Alexander (2004)
Average Rating: 3.9/10
Reviews Counted: 194
Fresh: 32 | Rotten: 162
Even at nearly three hours long, this ponderous, talky, and emotionally distant biopic fails to illuminate Alexander's life.
Average Rating: 4.1/10
Critic Reviews: 43
Fresh: 6 | Rotten: 37
Even at nearly three hours long, this ponderous, talky, and emotionally distant biopic fails to illuminate Alexander's life.
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Average Rating: 2.7/5
User Ratings: 214,755
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Movie Info
The fourth film to chronicle the life of fourth-century B.C. ruler Alexander the Great, Oliver Stone's Alexander stars Colin Farrell as the titular Macedonian conqueror. The film follows the young king as he leads his forces on a bloody empirical conquest across the known world, taking large parts of Asia and the Middle East to amass a giant empire, all by the time he turned 25. Anthony Hopkins co-stars as Ptolemy I along with Rosario Dawson as Roxane, Angelina Jolie as Olympias, Jared Leto as
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Cast
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Colin Farrell
Alexander -
Angelina Jolie
Olympias -
Val Kilmer
King Philip II -
Jared Leto
Hephaistion -
Anthony Hopkins
Old Ptolemy -
Rosario Dawson
Roxane -
Christopher Plummer
Aristotle -
Tim Pigott-Smith
Omen Reader -
Connor Paolo
Young Alexander -
Gary Stretch
Cleitus -
John Kavanagh
Parmenion -
Nick Dunning
Attalus -
Marie Meyer
Eurydice -
Elliot Cowan
Ptolemy -
Joseph Morgan
Philotas -
Ian Beattie
Antiginous -
Denis Conway
Nearchus -
Neil Jackson
Perdiccas -
Rory McCann
Crateros -
Raz Degan
Darius -
Annelise Hesme
Stateira -
Feodor Atkine
Roxane's Father -
Brian Blessed
Wrestling Trainer -
Brian McGrath
Doctor -
Mick Lally
Horse Seller -
Stéphane Ferrara
Bactrian Commander -
Jonathan Rhys Meyers
Cassander -
Peter Williamson
Young Nearchus -
Matthew Powell
Bagoas Dancer -
Fiona O'Shaughnessy
Nurse -
Jaran Ngamdee
Indian Prince -
Bin Bunluerit
Indian King -
Toby Kebbell
Pausanius -
David Bedella
Scribe -
Jessie Kamm
Child Alexander -
Patrick Carroll
Young Hephaistion -
Morgan Christopher Ferris
Young Cassander -
Robert Earley
Young Ptolemy -
Aleczander Gordon
Young Perdiccas -
Garrett Lombard
Leonnatus -
Chris Aberdein
Polyperchon -
Erol Sander
Persian Prince -
Tadhg Murphy
Dying Soldier -
Francisco Bosch
Bagoas -
Tsouli Mohammed
Persian Chamberlain -
Harry Kent
Cup Bearer #1 -
Suzanne Bullock
Roxane Dancer -
Kate Elouise
Roxane Dancer -
Gillian Grueber
Roxane Dancer -
Michelle Lukes
Roxane Dancer -
Anjali Mehra
Roxane Dancer -
Anthony Jean Marie Kurt
Bagoas Dancer -
Marta Barahona
Bagoas Dancer -
Monica Zamora
Bagoas Dancer -
Benny Maslov
Bagoas Dancer -
Tania Matos
Bagoas Dancer -
Leighton Morrison
Bagoas Dancer -
Isaac Mulllins
Bagoas Dancer -
Monica Perego
Bagoas Dancer -
Rab Affleck
Attalus' Henchman -
Sam Green
Cup Bearer #2 -
Michael Dixon
Campfire Soldier -
Laird Macintosh
Greek Officer -
Jean Le Duc
Fat Eunuch
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Alexander Trailer & Photos
All Critics (201) | Top Critics (45) | Fresh (33) | Rotten (168) | DVD (33)
Though the battles have the blood-and-sinew bravado you expect from Oliver Stone, this three-hour buttnumbathon is hamstrung by a hectoring grandiosity, not new to Stone, and a nod toward caution, which is.
Top CriticA lunk-headed train wreck that looks like a tag sale in a 323 B.C. supermarket in old Peking.
At a reported cost of $155 million, Alexander qualifies as a super-spectacle in every respect but one -- namely in its neurotic, confused and sexually ambidextrous hero.
Sluggish, unsmiling, and almost as limp as the feather fans with which our heroes are gently aerated on their trip to the Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
It's just a wild, glorious, wacky mess that I found really entertaining.
Call it Alexander the Grate, because, over the marathon of its three-hour running time, this wonky epic really does get on your nerves.
For the lucky few that see this without ever having viewed the first cut, they may wonder what all the criticism was about in the first place.
Alexander the person was great. This movie isn't.
General mistakes all across the board contribute and reinforce each other to bring it down
This is ultimately "Alexander" as written by Danielle Steele...
It's still a very flat, and awful "epic" that Stone can't accomplish for the life of him.
Stone doesn't present characters that the audience can believe in, even for one moment, as representative of their historic roles.
This oracular piece of hero-worship is perhaps the squarest film yet from this once-hip director.
Stone's Director's Cut is still too long and dragged out to be very effective.
Stone gives us some truly stirring visuals, music that soars and charges more often than not, and, um, performances that . . . Well, um, okay, about those performances . . .
the tragedy of Alexander appears to be that, like his hero, Stone has tried to go too far and has lost his way.
Unwieldy and flawed, but Stone remains a tornado in an era of airless formula and -- to paraphrase our Ptolemy -- its failings are greater than most films' successes.
Audience Reviews for Alexander
Oliver Stone's epic portrait of one of the greatest figures in history had the potential to be as epic, mythic, and great as the person it is about. What it turned out ot be instead was a bloated, hollow, unfocused mess filled with bland dialogue and some really out there and stilted performances. It's certainly not for lack of trying though.
For this should have been masterpiece, Stone at least assembled an awesome and talented cast that includes Colin Farrell, Angelina Jolie, Val Kilmer, Jared Leto, Anthony Hopkins, Rosario Dawson, and an all too short appearance by Christopher Plummer. Farrell was a decent enough choice, but I' not sure I really like the characterization all that much. Kilmer was okay, but seemed to be channelling his take on Jim Morrison a bit much. Jolie started off fine, but could have stood to dial it down quite a bit, and go for something more subtle and nuanced. Same goes for Rosario, and once again, Stone makes a film where women unfortunately get the short end of the stick. Hopkins was okay, but seemed better suited for a better film. Leto was likewise fair, but sorta came off as a bit too fey.
I liked that the film tried to tackle many facets of Alexander the Great's life, personality, and career, and had some decent themes to it, but it all comes off as really overblown, a tad pretentious, and actually rather boring and meandering. For someone as colorful as Alexander, this shouldn't be the case. The battle scenes are epic, really well done, and some of the best parts of the film, but sadly they are too few and far between, which is a problem when the film has a 175 minute running time and all the other stuff, which good at times, becomes really difficult to sit through.
I will give the film props for having a historical advisor on board (though oddly uncredited for whatever reason), and the costumes, period details, and all that are top notch, as are the cinematography, and Vangelis's score (which is atypical of what he usually does). Overall though, I'm not on board, even though I really wanted to be. I'd like to think that I knew what Stone was going for, but I can't really figure it out. Maybe I need to see one of the other cuts he came out with, since those are supposedly better.
As this one stands though, it's not a failure, but it's still an average, out of control and unbalanced mess.
Super Reviewer
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- Alexander: You can run to the end of the earth, you coward! But you'll never run far enough!
-
- Roxane: You l-love him?
- Alexander: There are different kinds of love Roxane.
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- Olympias: HE WILL NEVER BE YOURS! NEVER! IN MY WOMB I CARRY MY AVENGER! [SCREAMS]
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- Old Ptolemy: His failure towered over other men's successes.
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- Old Ptolemy: The glory and memory of man will always belong to the ones who follow their great visions.
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- Alexander: For the freedom and glory of Greece.
Discussion Forum
| Topic | Last Post | Replies |
|---|---|---|
| What were they thinking? | 3 months ago | 2 |
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For me Alexander has always been an interesting film. For the first time i saw it, it just felt weak and pompous work that seemed to go on forever. I have to admit that it Alexander is a film that might go on a bit too long but a story this big must have been hard to fit under three hours. When i saw the far superior director's cut i actually liked this film, but my opinion towards director's cuts is not very warm and it always feels that when they get released the directors are only trying to fix something that they felt is broken.
Alexander could have been a great film in it's theatrical release but it was not. Director's cut gives us more insight and makes the whole experience much richer, but after all it is another version of the same subject made from same material as the first one. These two versions both have their flaws and some of those flaws they share and some of them not.
As i earlier mentioned, Alexander is worth to see for it's pure visual madness and ambition. There are moments when director Oliver Stone literally seem to throw us into another universe and with highly talented cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto he uses colours and location into a great effect here. Some of the battle scenes does have even a surreal quality in them and reminds us about Stone's visual boldness as a director. I admire this film because it has ambition and the story it tells is worth to sit through, but this could have been something so much greater as a film. Now it is somewhere in the middle ground and story the of Alexander the Great does deserve a better film adaptation than this.