Troy

or "Frankie and Annette starring in 'Saving Private Helen'"

On the one hand you can't get too mad at a Hercules movie, whether it cost $100,000 and starred Steve Reeves or $200,000,000 and starred the hot blonde who peeked in "Thelma and Louise". Beefcake pictures are like beach books: they proliferate this time each year, much like pollen, and are long gone by Xmas, when Oscars the grouch wakes up. Gals drag their guys to them, mucho funno is had later at home, and the guys drag themselves to the gym the next day. Everybodys happy and the local economy prospers.

On the other hand, "Hercules Vs. the Moon Men" is more historically accurate and truer to its source material than "Troy". The "Iliad" is gratuitously long (Homer apparently was being paid by the quatrain), and a bit draggy in the voluminous character backgrounds. But so was LOTR. And I'm not saying that Tollkein does it better than Homer, but Peter Jackson does it WAY better than Wolfgang Petersen. Wolfies best known picture was the dark and claustrophobic "Das Boot" about life aboard a teeny submarine. He should have stayed on board.

On board the for the bloody beach party we have Brad, who prepared for his role as Achilles by hiring a personal trainer for six months at the cost of $5,000 a week. No money left over for acting lessons apparently. But he looks good, no doubt about it. He may be the hottest hairless blonde Greek ever. He may also be the ONLY hairless blonde greek ever. Alongside Brad (when he's not acting circles around him) is Sean Bean as Odysseus. One hopes for a remake of the Odyssey, with Boromir, and no one else involved in the making of "Troy."

Hector is finely played by Eric Bana, posessor of great talent, and even greater pecs. Hector, by some oversight of the screenwriter is allowed to retain some measure of conflict and growth. Orlando Bloom's Paris is a simpering little brother, worlds away from the evil bully that Homer described. The real Paris is decrepit, loud, nasty and quite dirty. Plus the traffic in summer is horrendous.

Helen, the most beautiful woman in the world, is played by Diane Heidkrueger, a somewhat attractive blonde. Paris, frankly is prettier than Helen. Her performance is a show stopper. Every scene she is in grinds to a complete stop, as everyone in camera waits for her astoundingly slow synapses to register an emotion, action, or line. (These slow synapses come to her rescue though in the scene where she embraces Orly, bare bazooms against cold metal armor. Yikes!) When Herr Diane does actually get a line of dialogue to emerge, her accent is a dead-ringer for Mrs. Olsen. I kept expecting her to serve Folger's coffee during the battle watching scenes. Overall though, we must describe Diane, as Jessica Lange was once described in Dino DeHorrendous' King Kong: "A former and future model."

Peter O'Toole is Priam, the king of Troy. Pete, fresh out of another rehab stint has, predictably, a spotty performance. The scene in which he pleads with Achilles to let Priam take the body of Hector is genuinely moving and touching. Outacting Brad Pitt is no stretch for this veteran actor. In the scenes where Priam is on his throne however, we were repeatedly reminded of another type of movement and another type of throne. Righteous indignation or three-day constipation? You make the call.

But all of these lovely people washing up after battle can not really be held responsible for the overwhelming "whatever" that is Troy. Wolfgang and Brad signed on first so they deserve a double share of overripe tomatoes. But the sturdy finger of fate points to know one else so much as to David Benioff. This is the fellow who rewrote the Iliad as a beach blanket movie with a few sub-par washed out battle scenes left over from Return of the King. Just about everything that makes Homer engrossing has been left out of "Troy".