"Alexander" (3 out of 5) Around 285 BC, Ptolemy I Soter, basileus and pharaoh of Ptolemaic Egypt, narrates the life of Alexander (Colin Farrell). Alexander grows up with his mother Olympias (Angelina Jolie) and his tutor Aristotle, where he finds interest in love, honor, music, exploration, poetry and military combat. His relationship with his father, Philip II of Macedon (Val Kilmer), is destroyed when Philip marries Attalus's niece, Eurydice. Alexander insults Philip after disowning Attalus as his kinsman, which results in Alexander's banishment from Philip's palace. After Philip is assassinated, Alexander becomes King of Macedonia. Ptolemy mentions Alexander's punitive campaign in which he razes Thebes, also referring to the later burning of Persepolis, then gives an overview of Alexander's west-Persian campaign, including his declaration as the son of Zeus by the Oracle of Amun at Siwa Oasis, his great battle against the Persian Emperor Darius III in the Battle of Gaugamela, and his eight-year campaign across Asia... Rotten Tomatoes critical consensus states: "Even at nearly three hours long, this ponderous, talky, and emotionally distant biopic fails to illuminate Alexander's life." One of the principal complaints among American film critics was that Alexander resembled less an action-drama film than a history documentary. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, giving the film two out of four stars, wrote in his review, "We welcome the scenes of battle, pomp and circumstance because at least for a time we are free of the endless narration of Ptolemy the historian." Faint praise came from Todd McCarthy of Variety who wrote, "Oliver Stone's Alexander is at best an honorable failure, an intelligent and ambitious picture that crucially lacks dramatic flair and emotional involvement. Dry and academic where Troy (2004) was vulgar and willfully ahistorical". (Via Wikipedia) This "epic" pompous historical drama film based on the life of the ancient Macedonian general and king Alexander the Great has the foundation of being a great "Sword-and-sandal" film like "Troy", but unfortunately it fails more or less on all levels. The acting and deliverance of the lines is over theatrical and it feels like the ensemble is reading from an ancient manuscript. The actors are over acting more or less throughout the film and you simply don't believe in any of the characters nor the historical drama it is supposed to be channeling. Colin Farrell is quite terrible as Alexander and I hate to say that as he is a magnificent actor. The accents are a massive problem in my book, most speak with an Irish accent and I can't understand how Oliver Stone thought that would fly, while some characters like Angelina Jolie´s Olympias speak with an English accent with some undertone of a foreign language. It becomes silly to be honest. The drama never really becomes a drama and the action sequences are few and not all that exciting. And it's just too much of a talky film we are served. Endless talking with endless mentions of names after names. And I don't get the switch to 8 years earlier in the second half of the film that makes no sense at that point during the running time. Maybe a desperate way of Stone recutting the film close to the premiere from what he thought was going to be the final running time, despite the fact that the initial theatrical cut was 175 minutes! "Alexander" is a snooze I am afraid to say. It just doesn't work. Trivia: The film's original screenplay was derived in part from the book Alexander the Great, published in 1973 by the University of Oxford historian Robin Lane Fox. After release, while it performed well in Europe, the American critical reaction was negative. It grossed $167 million worldwide against a $155 million budget, thus making it a commercial failure. (Via Wikipedia)

How anyone can make a film about one of the best conquerors in history so boring I'll never know. 3.5 hours long and you get 2 short battles. This film completely fails in every regard. Plus they made him a hom0. Ridiculous!

Boy, what a mess. This is so bad I don‘t know where to start. Nothing - really NOTHING - works out in this movie. In the wake of Gladiator, they all wanted to shine What an epic fail. Plus the score. Oh boy. Vangelis. While Bladerunner is arguably one of the greatest scores of all time, this might be the worst … at least when it’s about fitting pictures and story.

In 2024, I enjoyed this! Wow, a daring look at his life.

Not bad, but Oliver Stone could have done better. Rosario Dawson is so hot.

It was so bad I had to stop watching it, I was embarrassed for the amazing actors involved.

One of my favorites. I don't understand why it has such bad ratings. Maybe Alexander isn't depicted as the great man he was. I guess we can't really know how Alexander was in his intimacy, which is what I think this movie tries to depict more. Rather than the great and legendary conqueror.

One of my favorite movies. The ultimate cut, revisited final cut. Doesnt matter. Great movie. Just going in as a dum dum, recognizing its a movie and enjoying it for what it is.

A much better film than it has been received and reviewed, Oliver Stone's Alexander will one day be considered a very good movie that sought to discover the underlying motives, flaws and successes in Alexander the historical figure and man of destiny. There are some epic scenes, and while it is overlong, the payoffs are there for those that invest the time. This movie suffered most by its extremely poor timing going against prevailing US audience expectations in a post 9-11 world and released during the invasion of IRAQ. It's nuanced portrayal of a military leader that sought however imperfectly to unite tribes, peoples and races did not jibe at all with the prevailing mood and audience expectations, and the movie (unfortunately) flopped.

The movie is a great historical epic - so, expect to watch a movie that is over three hours. It presents the story of Alexander the Great. The screenwriters didn't miss the major points of his life: his master was Aristotle, he won over the Persians with a small army, he pushed the borders of his empire more than Aristotle thought possible, his (bi) sexuality, etc. Being an epic, the movie has a variety of scenes: some are breathtaking (battles), others are impressive (the entry into Babylone), and others are joyful with lots of dances and music. The wedding night scene is original and it fits the general topic and genre of the movie. A brilliant idea to unfold such a historical epic in a logical way and artistically memorable was to use a narrator. This narrator is no other but - the one and only - Anthony Hopkins (Ptolemy)! It's a great movie, a great story, and a great artistic achievement. Enjoy it!

Time has been kind to this, as has the numerous versions Stone has put together. There are still problems but they seem to matter less now, especially when stacked against the ambitious structure and length. Also, it is hard to not see how much of Stone's vision clashed with the mores and expectations of audiences in 2004.

The movie was great whit shots. But i din't like how at the end they just got back in like 8 years ago. idk how about others but i dint like it.

Yes, this is a ponderous movie. It asks more of its cast than what they can deliver. It moves at precisely the speed and ability of the Persian army at Gaugamela (Alexander's upset victory.) But it is one of Hollywood's uniquely epic films, arguably unrivaled in its authenticity and zest for bringing the ancient era to the big screen. It does a good deal of justice to the facts about Alexander as we know them. It deftly creates the world of his time. And, refreshingly, it seems to genuinely want to say something "grand" about who Alexander was and what he meant to the Hellenistic (and possibly Western) mind. Just to ask and attempt such an ambitious question gives it a staying power that many other history films lack. This day and age, Hollywood finds itself incapable of providing such an ennobling or elucidating examination of history. One only need to see Napoleon (2023) to note the complete uninterestedness of both director, actors, audience, and critics, in its subject. We trade away a search for Napoleon for a cardboard Hitler-in-becoming meets generic Hollywood romance. Alexander is only an unfinished house, but in an age in which we pretend a cave can be a substitute, it remains one of the few that keeps up its scaffolding, to remind us of another way forward.

I still like this. Love the scenes and action. I do believe Alexander was BI probably gay and he was a warrior! I do wish they could have gotten more Greeks to play the parts. British or Americans or Irish to Greek or Italian ancestry to be more authentic. Persians they tried but they got Moroccans that are not Persians or Iraqis. Close but not really. I am maternally Southern Italian including Sicilian. I feel that connection to Greece! Anatolia too. My dna in 4 companies came out to be 12 percent plus from Greece/Balkans and Anatolia plus Cyprus. Love Ancient History. Sicilians have up to 37 percent of their dna from ancient times from that SE part of Europe. Southern Italians 30 percent. Love Ancient world!

This is not so much one of the worst things I've ever seen but rather one of the most boring things I've ever seen. At the same token this is probably the worst epic film I've ever seen. Not even close. The editing is terrible and the pacing is horrifically bad. Even if a scene is competant it will go one two maybe even three times longer than it should. This jumps around constantly between 3 different parts of Alex's life and never follows a sequential order and borderline almost feels like an anthology rather than a biopic. Heck with the boring narration at times it truly feels like your watching a bad History Channel Documentary. Everything else is just passable and never even comes close to being a competant epic film. There are epic scenes and the battles are very gory but they never have epic scale to them and are shot very poorly at times because it chooses to focus more on the carnage and chaos rather than tell a story through the fight if that makes sense. Quite often it cuts around so much in the fights and so much is going on that I don't even know what is going on. On the acting side, after 3 hours plus I can't tell you much about Alex besides he was ambitious and Bisexual. That's it. Everone else is so forgettable and just rattles off constant plot expose. The sets are extremely lavish and there is scale to the production but 90% of this film it never shows. It never matches the epic character it is portraying and barely tells a competant story about him. The constant terrible editing and boring characters is what really makes this collapse under its own weight. It's amazing because this is so bloated with ideas, conspiraices, romances, historical events, battles, and it never makes it all flow even in the slightest. Stay away from this at all cost.

Alexander the great wasn't hero, was a bloodthirsty conqueror

Oh dear - what might have been. No saving graces with this mess. It just doesn't work. Dreadful script, acting and basic story telling. The frankly bizarre casting of the lead was the worst mistake. Irish and American accents make it amusing after a while. The action scenes are confusing. Embarrassing for the director…….

Alexander tries to be one of the great epics, but despite the obvious potential, there is a lot that stops this film from being as good as it could be. I would describe the film as interesting and quasi-educational rather than entertainment. From my subsequent readings, it is good to see that the film was, in terms of the overarching story at least, reasonably in accordance with historical accounts. There is an overly long period of scene setting at the beginning of the film. The problem with this is that time that could have been spent on character development was lost to storytelling. The old adage show, don't tell, would have been better here. The first battle scene of the film, is just sloppy. It was impossible to feel invested in any of the characters and the emotion of the event and you ended up with blood guts and gore for the sake of it. In addition to this, there are some scenes that a good editor would have just chopped as they really added nothing to the story. The second half of the film saves the whole. Although I never warmed to the character of Alexander, it was interesting to see how he changed from someone driven by desire to do what he thought were good things, to becoming heavily self absorbed. The standout acting (and indeed, the only really decent acting in the whole thing), comes from Angelina Jolie, even if she (the actress) was only 11 months older than the man who played her son. Come on, this just didn't look right in the film at all. Despite this failure of age accurate casting, Jolie's performance is exceptional, despite her relatively brief screen time. The later battle in the film is significantly better, even if it did come with a number of bizarre cinematographic choices. I looked at one of the transitions and could not understand why they had used something that would draw attention to the fact that it was a film that you were watching. The other criticism that I would have was the use of flashbacks which didn't really work in my opinion. As a historic drama, conventional chronological storytelling would have felt less disruptive. While I am glad that I watched the film as I learned the core elements of the Alexander story, I do feel that the film was not as gripping as it should have been. It is just as well that the film wasn't titled Alexander The Great.

3 hours of wasted time. The whole movie is a set of separate stories. Motivations of the people is hidden mostly somewhere in the time that was jumped over.

The actor who played Bucephalus outmatched the rest. It's as if Angelina wanted to outdo Brad's Troy. How can the story of the greatest conqueror be the biggest failure?