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What a waste of time that movie is. Someone should take Stone aside and whisper in his ear that film is a visual medium, that you show the story in images, not tell the story in narration.
And the daring sense of reality? What a crock that claim was. One example: in the first few scenes he shows not quite pubescent Al in a gym wrestling with his future lover. There were also a slew of other kids doing the same thing, pretty much commonplace in ancient Greece. What struck me as bogus? None of them were naked. I'm not all that interested in looking at naked little boys--my generation was one of those where all us school boys took communal showers after gym, a compulsory humiliation for younger males indulged in with glee by male gym teachers of dubious authenticity--but the point is that such a "cop-out" from the very first marks Stone's film as just another bogus Hollywood biopic, and not a very good one at that.
Daring homosexual content? I didn't see it. I did see a lot of men posing and sighing but there was a lot more shown of a very totally naked, very attractive young woman whose breasts were quite impressive to say the least.
And the history? Stone postulates a visionary Alexander who wanted to make everyone free (under his reign, of course) and who was far ahead of his time in sociopolitical terms. The history channel, on the other hand, suggests he was a somewhat perverted individual who got his kicks from big battles and massive bloodshed.
And nobody will ever sell me on the idea of Colin Farrell as a blonde Greek warrior. Richard Burton was much easier to take in the role, and his movie was much more of a movie movie than Stone's 150 million dollar history lesson.
Yeah, I really didn't like it.
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