Troy: the Director’s Cut (2007)

Originally released in 2004, Troy (directed by Wolfgang Petersen) was one of a handful of sword and sandal epics that followed in the wake of Ridley Scott’s monstrously successful Gladiator (2000).  Unfortunately the law of diminishing returns decreed that these films were distinctly below par: both Troy and Kingdom Of Heaven (2005) (Scott again) were messily put together and somewhat lacking, whilst Oliver Stone’s Alexander (2004) was just plain bad -  although it did start a chain of revision which would see each of these films receive the ‘director’s cut’ treatment and, in the case of Kingdom of Heaven and Troy, (Alexander remained a mess and Gladiator just got baggier) some deserved reappraisal…

Although Troy: The Director’s Cut does not quite match up to the ‘Extended Director’s Cut’ (I’m not sure what the difference is either) of Kingdom of Heaven, a film now superior to Gladiator, it is a definite improvement over the theatrical version with the extra thirty minutes allowing the events and numerous characters room to breath.  The Illiad is, after all, a big book and, much to their credit, Petersen and writer David Benioff have crammed plenty in (plenty is still missing and changes have been made but the basics are there).  In addition the battles have also been stretched out and there appears to be much more blood than I remember.

Whilst  Troy can no longer be classed as a disappointment, the longer cut  pinpoints the film’s central problem; the characters.  Throughout the whole film there are very few decent people; Achilles (a perfectly cast Brad Pitt) is the rock star of the Greek army, and a selfish, petulent bag of arrogance, Paris (Orlando Bloom) is a self-regarding, self-serving coward and anyone over the age of thirty-five is either an arch manipulator or ineffective.  This might be an accurate reflection of the way these people are portrayed in the source material but without the presence/machinations of the Gods (they are prayed to but never put in an appearance) and the accompanying ideas about fate and so on most of the main cast are simply unsympathetic.  Of course there are a couple of good eggs – both Hector (Eric Bana) and Odysseus (Sean Bean) are good men, unfortunately the former is treated horrendously whilst the later is sidelined thoughout most of the film.  Had the story been told through the eyes of these men then Troy might just have been a great film, but Petersen has secured the services of Pitt and so he is placed front and centre (to use another Pitt film as an example imagine Fight Club (1999) with Tyler Durden at the centre instead of ‘Jack’ – it just doesn’t quite work).

In all, Troy: The Director’s Cut is a decent enough if unfocused film.  It takes you through the seige of Troy with plenty of action and pretty much nails the characters.  It could still be better but it was once a lot worse and is definitely worth revisiting.

Troy: The Director’s Cut is availiable on DVD, as is the theatrical version.

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