Alexander (2004)

Oliver Stone must have been stoned during the shooting of the film. In fact, I believe that everybody involved with this production was stoned. Poor and stupid script, story, acting, directing, etc... Hollywood is known for misunderstanding and misrepresenting historical events, people, etc...or in short screwing up history but this is the ultimate screw up.

As a historian, I believe that Alexander III of Macedonia (whom we know as Alexander the Great) was so essential for the course of human history that he achieved, by his own merit, a permanent place in the list of ten or fifteen most decisive personalities always. A very exclusive list of personalities who, for good or bad reasons, have forever changed our world's history. Personalities like Jesus Christ, Julius Caesar, Gengis Khan, Albert Einstein, Adolf Hitler, Cleopatra, Shakespeare, Christopher Columbus, Vasco da Gama, Galileo Galilei, Darwin, Napoleon, George Washington or Picasso... heroes or villains in an always subjective list, but it's impossible to think what the world would look like without them, isn't it? So it is with Alexander. But I'm not here to talk about this historical personality, just the movie. An intense epic that seeks to be faithful to the known facts of the life of this conquering, narcissistic, megalomaniac, homosexual and deeply complex king. This story begins at the Battle of Gaugamela (331 BC) and follows, recounting childhood, youth and ascension to the throne through flashbacks.Overall, I found the film interesting and enjoyable, even though it wasn't good. The script is historically accurate, at least in general. Of course there are exaggerated or buzzing scenes for dramatic purposes. The problem is that, even so, its a vague script and doesn't justify three and a half hours lenght. It would have been better if the post-production and editing work had cut about forty-five minutes. Another problem I felt was excessive grandeur. I know it's an epic movie, but it's possible to be epic without being presumptuous and this movie was a show of self-importance. This can be seen in the actors' theatrical and affected manners, a bunch of peacocks displaying their feathers all the time. This heroic spirit impregnated also Vangelis soundtrack, probably one of the worst he already made. I still felt difficulties with all those flashbacks. A narrative so loaded with advances and retreats seems more like a tango. They are useful, no one doubts, but sometimes it took a long time for me to realize that I was watching a flashback, and it makes everything more tiresome and confusing.The film is loaded with great actors but none of them shone for lack of a competent script and director. Colin Farrell was boringly heroic and should have kept his hair dark because the real Alexander would NEVER have been blonde. The way this actor behaved was erratic and dialogues were theatrical and full of pompous sentences. Angelina Jolie is a casting error, she was too young for the character and seemed constantly younger than her own son. Val Kilmer was OK as Phillip, with a generous dose of make-up for making him older and scarred. Anthony Hopkins and Christopher Plummer were both well, but there wasn't much for them here. Jared Leto was terribly bad, and his effeminate character was already boring enough. Rosario Dawson, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, John Kavanagh and other actors were OK as supporting but had no individual brilliance.On a technical level, the film is flawless. CGI is excellent and gives us some truly beautiful scenes, such Babylon or several battle scenes. Battles are spectacular and full of action, steroids, adrenaline and epic spirit. Cinematography is loaded with warm, intense yellow and red colors, and this sometimes tires our eyes a little, but it's beautiful. Costumes are very detailed and well made. Oliver Stone worked hard on these points and succeeded, but it was the bad script, the actors wooden performances, the erratic narrative and an unpleasant presumption that defeated this film.

Alexander truly was great, and this movie truly was horrible. It had a few moments that were bearable. When Alexander was preparing for the great battle with Darius, and his eagle was flying above, and he addressed his troops similar to how Mel Gibson did, as in Braveheart, it was hard not to be interested in the outcome, and the size of the spectacle to come.If the rest of the movie had 1/10th as much going on for it, it may have been a success. But it wasn't to be. Instead Mr. Stone opted to go the route of vices, and emotion. He just couldn't 'imply' that the great Alexander was a homosexual, he had to explicitly 'show him' making out with his extremely gay boy lover that he plucked from his Harem in Babylon on more than one occasion. Of course, if you were to believe all what you see, the entire Macedonian empire were bisexual rapists. Even if that were partially true, I think Alexander and his crew deserved the focus of his conquests be remembered and observed on what really mattered, and not to smother it with Stone reality. Oliver Stone can't see past his nose, and he just had to make this potential history lesson, and possibly great movie, with his usual drenching of overdoing everything, and focusing on his own miserable obsessions of humanity. His Alexander was a mama's boy, a cry baby, and had a 'serious daddy issue' as well. Perhaps Stone was writing about himself, because it's certainly not the Alexander the Great I read about in school.The story of Alexander...the true story...we will never know, because the facts written by those closest to him were destroyed in the great fire of Alexandra. So, we are left with today's historian's best guesses, and Oliver Stones worst movie EVER.If you MUST watch it, have a good stiff drink handy, or a bottle of Valium. Even then, I'm betting you turn it off before it's over. I tried to watch the Blu-ray on my giant HD screen, 4 times, before I actually got through it. Some of the worst directing in cinema history, and some great performances ruined because of it. If I could have rated it here 'below' a 1, I would have.

I like epic movies especially when it involves history and human greatness. You have a topic here that qualifies however if one is to believe the movie, the subject matter namely Alexander was deeply flawed. The dysfunctions that he suffered from actually supplied the power and drive to do what he did i.e. to conquer and take over that which had never been done before just because he could. having cruel parents who specialize in crazy-making allowed his inner demons to flourish. The movie shows that after a conquest, he liked to return the situation to a status quo and one wonders why he bothered to in the first place. He lived a life of excess, irresponsibility, absolute power, sex-centered, alcoholic fueled daily existence that in the end contributed to his self-destruction. He set himself up to die so to speak. Why? He had no depth, meaning or purpose. Just an empty drive to succeed. He surrounded himself with people that supported his vanity and ego-centric comings and goings. He was not rare in that respect for history shows that all great men have peculiarities. The movie delivers these observations and more. The director comes from abundance when putting a story together which I consider a good thing. The actors each had good screen time to pitch their trade and did well. One thing though. I always notice that in certain movies like Braveheart, Return of the King, The 300, Troy and this one, the leader gives a speech to thousands of men and they cheer him on but for the life of me, how can they all hear what he saying? Only those within earshot get it which means about 100 at the most. Do the rest just do a "wave" and go along with the front group? I also had trouble with Alexander not taking the time to have many sons of which he had access to do. Again, this contributes to a self-sabotage theme for this conqueror. Oliver Stone did different versions of this movie and it gets confusing keeping track of it all. Was I glad I watched it? Sure. However, it is not something one wants to see again for it lacks the must see again scenes and has a lot of don't want to see scenes again in it as well. Enjoy with some favorite snack for after all it is epic movie time!