Alexander (2 out of 4)

Starring Colin Farrell and Angelina Jolie. Directed by Oliver Stone.

Tedious, lacking completely in emotional involvement and nearly laughable in its performances, Oliver Stone's Alexander is a veritable mess.
Once upon a time, circa 2,300 years ago, there lived a Macedonian named Alexander (Colin Farrell) craved the love of his roguish father, King Philip (Val Kilmer) but suffered under an imposing and vengeful mother, Olympias (Angelina Jolie). Following his father's murder, Alexander gathers his childhood friends - including lover Hephaistion (Jared Leto) - and sets off to miraculously conquer all of Asia even though Stone never really reveals the great man's strategic genius. Along the way he loses friends, takes a wife (Rosario Dawson), and finds a new home in Babylon, all before his mysterious death at age 32.
Using huge chronological leaps in its narrative, Stone gives us plenty of bloody battle scenes, but the viewer is often at odds at the geography of certain scenarios. Equally irritating is the director's preoccupation with Alexander's relationships with his mother and lover.
Usually a fine actor, Farrell here is hot-and-cold and his Alexander is often times too fragile to be considered great. Jolie is a caricature of the wicked witch of the east; and Leto looks good in his eyeliner. Then there's Christopher Plummer (as Aristotle), who's barely present; and Anthony Hopkins (as the narrator Ptolemy), who is useless and irritating.
Wasted opportunity.

Publication Date: 2004-12-05
Story Location: http://tandemnews.com/viewstory.php?storyid=4691