Volume 52, Number 1 · January 13, 2005
Alexander, the Movie!
By Daniel Mendelsohn
Alexander
a film directed by Oliver Stone
Whatever else you say about the career of Alexander the Great—and classicists, at least, say quite a lot[1]—it was neither funny nor dull. So it was a sign that something had gone seriously wrong with Oliver Stone's long, gaudy, and curiously empty new biopic about Alexander when audiences at both showings I attended greeted the movie with snickering and obvious boredom. The first time I saw the picture was at a press screening at a commercial theater, and even from the large central section that was (a personage with a headset informed us) reserved for 'friends of the filmmaker' you could hear frequent tittering throughout the film—understandable, given that the characters often have to say things like 'from these loins of war, Alexander was born.' A week later, a matinee suggested one likely reaction by those unconstrained by the bonds of amity: at the end of the three-hour-long movie, four of the twelve people in the audience had left.
Review, 4754 words
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