Review: ALEXANDER (Warning: With spoilers)

Watched Alexander last night, with Colin Farrell (?) as the lead and Angelina Jolie as his mother (his mother?!? Are they not almost the same age??), Jared Leto as Alex's lover (ack! There goes my crush since his My So-Called Life days...), Anthony Hopkins as the 'narrator'/old ex-general of Alex's, Val Kilmer as Alex's father, and Christopher Plummer (isn't the Captain guy in The Sound Of Music?) somewhere. And loads of other characters. Sadly, I was slightly disappointed in the movie... although that's surprising since I had no expectations. I guess I expected a semi-epic movie (not quite LOTR but a bit of what Troy hoped to achieve). A movie that was a bit like the latest King Arthur movie...

From what I remember of history, Alexander the Great was the one who united the entire known "civilized" world ages ago. He united Greece, Rome, Persia, India, etc. He had wanted to spread the Greek civilization or something. Y'know, unite all these provinces under one banner and make everyone "learned" and stuff. He was a great leader, they say, and was a good strategist (he must be, to be able to defeat and conquer all those places). I didn't remember anything about his sexuality, but I do know he fathered a son or sons... but sadly, none lived too long. He united an empire but, after his death, his empire crumbled. 'Cause he didn't bother to leave an heir... so, like almost everything in history, what one man built, others let fall. His generals (and sons??) fought over his land and a few years after Alex's death, his 'empire' went back to what it was before. Other than that, I don't remember much but I'll definitely research on that a bit.

The movie... well... like I mentioned, I was disappointed. I didn't know Great Alex was Gay Alex but somehow I wasn't surprised 'cause I know Greeks and/or Romans were open with their sexuality - and that included homosexuals and heterosexuals. In fact, I know that it was considered a good thing if a student became a professor's lover - and they're usually of the same sex. I forget why, but I know it was like that. Alex in the movie wasn't, well, 'great'. Maybe they wanted to show Alexander as a human being, who was stupid and reckless and way too obsessed with his dream. They were successful. I left the movie feeling as if Alexander was indeed a mere human being who doesn't deserve to have 'the great' tacked onto his name. I can't quite imagine how this human being was ever considered a great strategist since his wars seems to be composed of blindly blundering into enemy territory and hoping for the best. Yes, he did have a sense of military strategy, especially in the war with the Persians, but other than that, I didn't really see anything else.

They mentioned that he was sometimes harsh to some provinces while kind to others - what was the distinction? Why was he like that? And they never really showed the harshness, just mentioned it in passing - but his kindness was shown.

They rated the movie PG-13, but the war bloodshed was way too much. Blood kept spurting here and there - I'm awed that military precision knew every artery in every enemy and hit them. They didn't even hit a vein! (The diff between the two is that artery ligation [cutting] gives out spurts of blood while veins just ooze loads of blood). And why in heaven's name don't the Greek have archers? They have cavalry (horses), they have pikemen (spears) and that's it. And hasn't anybody invented the catapult yet? I'm a doctor, and I kept wincing and closing my eyes when they decapitated and speared people left and right.

I say he was too obsessed with 'his dream' and glory that he didn't really know the details of keeping that dream and glory. It's like a man saying he'd love sons and proceeding to impregnate as many women as possible and yet not caring what happened to those kids. How can you achieve your dream of glory when you give no thought to keeping it? To fortifying the empire you seek to complete? As everyone knows, the backbone of every army is the leaders and yet Alexander didn't bother keeping his generals happy. He advertised democracy but didn't bother to uphold it. To that, I say "absolute power corrupts absolutely". He wanted an empire but didn't bother to strengten it. Or - his biggest gaffe of all - make sure it was taken cared of after his death. Yeesh. How stupid can you get? And I don't get what his mother has to do with anything. They keep saying she's evil and a sorceress or whatever but, really, other than his first few 'lessons' from her... she didn't really influence his decisions much afterwards. She kept sending him letters with sound instructions that he didn't follow. If he had, like she had said, he'd maintain his position and power. So maybe the movie is telling us we must follow our mothers?? Whatever.

I was disappointed in the movie. Sayang. The cast and premise of the movie (after all, a movie about Alexander is a good endeavor) was great pa man din.