Alexander - Director's Cut (Two-Disc Special Edition)

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Nothing "GREAT" About This One, 2008-11-24
Oh, my gosh. This movie was, hands-down, one of the worst "historical" films I have ever seen. It may as well have been titled "I Love Your Kohl-Smudged Eyes" for the seemingly countless close-up shots of Alexander and pretty-boy Hephaistion staring dreamily at each other throughout the entire length of the film. We're supposed to believe that Hephaistion is a warrior!? No one could possibly finish this movie with an accurate idea of who Alexander the Great really was. In fact, a month after watching this film, I can remember little except the simpering, wimpy, pouty face of Farell (showcased beautifully and unemotionally on the DVD case) reciting endless bland dialoge and yearning desperately to get in bed with as many effeminate men as possible. br / br /Why was this film even MADE? Not for historacal accuracy, that's for certain. Or to showcase quality acting skills (there were none, except perhaps Jolie who gets an "A" for being the only person who didn't seem like a dead fish). Or an interesting pot. And not to produce a witty, educational, engaging script. The special effects and costumes get a scant B+ and are the only things that could possibly keep a viewer even remotely engaged in the film. br / br /What a waste of a story of a rich historical figure! How any person could give this more than one star is beyond me...these reviewers must not have seen a quality movie in a long, looooong time.

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Just a little too long, 2008-10-13
I really liked this movie and it played in 1080p.I think they it could have been a little shorter.The battle scene was well,i can't put it into words.I can't think of how men fought and died like that.Thousands and thousands i wonder if there still burying people today that fought there.Why were most of these men gay or is this just in the movie.

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Great Portrayal of a Great Historical Figure! , 2008-09-29
I loved this movie very much, it was a little bit long, but keep in mind to tell a great story like this one you must keep a open mind and sit down and listen. br / br /WARNING SOME SPOLIERS ARE PRESENT br / br /It starts out with the aged Ptolemy I Soter (Anthony Hopkins), a general, childhood friend of Alexander (Colin Farrell) and ancester of the great Cleopatra. He tells the story of Alexander as he remembers it. br / br /He begins to say that Alexander's mother Olympias (Angelina Jolie)was at the wrath of her abusive, drunk cyclopitic husband King Philip ll (Val Kilmer) of Macadonia. She claimed to have been with the god Dionisis and had Alexander with him. I probably would have claimed it too if I was married to a jerk like Philip. She also played with snakes, which I didn't mind because this is probably just me and all but I thought that the snakes she was playing with were really cute. br / br /Anyways moving on, one faithful day, Philip wants to kill an untrainable horse, and young Alexander, who wants to conquer the known world in the future, wants to train this wild horse and keep him. Philip lets him do so, and it turns out that the horse was afraid of his own shadow, and Alexander got to keep him when he tamed the wild thing. This is a true story too, I read it in my history textbook from school. And then he even bonds with his father too. br / br /But years later Philip takes a young wife and impregnates her, and Philip and Alexader get into a huge fight at the wedding ceremony almost leading Alexander into exile. After his father gets assonated, Philip's young wife and child are killed, and Alexander becomes ruler of all of Macadonia and Greece. He goes on to conquring Egypt, Anatola, which they don't show in the film. Then he conqures the big daddy of them all, the Persian Empire! The king of Perisa Darius lll fled like a little coward, amazing! br / br /Then he goes onto conquiring some of India, which he for some reason couldn't conqure all of. Then at the end of the film he dies of an illness. And the empire was split up by his generals into four parts. It just so happens that Ptolemy I got to rule Egypt. br / br /Also beautiful authintic costums, music, film settings and acting. It also goes into telling about his relashionship with his aparant lover and childhood friend Hephaistion (Jared Leto), which to me seemed more like true love then with his Bacterian wife Roxanna (Rosario Dawson), and I mean that women was a total b----. br / br /And last but not least it goes to tell how power corrupted him just like it did to his father. br / br /But this is a good movie, that is if you are interested in the ancient world along with war. I recommened this movie to just about anyone who can sit through a long movie on a very boring day.

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GREAT MOVIE ON BLU-RAY, 2008-09-06
THIS IS SO MUCH BETTER ON BLU-RAY WITH THE high def. br / also the extended edition add a lot more to the story especially the romance between colin and jared scenes. br /recommend the blu-ray very highly. you see more detail of the cities and they sparkle like jewels.

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Flip a coin, 2008-09-06
Director Oliver Stone's film version of the life of Alexander the Great, came out to dismal reviews and worse box office. There were controversies over its portrayal of the bisexuality of its protagonist, as well as the poor screenplay, stilted dialogue, and many other things.... We get the requisite battles, the CGI armies of huge hordes, but Stone's camera work is not what it was a decade or more ago. There is very little that sets this apart as an Oliver Stone film. It's a generic pseudo-epic that makes the great epics, like Spartacus, or Lawrence Of Arabia, seem that much greater. I guess there's just a simple lack of passion in the whole endeavor. What saves the film from being total trash, however, is Val Kilmer's relationship with Alexander- mostly as a boy (Connor Paolo), but also with the older Farrell. Kilmer's best moment comes when he demands buying a horse at half price if Alexander can tame it. The son, of course, tames it, in generic rite of passage form, but the key that makes this otherwise trite scene work is how Philip will to risk his son's life merely for a bargain. It shows why the two men will bond, but never be truly close.... In short, Alexander fails not for many of the reasons the major critics roasted it (although to be fair, I don't know just how different the filmic and DVD versions are) but because it has too much breadth, and not enough depth. Accordingly- while not terrible, it's not great. Flip a coin over whether it's passable and either way you're probably right.