Film

What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases

Get 2 for 1 cinema tickets with Orange Click Here

Search cinema listings

Browse cinemas A-Z

Search 20,000 reviews

 

Troy (2004)

Director: Wolfgang Petersen

Average user rating
1 review

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

As preposterous excuses for calamitous military assaults go, the tangled pretext for the Trojan War might rival those fictitious WMDs. To the consternation of his upstanding brother Hector (Bana), timid trousersnake Paris (Bloom), an androgynous pin-up, smuggles away his sweetheart Helen (Kruger) from her gilded cage in the palace of her much older husband, the Spartan king Menelaos (Gleeson). When the spluttering cuckold swears revenge, his brother, ruthless land-grabber King Agamemnon (Cox, taking fork and well-sharpened knife to a prime-beef role), seizes the opportunity to lay siege to Troy, the last barrier to complete control of the Aegean. To vanquish his enemy, however, Agamemnon requires the fighting prowess of the unreliable and apparently unkillable Achilles (Pitt), a surly surfer type who, in his apolitical stance and stoical longing for death, somewhat recalls Maximus in Ridley Scott's Gladiator. Petersen's own sword and sandals bonanza proceeds by a numbingly reliable tick-tock of expository set pieces alternating with vast CGI-aided battle scenes. Originally set to shoot partly in Morocco, the production moved to the Baja peninsula of Mexico when the Iraq war loomed. Under this shadow, Petersen sensibly veers away from morbid intimacy with war's ravages on the flesh, and instead strains for a Breughelian horror in the D-Day-like assault on the beach and the inferno-lit sack of Troy. In grandiosely illustrating the power-drunk derangement of empire building, and in rendering war as a pointless, brutish, dishonourable wank (not to mention a big sandy bore), Troy is certainly of its horrified moment. JWin.

Author: JWin 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide


  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend
Get 2 for 1 cinema tickets with Orange Click Here

User reviews of this film

  • Andy S said...
    Posted on Jan 22 2009 14:40 Great sword and sandles epic....by no means as good as Gladiator and many will slam the difference between movie and legend, but it is very entertaining. Pitt is actually suprisingly good as Achilles but the real star is Eric Bana as the tough Hector, and his sword fight with Pitt an action movie highlight. Brian Cox is very good as a real evil SOB, and Peter O'Toole's key scene with Pitt beautifully acted. Check out the new director's cut on dvd too, for more violence and flesh!! Great stuff.
    Report as inappropriate

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields





Top Stories

Hippies who work for The Man

Hippies who work for The Man

To celebrate George Clooney comedy 'The Men who Stare at Goats', we look back at six memorable onscreen hippies who fought the system from within

Roland Emmerich's guide to disaster movies

Roland Emmerich's guide to disaster movies

Ahead of the release of '2012', Roland Emmerich offers his ten tips on creating the perfect global catastrophe

Grant Heslov: interview

Grant Heslov: interview

Grant Heslov, director of 'The Men who Stare at Goats' talks about his old pal George Clooney, his interest in the paranormal, and his fond memories of working on 'Happy Days'

The Coen brothers discuss 'A Serious Man'

The Coen brothers discuss 'A Serious Man'

Masters of contrary comedy, Joel and Ethan Coen have struck gold again with their latest, ‘A Serious Man’

Ten inspirations behind 'Avatar'?

Ten inspirations behind 'Avatar'?

Time Out ponders the influences behind James Cameron's anticipated space-opera on the basis of the trailer

Michael Jackson's This Is It: review

Michael Jackson's This Is It: review

Kenny Ortega's posthumous concert film is a rousing eulogy for one of pop's great enigmas

Michael Haneke: The man behind the menace

Michael Haneke: The man behind the menace

From Cannes to Munich to London, Dave Calhoun tours Michael Haneke's Palme d'Or winner, 'The White Ribbon'

Lone Scherfig talks 'An Education'

Lone Scherfig talks 'An Education'

Danish director Lone Scherfig was an unlikely choice for a very English affair like 'An Education'. Cath Clarke meets her

How Jane Campion brought John Keats back to life

How Jane Campion brought John Keats back to life

Time Out gets Romantic with the ‘difficult’ New Zealander about her new film, 'Bright Star'

Time Out's 50 greatest animated films with commentary by Terry Gilliam

Time Out's 50 greatest animated films with commentary by Terry Gilliam

In celebration of the release of Pixar's 'Up' and Wes Anderson's 'Fantastic Mr Fox', read our rundown of fifty classic feature length animations