Is Oliver Stone's Alexander worth a watch?

[jademunky]

Personally, I hated it. Just bad dialogue, bad characters, nobody I could really identify with and root for.

Also Colin Farrell and Angelina Jolie are just godawful in everything.

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

Personally, I hated it. Just bad dialogue, bad characters, nobody I could really identify with and root for.

Also Colin Farrell and Angelina Jolie are just godawful in everything.

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great. Can someone make a Virgin Alexander and Chad Caesar joke?



To think this man wept at Alexander's statue because he wanted to emulate him.

 

[Basement Cat]

Well, the Director's Cut has something for everyone: In one scene you get to see Rosario Dawson topless and in another you get to see Colin Farrel's naked testicles from behind.

I kid you not.

The movie is an okay movie. It's worth watching and has some good scenes but it's not something I've rewatched again and again. Instead it's a movie I might pull out every 5 or so years and watch again.

 

[jademunky]

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great.

Well Caesar could really do it all. The man was a military leader, an orator, a writer, a statesman, etc.

There really had never been someone like that before (and arguably since, maybe Napoleon kinda sorta but not-really).

 

[SckizoBoy]

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great.

Well Caesar could really do it all. The man was a military leader, an orator, a writer, a statesman, etc.

There really had never been someone like that before (and arguably since, maybe Napoleon kinda sorta but not-really).

All three men brought low from within more than from without... which you can argue in either direction.

While I respect all three, my attitudes towards them are almost disdainful by comparison, insomuch that their contemporary material legacies are all rather tainted. Though in fairness, there are few such leaders that managed to escape such a fate.

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great.

Well Caesar could really do it all. The man was a military leader, an orator, a writer, a statesman, etc.

There really had never been someone like that before (and arguably since, maybe Napoleon kinda sorta but not-really).

All three men brought low from within more than from without... which you can argue in either direction.

While I respect all three, my attitudes towards them are almost disdainful by comparison, insomuch that their contemporary material legacies are all rather tainted. Though in fairness, there are few such leaders that managed to escape such a fate.

Three Men?

Who's the third we are talking about?

 

[jademunky]

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great.

Well Caesar could really do it all. The man was a military leader, an orator, a writer, a statesman, etc.

There really had never been someone like that before (and arguably since, maybe Napoleon kinda sorta but not-really).

All three men brought low from within more than from without... which you can argue in either direction.

While I respect all three, my attitudes towards them are almost disdainful by comparison, insomuch that their contemporary material legacies are all rather tainted. Though in fairness, there are few such leaders that managed to escape such a fate.

Three Men?

Who's the third we are talking about?

I assume the three men he was talking about were Alexander, Caesar and Napoleon (I mentioned him previously).

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

So I have seen the movie and yeah I was mostly skipping the scenes to get to the things that are interesting. So many cuts and editions and Oliver Stone never realized "Hey, mabye we should have all the sequences of events in historical chronlogical order"

But holy shit was the Battle of Hydaspus as seen in its entirety was sick, eat your heart out Oliphaunts in Return of the King, they used real elephants. And the Battle of Gaugamela was also badass.

I guess they could not show the Siege of Tyre because Alexander had that placed Sacked and Butchered, which would probably make him look less like a hero protagonist.

In the end perhaps Oliver Stone wasn't cut out for directing a more "Classical Epic" War/Drama movie. Just stick with doing contemporary 20th-21st Century USA movies dude since that is your fortee. Leave movies like this to someone more worthy of it, Mel Gibson did it better in Braveheart, and so did Ridley Scott in Kingdom of Heaven.

 

[SckizoBoy]

But holy shit was the Battle of Hydaspus as seen in its entirety was sick, eat your heart out Oliphaunts in Return of the King, they used real elephants. And the Battle of Gaugamela was also badass.

Definitely (re: Gaugamela), but for Hydaspes, being colour blind, that scene gave me an almighty headache and it was far too stylised to be sensible and too simplified to explain Alexander's respect for the Indians.

I guess they could not show the Siege of Tyre because Alexander had that placed Sacked and Butchered, which would probably make him look less like a hero protagonist.

Why not? Shows he was a 'man' (even if a great one) and, along with the scapegoating of Philotas and Parmenio (you may need to remind me how much detail there is regarding their executions/justifications, been a while since I watched it), plants the seeds for his eventual (alleged) assassination, disintegration of his empire, Antipater's... antipathy, Ptolemy/Aristotle's increasing skepticism and indicates his inability/unwillingness to do anything about the Macedonian propensity for backstabbing (and, to a degree, his own alcoholism).

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

But holy shit was the Battle of Hydaspus as seen in its entirety was sick, eat your heart out Oliphaunts in Return of the King, they used real elephants. And the Battle of Gaugamela was also badass.

Definitely (re: Gaugamela), but for Hydaspes, being colour blind, that scene gave me an almighty headache and it was far too stylised to be sensible and too simplified to explain Alexander's respect for the Indians.

I guess they could not show the Siege of Tyre because Alexander had that placed Sacked and Butchered, which would probably make him look less like a hero protagonist.

Why not? Shows he was a 'man' (even if a great one) and, along with the scapegoating of Philotas and Parmenio (you may need to remind me how much detail there is regarding their executions/justifications, been a while since I watched it), plants the seeds for his eventual (alleged) assassination, disintegration of his empire, Antipater's... antipathy, Ptolemy/Aristotle's increasing skepticism and indicates his inability/unwillingness to do anything about the Macedonian propensity for backstabbing (and, to a degree, his own alcoholism).

Essentially he had them executed over a "possible" conspiracy where they were gonna have Alexander poisoned through his drink, over there misgivings about the direction Alexander's campaigns have been, mostly with regards to him making "friends and lovers" with the Persian people.

 

[Russ Pitts]

The director's cut is a lot better. If you want a historical docu-drama then it fills that role very well. But it is not what one would consider a good mainstream film.

It does jump around a ton as well, but if you know the history it is something you will appreciate.

If you want a great historical film though you can't go wrong with Master and Commander, The Far Side of the World.

Agreed. Watch the Director's Cut. It's still a mess, but worth a watch.

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

The director's cut is a lot better. If you want a historical docu-drama then it fills that role very well. But it is not what one would consider a good mainstream film.

It does jump around a ton as well, but if you know the history it is something you will appreciate.

If you want a great historical film though you can't go wrong with Master and Commander, The Far Side of the World.

Agreed. Watch the Director's Cut. It's still a mess, but worth a watch.

Well I was watching the Ultimate Cut on Netflix.

So I have no idea what the prior three cuts offered.

 

[Terminal Blue]

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great. Can someone make a Virgin Alexander and Chad Caesar joke?

Fun fact which came up in my IRL research recently. Julius Ceasar was renowned for being effeminate by Roman standards.

He was very particular about the way he dressed and about his hair, and he always wore a loose belt (in Rome, any kind of loose clothing was a sign of unmanliness). There are accounts that he would only scratch his head with one finger to avoid messing up his hair, which was considered a kind of stereotypically feminine gesture.

In pre-Christian Roman society, being unmanly in any way was considered shameful for a normal, virile man, and thus while sex between adult men was acceptable, it was extremely shameful and socially maligned for the bottoming partner (and at times, punishable for Roman citizens). Julius Ceasar also seems to have kind of ignored this whole thing completely. One of his friends, Gaius Scribonius Curio, once described him as "every man's woman, and every woman's man".

Modern audiences (like Shakespeare) tend to see Ceasar as a very stoic, manly figure because we assume that's what a military general and powerful dictator must be like, however, the reality is a lot weirder than that. There's even an argument that Ceasar deliberately emphasised his own effeminate qualities in order to set himself apart from the traditionalist, aristocratic class of Rome, and to establish that he was something new and a force for political change.

Honestly, for those people who were upset about the gay stuff in Alexander, a "realistic" historical movie about Julius Ceasar would probably blow their little minds.

I'm not contesting you though, for me this makes him incredibly cool. He became the most powerful person in the Roman world while also being a textbook example of someone Roman society didn't tend to think should be powerful.

 

[SckizoBoy]

There are accounts that he would only scratch his head with one finger to avoid messing up his hair, which was considered a kind of stereotypically feminine gesture.

AFAIK, he did that because he lost a fair bit of his hair quite quickly and had the equivalent of a comb-over, so he'd only scratch with one finger to prevent losing more hair. I'm not sure, but with the femininity in this regard, he just ran with it.

In pre-Christian Roman society, being unmanly in any way was considered shameful for a normal, virile man, and thus while sex between adult men was acceptable, it was extremely shameful and socially maligned for the bottoming partner (and at times, punishable for Roman citizens).

The irony is that mid/late-Republic was when they really started aping Greek culture. Koine was the lingua franca from before 150BC. Which goes (weirdly), hand in hand with the Roman/Greek contrast in attitudes towards the penis.

Honestly, for those people who were upset about the gay stuff in Alexander, a "realistic" historical movie about Julius Ceasar would probably blow their little minds.

You want mind blowing, how's about portraying Spartan soldiers on their down time (made worse by women's pedagogic relationships at the same time)?! XD

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great. Can someone make a Virgin Alexander and Chad Caesar joke?

Fun fact which came up in my IRL research recently. Julius Ceasar was renowned for being effeminate by Roman standards.

He was very particular about the way he dressed and about his hair, and he always wore a loose belt (in Rome, any kind of loose clothing was a sign of unmanliness). There are accounts that he would only scratch his head with one finger to avoid messing up his hair, which was considered a kind of stereotypically feminine gesture.

In pre-Christian Roman society, being unmanly in any way was considered shameful for a normal, virile man, and thus while sex between adult men was acceptable, it was extremely shameful and socially maligned for the bottoming partner (and at times, punishable for Roman citizens). Julius Ceasar also seems to have kind of ignored this whole thing completely. One of his friends, Gaius Scribonius Curio, once described him as "every man's woman, and every woman's man".

Modern audiences (like Shakespeare) tend to see Ceasar as a very stoic, manly figure because we assume that's what a military general and powerful dictator must be like, however, the reality is a lot weirder than that. There's even an argument that Ceasar deliberately emphasised his own effeminate qualities in order to set himself apart from the traditionalist, aristocratic class of Rome, and to establish that he was something new and a force for political change.

Honestly, for those people who were upset about the gay stuff in Alexander, a "realistic" historical movie about Julius Ceasar would probably blow their little minds.

I'm not contesting you though, for me this makes him incredibly cool. He became the most powerful person in the Roman world while also being a textbook example of someone Roman society didn't tend to think should be powerful.

I have heard he had affiars with male lovers in his lifetime. But homoerotic tendencies or not, Caesar is still the better man then Alexander.

 

[Hades]

Alexander is sadly enough a movie that proves those who say historical accuracy is boring right. Its very accurate as far as I can tell but also very boring.

On the subject of Kingdom of heaven since it came up, I'd actually say its much worse than Alexander. Alexander was merely boring but Kingdom of Heaven was just offensive. Far too little history, and far too much preaching. Don't get me wrong, I'm no Christian rights activist but it did make me uncomfortable how every Christian was so cartoonishly evil and just wanted to eat Muslim babies for dinner while the few decent ones that are the main characters are actually time traveling atheists in disguise rather than Christians. Heck, even the priest that offered to ransom himself for the sake of his poorer citizens got demonized as a despicable coward because the plot had ran out of Templars to bully.

 

[Hades]

Personally, I hated it. Just bad dialogue, bad characters, nobody I could really identify with and root for.

Also Colin Farrell and Angelina Jolie are just godawful in everything.

Well I am just gonna be watching it for the spectacle then. And so far this fully confirms my thinking that Julius Caesar is better and cooler than Alexander the Great. Can someone make a Virgin Alexander and Chad Caesar joke?



To think this man wept at Alexander's statue because he wanted to emulate him.

To me Caesar comes off as the far greater figure too. Alexander was somewhat of a one trick pony. He was a fantastic general but no statesman while Caesar was both. Alexander's empire died with him but Caesars achievements outlived him and his reforms would stay in place for centuries.

 

[Thaluikhain]

To me Caesar comes off as the far greater figure too. Alexander was somewhat of a one trick pony. He was a fantastic general but no statesman while Caesar was both. Alexander's empire died with him but Caesars achievements outlived him and his reforms would stay in place for centuries.

Alexander died in his early-mid thirties, though, Caesar had more time to do things. Given a few more decades of life, who is to say what Alexander may have done?

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

Alexander is sadly enough a movie that proves those who say historical accuracy is boring right. Its very accurate as far as I can tell but also very boring.

On the subject of Kingdom of heaven since it came up, I'd actually say its much worse than Alexander. Alexander was merely boring but Kingdom of Heaven was just offensive. Far too little history, and far too much preaching. Don't get me wrong, I'm no Christian rights activist but it did make me uncomfortable how every Christian was so cartoonishly evil and just wanted to eat Muslim babies for dinner while the few decent ones that are the main characters are actually time traveling atheists in disguise rather than Christians. Heck, even the priest that offered to ransom himself for the sake of his poorer citizens got demonized as a despicable coward because the plot had ran out of Templars to bully.

I'd argue when it comes to historical accuracy, Braveheart is the absolute worse and that its because of solely one thing and one thing only, Isabella of France had a child with Wallace.

This one thing would have RADICALLY changed history of England. Forget the Scottish people looking like barbarians, forget that there was no bridge in the Battle of Sterling, forget that Wallace was just some commoner. This one thing with Isabella is the most egregious historical diviation of all. All because the writers wanted to have Mel Gibson to score some hot French Disney Princess-looking poontang

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

To me Caesar comes off as the far greater figure too. Alexander was somewhat of a one trick pony. He was a fantastic general but no statesman while Caesar was both. Alexander's empire died with him but Caesars achievements outlived him and his reforms would stay in place for centuries.

Alexander died in his early-mid thirties, though, Caesar had more time to do things. Given a few more decades of life, who is to say what Alexander may have done?

The problem was Alexander didn't know when to stop, Caesar did. I mean he could have for example continued all the way to northern tip of the Britain and then continued to Ireland but he didn't.