Megas Alexandros. The Greatest Alexander of them All

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jasonxx

Megas Alexandros. The Greatest Alexander of them All

Post by jasonxx »

Last Nights viewing on TV was as per usual rubbish. So to pass time I popped Alexander into the DVD player. The more I see it the more it looks stupid.

I particulaly watched some of the Anthony Hopkins Ptolemy stuff. Quotes Like.

"Megas Alexandros. The Greatest Alexander of them All."

"The freest man hed Ever known."

"His Mighty heart Finaly gave out"

And few other quotes very likely to refer to our known Alexander.

However the guy he was talking about never made an apearance in the movie. We had a guy unsure of himself. Crying after Gaugamela. Crying to his mother and getting a slap in the process.

Ptolemy was talking about a different bloody guy.

Kenny
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Re: Megas Alexandros. The Greatest Alexander of them All

Post by marcus »

Hi Kenny,
jasonxx wrote:Last Nights viewing on TV was as per usual rubbish. So to pass time I popped Alexander into the DVD player. The more I see it the more it looks stupid.
I can't resist this, but ... if you feel the Stone film is so silly/stupid, then why did you choose to watch it again rather than the rubbish on TV? :lol:

I think you actually love the film, but don't want to admit it ... :wink:

ATB
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jasonxx

Post by jasonxx »

Marcus You found me out. All along Ive been a huge fan. Well I was spoiled between the X factor. Come Dancing and Robin Stupid hood. Then the evenings viewing got predictably worse. :shock:

More is less I channel hopped through sky and even peeped at the Shopping channel. Life has become that mundane. :(

So it was a choice of DVds. Fast foreward to the Action scenes in Gladiator or Troy. Watch THe Elvis 69 Special or some others. :?

I thought id show loyalty to Alexander and watch the Alexander Battle scenes instead. And to be totally honest I do like the Ptolemy Narative at the end. It even brings a tear to my eyes when he his talking about Alexander. :(

Especially that Quote "Megas Alexandros" :D Who as I said bore no resemblence to the tosser in the Movie :roll:

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Post by marcus »

jasonxx wrote:Marcus You found me out. All along Ive been a huge fan. Well I was spoiled between the X factor. Come Dancing and Robin Stupid hood. Then the evenings viewing got predictably worse. :shock:
:lol: :lol:

Well, I have to say that (a) I love Strictly Come Dancing, despite being a red-blooded male :) ; (b) although I have many complaints about Robin Hood, I still watch it; and (c) I have also been watching Into the West on BBC2, which I thought was rather good.

Then again, I do like the Stone Alexander, for all its faults ...

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Post by jasonxx »

Marcus Strictly Come Dancing would apeal to any red blooded male. The Legs on those girl dancers are something to behold :wink:

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Post by marcus »

jasonxx wrote:Marcus Strictly Come Dancing would apeal to any red blooded male. The Legs on those girl dancers are something to behold :wink:

Kenny
That is true - I have to say, I don't spend much time watching the male celebrities.

Anyway ... ahem ... back to Megas Alexandros ... :oops:
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Post by dean »

Hello,
jasonxx wrote:
Marcus Strictly Come Dancing would apeal to any red blooded male. The Legs on those girl dancers are something to behold

Kenny


That is true - I have to say, I don't spend much time watching the male celebrities.
Just reading this thread- and must comment that "Strictly dancing" with old Brucey is definitely prime time watching with the BEEB :roll: . Bruce Forsyth is still playing his cards right (have you seen the babe he is "compering" with? I can see why his smile goes from one ear to the other :lol: )

Best regards,
Dean
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Are you watching Colin or Alexander?

Post by jan »

Jasonxx, You just love Colin Farrell! Maybe even the music. I want to add here now that I have found a copy of a book written by Robin Lane Fox called The Classical World. Made me think of Ruthaki. It is a most interesting read, and you should try to find it somewhere to read. You will love it.

Well, I like Colin Farrell too. But I don't think he is the quintessential role model for the grave Alexander. At least, he was not directed to give a performance as Alexander as he should have been done. All your critical comments just cement my own feelings about that debacle of a film, but like any disaster, one is always drawn back to see it again and again. I understand your attraction to it.

I keep returning to Alexander again and again too. As old Will said it in Julius Caesar, the evil lives after men, the good is oft interred in their bones..." Alexander did a lot of good, probably more than we even know, but his evil surely does live on and on and on, doesn't it? Most think it is the evil of ambition. Myself, I think he was like the sun...he had to go as far as he could go....

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The movie

Post by pankration »

I've rewatched the movie also. I equate it to watching a car accident. You know it's going to be bad but you can't take your eyes off of it. Maybe we keep hoping that it will get better every time we watch it. So far, for me, no such luck.
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Post by aleksandros »

I totally agree with most of you!

'He was a God Cadmus...'
We never seen on screen an Alexander close to that...

I know that it is difficult to cmpress Alexander's life in a 3 hour film, but there was still time to show some Alexander ;)

We never saw siege towers and catapults. We weren't able to see the main reason of Alexander's army superiority, sophisticated machinery.

We never saw Alexander's debates with philosophers in Greece and India.

We never saw that mobile empire of thousands including scientists, engineers, doctors...
neither the construction of at least one city!

The only thing one could see was some roma like wanderers dressed with rugs and some sacae like horsemen...

'no occupied teritory remained the same again'
we didnt see any areas changing after Alexander on film...

There are so much more that i am borred to write all of them down...

There were also factual errors! Who was this great history professor who consulted Oliver Stone??? My God...

And of course there were so many great events skipped that could have shaped Alexander's profile more adequately.


That movie really sucks and i am sorry it cant suck less everytime i watch it.
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Yearbook time

Post by jan »

:lol: Thanks, I really appreciated knowing now that it resembles a Latin Club gathering...just so I can get the right yearbook out...very smart of Stone to use a Cowan in his movie! Mucho gracia! :wink: :wink: :wink: :lol: :lol: :lol: Actually in one scene of Alexander by Stone I could see such a resemblance to Shirley Temple in one of her many photos in Life Goes to the Movies! :lol: :lol: :lol:

Well, seriously, it is always difficult to take this movie very seriously as I can trace my own footsteps today so well in it. I just keep wondering where it is that Stone has stashed his hidden camera! Not so funny now! :twisted: He nailed me! Even in the scene where he is choking Olympia so sincerely...and I caught that one last time I watched this psychodrama again...gee, that Stone! He is something else in the world of esp! Now did I get it from him or was he watching me? I am still figuring that one out! :cry:

I now call the movie Alejanet!
jasonxx

Post by jasonxx »

Alex Hail

I couldnt sgree more. The Ptolemy speach about Alexander brough a tear to my eyes and did feel the essence what he was saying. But as you say that narrative bore no resemblence at all to the character portayed in the bovie.

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Post by athenas owl »

Not to rehash the film, but for those who made it to the end of the film, you can see the difference in Ptolemy's view of ATG.

In the opening sequence Ptolemy is speaking about the myth, the "god"....(insert film here) and then at the last he speaks more honestly..even admitting to being in on the poisoning of ATG. He and his comrades couldn't go on, as he said. He then has Cadmus throw that away and he continues writing the "myth".

There are somethings that I wish had been done differently in the film, but it is still a great film to me. It isn't called "Alexander the Great", but simply "Alexander".

If it had been a recounting of the famous battles that alone would have taken up the entire film. The seige of Tyre alone could be made into a movie. The combining of details and characters, this is not a problem for me. I know the history. Stone was looking for something else, the inner ATG. Whether he found that unknowable person I don't know.

I am always amazed at people who expect Alexander to glide across the stage of history as some stoic statue of Apollo. He was an emotional man.
jasonxx

Post by jasonxx »

Athena Hail

Maybe Alexander had emotion. And to say the film was called Alexander fair enough. The world only know Alexander the Great and should have been shown a little of what we understand about him. If the film wanted to be negative about certain aspect fair enough. But the stupid wedding night scene and the crying to his mother. Cmon do you think that was even Alexander. As far as inspiration. The guy in that movie couldnt inspire a soldier to get out of bed let alone half way across the unknown world.

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Post by athenas owl »

"Maybe Alexander had emotion"??

Are we talking about the same guy that threw a goblet at Attalus? Who, according to some, tried to kill himslef after he skewered Cleitus? Or had to dragged off dead Hephaistion's body?

I don't see Alexander's public persona as being betrayed by Farrell's performance. His speech before Guagamela was very well done. At the "mutiny" on the Hyphasis I found that speech absolutely stirring. It is the private ATG that cries and has major self doubts. He wasn't a perfect man at all. Look at the mistake he made in the proposed marriage with Caria. That was a rash and not well thought out thing to do at all.

Just my opinion of course. Evening to you Jason.
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