Sing, Muse, of the collector’s edition for a film that launched a thousand ships.
Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey may have already become a definitive cinematic epic, but it wasn’t the first stab at putting Homer on the big screen with the full 21st century blockbuster treatment. In 2004, Wolfgang Petersen (Das Boot, The Neverending Story, Air Force One) released a take on The Iliad that set out to retell the story of the Trojan War for the Gladiator crowd with a production as massive in scope as its story.
The 1990s saw the return of the “sword and horse” adventure with films like Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and The Mask of Zorro revitalizing swashbuckling sensibilities and Braveheart reinventing the historical epic for a new generation. In the wake of Gladiator‘s box office and Oscar gold, several other projects jumped on the genre bandwagon hoping to find similar success. Troy was initially developed for Warner Bros. by Wolfgang Petersen, but briefly landed at Christopher Nolan’s doorstep when Petersen started work on the ill-fated Batman vs. Superman project of that decade. When that fell apart, Petersen returned to Troy, Nolan went off to make Batman Begins, and the rest is history.
Petersen has talked extensively about his passion for Homer’s epic poetry dating back to his days studying it in school. The idea behind the film was to take the story of the fall of Troy and remove the fantastical mythology from the tale to refocus it as a narrative of the destruction wrought by superstitious and power-hungry men. While losing out on the golden apple, the trial of the “most beautiful,” and the actions of the gods directly influencing the story may have seemed anathema to Terry Gilliam when he was offered the project, Petersen and writer David Benioff (yes, of Game of Thrones) focus the moving of nations by the levers of political ambition and personal folly.
When Helen, Queen of Sparta (Diane Kruger) runs off with Prince Paris of Troy (Orlando Bloom), King Menelaus (Brendan Gleeson) abandons his plans for a peace treaty with Troy in favor of all-out war to reclaim his wife. This is great news for his brother, King Agamemnon (Brian Cox), who’s been bringing all of Greece under his banner and would love nothing more than to break Troy’s hold over the Aegean Sea.
The film boasts an all-star cast worthy of the company of heroes who follow Agamemnon, from Brad Pitt’s Adonis-like appearance as the undefeated warlord Achilles to Sean Bean’s wily King Odysseus. However, the film places many of its sympathies with the Trojans, led by King Priam (Peter O’Toole) and his son Hector (Eric Bana), really leaning into the tragedy of the story as a disaster that could have been averted at several points if only cooler or kinder heads had prevailed.
Troy boasts an incredible production of thousands of performers in costumes on giant sets (they built the wall and gates of Troy in Mexico and the streets of the city in Malta), with two real ships constructed as references for the fleet of the thousand launched in pursuit of Helen. However, the changes to Homer’s story were a big point of criticism on the film’s original release, as was the somewhat rushed nature of the story. As fans of this year’s Homeric epic will know, the siege of Troy lasted about ten years, but Troy condenses events into only a few weeks.
The theatrical cut of the film is also fairly breathless, offering plenty of spectacle that combines large companies of extras in costume enhanced by digital VFX to create the armies of tens of thousands. However, many character-focused scenes feel somewhat rushed or perfunctory, moving necessary pieces between set pieces but rarely painting the cast with more than a broad stroke. This was something Petersen decided to directly address with his Director’s Cut that WB bankrolled in 2007. Along with changes to James Horner’s musical score, this version of the film adds more than 30 minutes of previously cut material – primarily to do with more natural transitions and motivational character beats, several extensions of existing scenes, more nudity/sexuality and violence, and especially expanding on the horrors of the fall of Troy.
In addition to fleshing out the central love story that precipitates the events of the film, one of the major additions has to do with the continued strategic and ideological clash between the devout but pragmatic Hector and Troy’s high priest Archeptolemus (Nigel Terry). This version also digs into the reasons behind why Priam is so devoted to following perceived omens from the gods over his own son’s advice, while other expansions give a fuller view of Menelaus’s indifference to his wife, an alternate introduction to Odysseus (the more Sean Bean the better), and countless other touches that subtly tweak the pacing of the film.
This doesn’t stop the dialogue from sounded somewhat stilted or overly declarative at times, but it makes subplots like the romance between Achilles and the priestess Briseis (Rose Byrne) flow a bit more naturally. And while the additional violence might initially seem exploitative, it ends up being part of the film’s final thesis on the Trojan War itself.
In the context of Homer’s poem, the fall of Troy is a tragedy, but one in the context of the great deeds of mythic heroes. However, the way Petersen shoots the sacking of Troy like a Ken Russell horror sequence or Paul Verhoven’s Flesh + Blood makes it explicitly a monstrous war crime two decades before Nolan had a similar take on the material. The film portrays Paris as a naive and somewhat thoughtless boy who thinks he’s in a romantic fable at the opening of the movie, only to be proven completely incapable of embodying the mythic hero role to which he aspires when Menelaus beats him like a dusty rug in their duel. While Bloom reportedly didn’t like playing a more sniveling and hapless version of the younger prince of Troy, he’s quite effective at portraying a formerly pampered puppy dog newly discovering that his actions have consequences as he experiences the true horror and folly of war.
His dynamic with his older brother is mirrored by the relationship between Achilles and his cousin Patroclus (yeah, “cousin,” the Homer fans loved that). Achilles tries to dissuade the young Myrmidon from being so eager to throw himself into battle, and seems to regard his own fighting skill as a curse as much as a blessing. Pitt’s Achilles is beautiful to behold but terrifying to watch in action, cleaving through men like a hot knife through butter and only able to communicate with a handful of respected peers without resorting to the sword. While Pitt’s accent tends to wander throughout the film, he throws himself bodily into proceedings to capture both the physical and emotional intensity of the character – especially when matched by another cast member in his weight class. The scene Achilles shares with O’Tool’s King Priam is a particular highlight for both actors, and handily the best bit of the film.
Petersen is no stranger to big movies, but Troy was a step up even from his previous superstar vehicles like The Perfect Storm, and he had expressed hesitation at the sheer scale of the project. However, he proves especially capable in balancing impossibly large battle sequences in a variety of configurations with one-on-one duels between these larger-than-life characters. Where it would be easy to loose individuals in the chaos of set pieces this large, the combination of clever camera work and a focus on the battlefield position and body language of the central characters immediately differentiates them from the throng. It also helps that the movie deliberately focuses on the actors faces as they’re doing their own fighting.
Eric Bana’s Hector emerges early as the film’s moral compass, caught between his love for his family and devotion to his country and his inability to protect either from their own foolhardy actions in spite of his near-peerless skill. Hector is a warrior who’s earned his survival with every scar on his body, and the film takes time at multiple points to show his form contrasted with Achilles’ unmarked flesh to accent the difference between his hard-won survival and the other’s godlike abilities. Bana also displays impressive physicality during the film’s action scenes, his siege-hardened planted feet at odds with Achilles’ aerial attacks. The blissful domesticity of the scenes he shares with his family make Achilles’ tent seem that much more empty, even when Briseis is being held prisoner within, and the film really feels his absence once Hector exits the story.
The movie is overall fairly adept at juggling its mammoth cast of shifting motivations, allegiances, and personal entanglements, though a few characters are left wanting. Briseis gets fairly little to do other than challenge Achilles verbally until the final reel, and Saffron Burrows’ Andromache is mostly saddled with looking worried and not much else. However, the overall solid command of a large ensemble of Proper Nouns and bloody clashes certainly feels familiar to anyone who’s watched Benioff’s high profile TV work. Brian Cox’s Agamemnon in particular feels like a real Game of Thrones-ass villain, and I mean that as a compliment both to how the film utilizes him and how Cox relishes sinking his teeth into the scenery.
Troy isn’t as wholly successful as its most obvious inspirations (and coming right on the heels of the very fantasy-forward Lord of the Rings films likely made its insistence on an “historical” version of myth seem a bit silly), nor is the Director’s Cut the transformational masterpiece that Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven was from around the same time. However, the film’s emotional and visual highs, along with its commitment to recapturing the scope of golden age Hollywood’s biggest stories with the assistance of modern techniques makes the majority of it hold up surprisingly well more than 20 years later. And the way it recontextualizes a heroic ballad as a brutal war crime makes it a fascinating companion to the newer more “faithful” adaptation of its sequel text.
Presentation:
This is the first time Troy has been available in 4K UHD, with both the Theatrical and Director’s Cut restored from either scans of the 35mm negative or a 2K DI for sequences unique to the Director’s Cut.
Needless to say, this is the best the film has ever looked. The original Blu-ray release was no slouch, but the detail on the 4K disc, along with the sharper colors (especially the oranges, yellows, and reds) is impressive even in comparison. Both cuts of the film are presented in HDR10 and Dolby Vision in the film’s 2:39:1 “scope” aspect ratio, and this release is reference-quality video on both the 4K and even an improvement on the original visuals on the Blu-ray disc.
It feels both reductive and tired to say that movies “don’t look like this anymore,” but they really don’t.
Troy is presented in both DTS HD 5.1 surround sound and DTS Master Audio 2.0. The mix is clear and appropriately forceful, especially during the busy action sequences, but never loses clarity for dialogue or voice-over.
Petersen mentions putting a lot of work into the audio of the film, and the Director’s Cut in particular features differences in the music from Horner’s full theatrical score. There are pieces that feel like midi temp tracks, and some of Elfman’s score for 2001’s Planet of the Apes is used over the duel between Hector and Achilles.
The set also includes optional English subtitles for the Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing.
Bonus Content:
This limited edition set comes with a case, reversible slip cover, booklet of information on and essays about the film, and 3 discs.
Disc 1 (4K UHD): Theatrical Cut
Theatrical Cut of the film (4K HDR – 163 minutes)
Disc 2 (4K UHD): Director’s Cut
Director’s Cut of the film (4K HDR – 196 minutes)
- Archival Introduction by Director Wolfgang Petersen
For the Director’s Cut disc, this set includes a 2:31 introduction by Petersen describing his goals for the expanded cut of the movie and reflections on making the movie.
Disc 3 (Blu-ray): Special Features
- In Movie Experience (Picture-in-picture commentary on the theatrical cut of the film featuring the director, cast, and crew – HD 162:49)
- Troy In Focus – multipart archival making-of featurette (SD 23:08)
- In the Thick of Battle – archival featurette on the film’s action set pieces (SD 17:14)
- From Ruins to Reality – archival featurette on the film’s production design (SD 14:02)
- Troy: An Effects Odyssey – archival featurette on the film’s visual effects (SD 10:54)
- Attacking Troy – archival featurette on the way the film adapts Homer (SD 15:12)
- Gallery of the Gods – archival featurette on the Greek gods and goddesses (SD 10:49)
- Theatrical Trailer (2:08)
- Image Galleries (Original Production stills, behind the scenes, and supplementary promotional materials)
All the special features are ported over from previous releases and – aside from the “In Movie Experience” – are all in standard definition. However, it came from the golden age of DVD extras, so while the presentation feels very of its time, it’s still fairly comprehensive.
There’s also something precious about getting these materials to revisit now that screen legends like Petersen and O’Toole are no longer with us.
Troy is now available on Limited Edition 4K UHD and HD Blu-ray from Arrow Video.
