Flutterby™! : Troy - Illiad - Movie Review - short version 2004-05-17 19:36:55.725069+00

Troy - Illiad - Movie Review - short version

2004-05-17 19:36:55.725069+00 by ziffle 3 comments

Saw Troy - I liked it. At first I had trouble with some of it, but later I fell in love with it. No time to go into depth but, it wouldn't hurt to reread The Illiad first http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~joelja/iliad.html for essential background. I also now am a fan of Brad Pitt- wow what focus. He got Achilles mental state just right! Rambo is nothing compared to Achilles.

They have a lot of gods - its quaint in a way, and refreshing not to listen to the usual BS about God and JC and so forth as they don't come along for another 1200 years. Achilles is not real caring about what the gods think so thats nice too. A free thinker hero!

Recommended, with caution - the script wanders and is a little thin at times. Borrows some action and actors from Brave Heart and LOTR 3 (ugh) and I believe there were 1000 ships and that was not done digitally!

Still - if Hollywood could only write a real heroic script... In some ways the Illiad is better than the movie.

All over a woman - Hector, Priam, Achilles, Agememnon - now those were the days! Attack, kill, fuck, eat and drink. aahhh -

Ziffle

Yes, I liked Troy as well. Yes, they did mess with the story a bit, like putting Achilles in the Horse, and making the war seem like a few weeks long instead of 10 years. But they did get some of the attitudes right, like personal honor as solid a presence as steel, or the thirst for immortality. These were Greek attitudes of the day, and trying to stick in our own attitudes would have just ruined it.

I did get goose bumps when, near the end, Paris gives the Sword of Troy to a young guy named Aeneas, and I realized that the last Chapter of the Illiad was actually the first chapter of the Aeneid. This was a nice classical touch.

If you can find it, do a tape of the Oddessy, the NBC miniseries from a few years ago by the Halmi production group, by far the best American TV producers. It has the attitudes down just right, and has the same half-civilized, Half-savage air as the stories themselves. It is the First Story in our culture, and deserves to be told straight.

What a heel! What you are describing is true hubris and it was considered a character flaw. The basic theme of Greek mythology is that mortals come along who think they are greater than the gods but ALL of them eventually succumb to their mortality and the gods continue... At least until the next paradigm comes along and slays them...

Remember, before Zeus and Athena there were the Titans. The Olympians were morphed into the Roman gods. The Roman gods gave way to Moses and Jesus.

I guess the real lesson is that even the most mythically powerful mortals have a lessor impact than the gods: