Troy is a bit of an odd movie for me. There are parts of it
I love – quite a few parts actually. Yet as an overall package, I find the
whole film to be extremely shit. Troy is actually one of the most extreme
examples of this that I can think of. I might like one or two one liners or a
single scene from other terrible movies, but generally they’re not enough to
get me to watch that movie again unless I’m deliberately inflicting it on
someone else. Troy however is a movie I’ll happily keep watching, even though I
think the movie is, overall, garbage. So, I want to go over it and see if I can
coherently explain why.
Firstly, let’s get the basic plot out of the way. Helen and
Paris really love each other and elope…wait hold up. The fuck is this? Ok,
let’s start again. Eris decided to fuck with the gods because Zeus didn’t
invite her to a wedding banquet…and nope. Apparently not. Hector and Paris went
to Sparta to sign a peace treaty with Menelaus, and Paris nicked off with Helen
all sneaky like. Huh.
So, the plot’s changed a little bit. And by a little bit, I
mean that the Gods have been completely removed from the film. They’re pretty
much only referenced by Trojans played up for laughs as senile old men
throughout the entire film. This decision essentially leads to every single
thing I hate about this film. Well, that and the, for lack of a better term,
“westernization” of other plot elements. Still, the bare bones of the plot –
Greeks attack Troy, everyone dies, goes down roughly the same, just condensed from
10 years and all sorts of madness into about a week focused on Achilles. We
should all know the basics, so I’m going to move straight into picking apart
the good and the bad without doing a full plot recap.
Let’s get the ugly out of the way first. Removing the
involvement of the Gods from the whole plot not only necessitates making half
the cast idiots, it also means several of them have to become cackling bad
guys. Agamemnon and Menelaus in particular cop the brunt of this – Agamemnon,
played by Brian “why do my amnesiac black ops projects keep killing me?” Cox,
becomes a completely standard fantasy warlord, complete with total lack of
honour and absolute sliminess in attitude. Menelaus, played by the still
entertaining Brendan Gleeson, becomes a lecherous, abusive husband of the type
who wouldn’t look out of place in a modern redneck bar. The film sets out to
make these two the villains of the piece, even though Achilles is pitched as
the hero (who does nothing to actually stop the war, which would be the way to
go with this setup regardless of how off base it is).
It also makes the elopement of Paris and Helen monumentally
stupid. In legend, whilst accounts vary on just how willing Helen was to leave,
she never had a choice. Aphrodite promised her to Paris in return for naming
Aphrodite the most beautiful of the Goddesses. And we all know what happens to
Greeks who brazenly defy the gods. That whole mess with the golden apple led to
Greeks and Trojans becoming little more than pawns in a gigantic ego trip
battle for the gods, which is part of what makes the whole thing so tragic. A
great nation ruined, and countless good people slaughtered all to satisfy the
ego of bored gods. The utter futility of it all is what the story hangs off. In
Troy, the same ruination happens, but all because Paris couldn’t keep his dick
in check. Hector threatens in an early scene to tear Paris’ face off if he does
anything that could threaten their people – it’s a bluff (Hectors love for his
brother and the way Eric Bana plays it is something I’ll come back to later),
but frankly, Hector really should have followed through with that here.
The movie does take pains early on to paint Menelaus as a
lecherous prick, but spiriting away the poor wife only really works morally if
the story is about helping her escape and then actually dealing with the
consequences. Aside from his one attempt at a duel (covered later), Paris was
happy to sit back and let his countrymen and his brother die to protect his
latest romantic conquest. And the maddening part is, even if Menelaus wasn’t
portrayed the way he is, Paris still comes off as the kind of guy who would
have tried to steal Helen anyway.
The lack of divine involvement also hits home in the Trojan
camp – Priam is shown to be extremely devout, and frequently takes the advice
of the High Priest of Apollo over that of anyone else, including Hector. Sure,
Hector wins the early battles but that’s because he and the Trojan army are
awesome and disciplined. Not because the gods got involved. Yet Priam
constantly defers to the guy talking about bird omens on matters of strategy,
which has the unfortunate effect of making him look like a senile old man
instead of an old but still switched on ruler. Which is sad, because in the
moments when they let him not be senile, Peter O’Toole is amazing. The scene
where he pleads with Achilles for the return of his son’s body without ever
actually saying please is, in particular, amazing. Yet he spends most of his
time being wasted as a doddering old man. Again, in a story where the gods are
actively getting involved it could have been better, but here it just falls
apart.
Those are the major offences removing the Gods from the
story caused. I could pick apart all of the problems but I think I could write
a book about that. So now I’m going to pick on the Americanization of the
story. Basically, this means two things. First, we have to have clear good and
bad guys. The Greeks end up filling both these sides while the Trojans exist to
be killed. With the gods gone from the equation it’s less of a web of alliances
being toyed with by divine tools and more Brian Cox wants to rule the world. Meanwhile
Hector’s over with the Trojans actually being a reasonably complex character
and one of the few decent people in the film…but because we’re going to adhere
to the basic plot despite mangling the meat of it so much, Hector and his
people are both doomed. But the primary romance subplot is over in Troy as
well, even though they’re all doomed. So Achilles gets to have a romantic subplot…
With Briseis, a priestess of Apollo played by Rose Byrne,
who really should have fled this movie screaming. Seriously, in a movie full of
baffling writing decisions her character got the real short end of an already
mangled stick. She gets captured early on by Achilles and eventually falls in
love with him. Over the course of 48 hours, and near as I can tell it’s
entirely because he didn’t rape her on sight like the rest of the Greeks were
going to. It’s incredibly fucked up – especially since the big “now kiss!”
moment comes as she’s pondering slitting Achilles’ throat while he sleeps. That
right there would have saved the Trojans. Instead, she fell on Achilles sword
with very little hesitation. It’s infuriatingly stupid, but we have to have
love interests for our heroes and since male heroes aren’t allowed to be
bisexual (Patroclus is Achilles cousin in this film btw), here we are. What the
hell.
I realise I’m jumping about here but the writing in this
movie is painfully stupid. Let’s move on to what I do like – the majority of
the acting and the fight choreography.
Now, it’s rare for me to find a movie where I hate the
writing but love the acting. I tend to find that the two either work together
or not at all. But despite the writers, the majority of the cast still managed
to impress me greatly. Eric Bana and Brad Pitt in particular I feel were
brilliant. Hector was sold really well as a noble, great but ultimately doomed
soldier. Achilles meanwhile was a cynical, petty, extremely talented
psychopath. The contrast between the two is great, and both actors really make
it work for them. Orlando Bloom was actually an appropriately wimpy Paris,
which was interesting to see. Peter O’Toole has already been mentioned, Brian
Cox and Brendan Gleeson are always amusing even if they’re playing mangled
characters, this movie taught me that Saffron Burrows can actually act*, and we
had Sean Bean as Odysseus, which was amazing.
*At the time the only movies I’d seen her in were Deep Blue
Sea and Wing Commander…
Coming to the fights now – aside from this strange signature
jump attack Achilles had, the majority of the choreography was pretty good. The
army fights felt appropriately nasty and close, the duels were well shot and
served to highlight actual character traits (more in a tick), and everything
just felt nicely brutal. The actors did a lot of training for their fights, and
it shows. Plus, the two significant duels of the film helped sell the characters
involved in ways that I hadn’t really felt since Empire Strikes Back/Return of
the Jedi (when I first saw Troy that
is).
Speaking of, let’s cover them now. Firstly, Paris and
Menelaus. In both the old tale and the movie, Paris has a moment of manning up
and decides he’ll challenge Menelaus to a duel over Helen. In both versions
this does not end well for him. In the books, Menelaus wounds him then
Aphrodite teleports Paris away. In the movie, Menelaus wounds Paris, who goes
crawling back to Hector for protection. Hector then kills Menelaus when he
tries to finish Paris off. Two big things stand out – firstly, as mentioned,
the choreography. This fight is a complete beatdown. Paris had no business challenging
an actual warrior to a fight, and from the moment he steps out onto the field
he knows it. Once the fight starts his head is down, he’s really tucked into
his shield and he’s not moving except when he’s pushed. Meanwhile Menelaus is
laughing like he’s beating down some random mook the whole time. Even tosses
away his own shield just to show off. There’s a great moment where the camera
switches to a point of view for Paris – between his helmet and his own posture,
literally the only thing he can see is a raging Brendan Gleeson trying to
murder him. That’s his whole world. Given Paris was never a fighter, it’s no
wonder he legged it as soon as he got hurt.
Secondly, the end of the fight – Paris has crawled back to
Hector and has grabbed a hold of his leg. Paris is so scared at this point he
can’t talk – all he can do is shake his head and not move. Orlando Bloom really
sold that fear, which is pretty impressive given he was just coming off stints
as Legolas. Menelaus is in a rage, demanding Hector move aside and allow him to
finish the duel. Paris refuses to stand, and Hector gets this pained look on
his face that extends into his voice as he simply says “He’s my brother”. This
moment, and Hector’s own fight with Achilles almost perfectly evoke to me to
the core concept of a Greek tragedy – you know exactly how the next part is
going to play out, and know with absolute certainty that no one involved is
going to back down now. It’s brilliant.
And that can be a nice segue into the main event for the
film, Achilles fighting Hector. Bana and Pitt reportedly worked their arses off
training for this film, and it shows. This fight is one of my favourite
cinematic duels. And for all the skill of both the actors and characters
involved, it’s still as one sided as the Paris/Menelaus fight. Achilles is that
much of a beast that even Hector has zero chance fighting him – he just lasts
longer. All Hector does is put a scratch on Achilles’ chest plate. At that
point, Pitt gets this brief look on his face that switches from mild amusement
to “that’s as far as you go” and from there Hector gets beaten down and killed.
It demonstrates that for all of his many character flaws, Achilles really is as
talented as he thinks he is. And it helps highlight Hector’s own inability to
back down from any threat to his people – at no point in the duel does Hector
ever try to flee or back down like his brother did. Of course, Paris survived
the film, so take from that what you will.
I might end it there. People probably have filled books trying
to analyse Troy completely, and I could probably keep going for ages just
ranting. For me it’s my go-to example of a shit movie still having really good
performances and moments – they don’t save the overall package but they’re
still memorable. At the end of the day though, I say this movies worst crime is
making the idea of a Greek myth movie so toxic in the short term that we never
got Sean Bean’s Odyssey.
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