The Popkorn Junkie :: ALEXANDER

     When one thinks of the biggest disasters in cinematic history, films like "Ishtar", "Waterworld", and "Hudson Hawk" immediately spring to mind, for they have cemented themselves in the annals of pop culture crap. Move over Warren Beatty. Move over Kevin Costner. Move over Bruce Willis. A new dog is in town and his name is "Alexander", the newest epic from formerly amazing director Oliver Stone. What the hell happened? Did he use all of his creative energy with "JFK" and "Natural Born Killers"? I mean, we all knew that "Any Given Sunday" was pretty much worthless, but we never would have imagined this much hyped and much anticipated picture would bomb so completely. "Alexander", from the opening seconds until the final credit, is the worst Oliver Stone film ever, the worst picture of the year, and one of the worst movies of in the history of American film.

      Colin Farrell (who is way too attractive and way too boyishly charming for this role) stars as the great king Alexander, who became the greatest conqueror the world has ever known. His story is told by Ptolemy (Anthony Hopkins), who serves as narrator. He has a distinctive view of the facts because he was there with Alexander every step of the way. We see Alexander's upbringing, raised by a sometimes vicious father, King Philip (Val Kilmer), and a gorgeous, yet deviously cunning mother, Olympias (Angelina Jolie). We see how he grows to both despise and admire his father, while always staying cautious of his mother. We also see him set out to conquer the world, starting with Persia and ending in India. The film also deals with Alexander's homosexual lustings and love for his best friend Hephaistion (Jared Leto), whom turns out to be his one sole mate. Rosario Dawson co-stars as Alexander's first wife Roxane, and the great Christopher Plummer in a brief appearance as Aristotle.

      There is very little too enjoy about this train wreck. Colin Farrell is almost as bad as Brad Pitt was in "Troy". Sure, Farrell is a fine actor, just like Pitt -- but neither were able to pull off the whole Greek hero thing. Anthony Hopkins seems bewildered and lost in the film, and that is not just the character. Does he even know why he is in this film? As for the story -- give me a break. The supposed scenes of 'intimacy' between Colin Farrell and Jared Leto are nothing short of laughable. If you are going to catalogue Alexander's homosexual tendencies, do it in a way that doesn't seem like a crappy Lifetime movie of the week. I also found the numerous dancing interludes to be extremely unnecessary and pointless. They might have been better if the choreography didn't look like something out of a dinner theatre production of "Bye Bye Birdie". Also, no matter how hard you are trying to be serious -- having a horse go up against an elephant just makes anyone giggle...not to mention the 'fighting hairy monkey men' in the trees. Was all of that really necessary? I found it absolutely hilarious.

      Alas, despite how pitiful this film was, there were two (and only two) bright spots. Angelina Jolie is amazing as Olympias. She has this scene at the very beginning, when Philip has just attacked her, when she is crouched on the floor, veins bulging -- that reminded me why she is an Academy Award winner. Val Kilmer is also exceptional as Philip, proving that he can carry a film on his own, though his performance was certainly not enough. The problem is that the most enjoyable performances are the ones we see the least of. Kilmer is not on screen nearly enough, nor Jolie. And, what a waste of Christopher Plummer -- he dominated his one scene, and we never saw him again. How are you going to cut Aristotle short like that?

      Part of me wants to jump inside of Oliver Stone's head and see what the hell he was thinking. Could he have actually watched the finished product of this film and thought anything other than..."Jesus, I really blew it"? His direction is terrible. The editing is sporadic and looks cheap and rushed -- he had plenty of both time and money to give us better than that. This film makes me think that "JFK" and "Natural Born Killers" and "Platoon" might have all been just flukes. Maybe he really doesn't have that much talent up his sleeve. If he does, he sure as hell wore the wrong shirt for "Alexander", an absolutely wretched waste of both time and money. The tagline for this film is 'the greatest legend of all was real'...yeah...real awful.

-- Billy Ray ( 1/2 out of 4 pops )

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