too time-consuming to write of them in paragraphs, I thought that it would be simpler to just list them all out.
These nitpicks are arranged in no particular order:
a. There is no Port of Sparta. Sparta is a landlocked country, famed for its infantry and not its navy. A look at ancient Greek history will prove this.
b. Hector was not present when Paris was at Sparta. In fact, it can be said that Hector never once set foot on Spartan soil.
c. When Odysseus went to talk to Achilles, the latter was not at Pthia - he was at the court of another Greek king where his mother, Thetis (who, by the way, was an immortal Sea-Nymph and not an aging mortal), forced him to dress up like a woman in the hopes that her son would be able to avoid his fate, which was to die before the walls of Troy. The original story about this shows more of Odysseus’ legendary cunning than was shown in the movie.
d. Briseis was not in any way related to Hector and Paris; neither was she a priestess of Apollo. The latter honor went to a woman named Chryseis in the original Iliad.
e. There was no mention made of a Sword of Troy in the Iliad.
f. Menelaus and Agamemnon did not die - at least, not in Troy. Menelaus survived the Trojan War, and went back home with Helen. Agamemnon, on the other hand, survived the Trojan War, but when he got back home to Mycenae he was murdered by his wife.
g. Achilles never stepped walked in Troy - Paris had already killed him before the creation of the Trojan Horse.
h. Paris did not survive the Trojan War - he was shot to death by Philoctetes, who was the best archer of the Greeks.
i. Achilles was never really that in love with Briseis. He never really loved any woman that much, save perhaps Polyxena, princess of Troy, for whom he was willing to end the Trojan War if she married him. Supposedly, when Troy finally fell, his ghost asked for her soul, and she was sacrificed on his tomb.
And yet, in spite of all these discrepancies, the movie was a very enjoyable one. As long as one forgot everything one knew about the original Iliad, it was really a very fun thing to see.
In my opinion, the best characters were Hector (Eric Bana) and Odysseus (Sean Bean). Since I read the Odyssey first, I was a fan of Odysseus from the get-go, but Hector quickly became one of my favorites after I read the Iliad.
When I first found out that Sean Bean had been cast as Odysseus, I had some qualms about him being able to play my favorite character properly. But after watching the movie, I was pretty much satisfied. My only complaint is that Odysseus was such an under-used character - he certainly deserved more screen-time. I would also have appreciated it if they had let more of Odysseus’ cunning show.
Hector’s character in the movie was a bit nobler than how he was portrayed in the original. The movie shows more of the non-warrior side of Hector, portraying him as a dutiful son, a loving husband and father, and a loyal servant of his country. This makes Hector a very sympathetic character - more sympathetic, in fact, than Achilles.
Due to his pretty, almost feminine features, Orlando Bloom made a very appropriate Paris. Standing next to Eric Bana’s Hector, they show a difference that was made very clear in the original: Hector is the warrior, while Paris is only good for seducing women (in fact, Hector makes a statement along that line in the original).
Sadly, Brad Pitt delivered a disappointing performance as Achilles. As the main character of the whole movie, I had expected him to do some pretty good acting. Unfortunately, his performance was as stiff as the shaft of Achilles’ javelin. Instead of me adoring Achilles, I ended up adoring Hector.
As can be expected from a movie as grand and as costly, as this, the special effects were superb. As I mentioned before, that wide shot of the Grecian fleet sailing to Troy was an effective attention-grabber. The battle scenes were also well shot and well executed, so cinematography gets plus points from me. I will say the same for the musical score, which was quite appropriate and unobtrusive during crucial scenes.
Overall, Troy is a good epic movie: grand in scope, and lavish in production. But, as is often the case with movie adaptations based on literary works, leave all you know about the original behind, because you might end up having to nitpick on everything and end up not enjoying it for what it is.