Troy

I have to admit that while I was watching this film, I thought this was the Oliver Stone ancient-times epic film. It wasn't until the end credits rolled that I realized my mistake! This is the Wolfgang Petersen ancient-times epic. Had I known this ahead of time I may not have watched it.... having been left unsatisfied by his last few films. But this one makes up for my past disappointment. This is not a masterpiece but it has some very interesting in moments and works well as a soap opera with helmets and swords. It has a great performance by the wonderful Brian Cox as the consolidator Agamemnon. Sean Bean, Eric Bana, Peter O'Toole, Rose Byrne, Orlando Bloom and Brendan Gleeson are all great. Oh yea and Brad Pitt is beautiful. It's odd watching him try to hold his own with all these major leaguers but he stays cute as he pouts and puckers. The vistas and battle scenes work very well especially the fight sequence between Bana and Pitt. It's worth watching in slo-mo. I also enjoyed the back and forth various dialogues about issues of war, the role of soldiers and the justification of killing to consolidate power etc. It was semi-sophmoric but refreshing considering we are in a war and no seems to have these discussions except in the movies.
Memorable moment: Hector and Achilles battle to the death.