Sporadic Ramblings

What a mess. An expensive mess. The good parts:

• The re-envisioning of the ancient world. I have no idea how historically accurate the portrayals of people and buildings were; I suspect the palaces were far less sumptuous, the people far less clean, the teeth far less straight and white, but darn it, this is a movie, and the vision of Babylon's roof-top gardens, busy streets, and elaborate palace was breathtaking. If I'm watching a dramatic movie about the ancient world, I'm OK with it being grander than life, in much the same way that I'm OK with Shakespeare's re-envisioning of Julius Caesar, where everyone speaks with deep meaning in wry verse.
• The battle scenes, particularly the first sequence; in that one, you could get a sense of numbers and layouts and even follow the strategy to some extent, although it wasn't clear exactly how Alexander could get back through all those guys to the opposing leader. Also, the use of elephants in battles was strikingly portrayed; I admit to often having wondered how effective an elephant could be. I've been snowed by elephants in the wild, in zoos, and in circuses, and neglected to imagine how elephants trained and bred for war might act. The scene toward the end where a charging horse is multiply skewered was amazing; I'm sure it was all computers, but it was visceral, dramatic, and unlike anything I've seen.
• The credits - visually neat-o, especially with the Greek renderings of the actors' names.
  

The rest of it was pretty much a failure. It often wasn't clear what was happening or why, or how much time was passing, or what the importance of the various battles was, or even what the characters wanted, although they sure yelled at each other a lot. The acting was very overwrought; lots of eyebrow-based emoting as in Camelot or JAG. The accents were horrible - I'm not sure where Angelina Jolie was supposed to be from, but it must be somewhere between Moscow and Transylvania, and I'm pretty sure the real Alexander wasn't from Ireland, but you wouldn't know it from this. The accents of the other folks were all over the map, too, and it wasn't the Mediterranean map. I don't need them all to speak in accents, but if they do, they shouldn't be different nationalities from the characters. Sometimes it seemed like Alexander was channeling the Lucky Charms leprechaun.

Speaking of language, another thing bugged me, which was the use of English in maps and written materials shown in the movie. Obviously the characters have to speak English, or the movie becomes a stupid subtitled exercise. But having the wall mosaics and tax documents in English was jarring and lame. Putting them in an Greeky-looking font doesn't cut it.

The portrayal of homosexuality was a puzzle for me. I'm a passionate supporter of gay rights, including marriage. I like seeing shows that portray realistic-seeming gay people in realistic-seeming relationships (e.g. Six Feet Under, not Will and Grace or The Birdcage). I wasn't sure really what they were after in this movie - showing a culture where homosexuality was accepted, or trying to be risque and titillating about gay sex. I have to think that in a culture where male homosexuality was common and approved, the gay folks you'd see most often wouldn't be wearing eyeliner or mascara or be drag queens or do exotic dancing.

This could have been a really neat movie; it had great costumes, great visuals, and a great life as subject matter. I think you could even take the movie that currently exists, cut out all the interpersonal stuff, and turn it into a cool documentary. But what we got was a muddled, often incomprehensible story with enough jangling wrong notes to ruin the rest of it.