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Troy: the Tragic Blockbuster In this case, two books: the sword and sandals gore-fest includes most of Homer’s Iliad and some further episodes from Virgil’s Aeneid, supplementing these with snippets from both Greek mythology and Hello! magazine. The largest omission from The Iliad is that of the gods, and the omission improves the drama. Where in Homer the gods were endlessly meddling in pre-history’s first great war, the film severely curtails their role, choosing instead to portray the actions of human beings in a godless universe whose destinies are shaped by their own free will. Aristotle, no mean drama critic, would have approved: he hated the various deus ex machina devised by poor dramatists to rescue their protagonists. The best addition comes from Ovid, I think (I’m not aware of it appearing in Homer), providing one of the best lines of the movie: Achilles tells his shocked lover, a priestess, “The gods are envious of us because our mortality gives every moment meaning which they could never have.” About that line, I feel sure Ayn Rand would have approved. Although Brad Pitt still plays Achilles as an indestructible robot, the screenwriter has at least tried – for the observant viewer there is meaning in most film moments. Now for those film-goers who are inspired enough to read the book let me tell you that the Iliad is a fabulous example of Greek tragedy, about which some modern punters unfortunately tend to lose the plot a little. Those who have grown up watching on-screen car chases, explosions and shoot-’em-up film finales in which goodies triumph over baddies are probably going to understand little of what good tragedy might consist – which is why I am here to help out. As usual Aristotle is an informative guide, in this case both as to what to expect from good tragedy and what to expect from your summer blockbuster. The first lesson in understanding tragedy is this: good tragedy does not involve a special-effects-filled struggle between a wise-cracking but humble hero and a crazed villain, about which we all know the outcome. Aristotle was scathing about such stories, saying they are “considered the best only because of the feeble judgement of the audience.” Such stories are indeed feeble, providing a job better suited for cartoons, comic books and Bruce Willis. It’s drama for six-year-olds – a light confection. Adults need something more: they need drama with real meat. The second lesson is this: as human beings are volitional beings who prosper or not based on the choices they make, good tragedy should depict men making important choices, and it should show us the consequences in action of those decisions. Good tragedy, explained Aristotle, allows us to witness what might happen when good people make bad choices – often under pressure; sometimes ill-informed – and to experience the pity and fear of the protagonists as oft-unfortunate consequences unfold. The events portrayed should be of sufficient moment to make them worth watching and to make a decent story; further, the people making them should be of sufficient stature that we can learn something from them (which is why crazed villains are such a banal plot device), and sympathetic enough that we can feel their fate as important to us. That’s the key lesson then: if tragedy is done right it is no mere entertainment, it is both entertaining and illuminating. It tells us something about ourselves by presenting us with events that “involve testing or finding the limits of what is human. This is no mere orgy of strong feeling, but a highly focussed way of bringing our powers to bear on the image of what is human as such.” [Joe Sachs] As Aristotle summarised in his definition of the genre: "Tragedy, then, is a representation of a noble and complete action, having the proper magnitude; it employs language that has been artistically enhanced . . . ; it is presented in dramatic, not narrative form, and achieves, through the representation of pitiable and fearful incidents, the catharsis of such incidents"[Aristotle, trans. L. Golden] That catharsis, as I explained in an earlier SOLO article, is one of intellectual clarification, which is the very point of all drama, and of all art. Tragedy gives us insight into the nature of human beings with free will making “decisions of some moment.” For a dramatic example of a “decision of some moment” that had fearful consequences, we see in Troy Paris’ unthinking decision to abduct the wife of the man with whom he was attempting to make peace. Instead of peace, that choice brought war and the demise of everything Paris valued. His brother Hector, too, made a choice: not to turn back and give up his erring brother and his newly-betrothed. His choice was made with a clearer head, and he too was made to suffer the consequences of that fateful decision. Achilles too makes a fearful decision, one on which the book turns - though not the film. The wilful warrior Achilles chooses to stay in his tent to teach the unprincipled Agamemnon a lesson. The lesson is eventually learnt but at enormous cost to his comrades and to himself: "What pleasure is this to me now," laments Achilles to his mother, "when my beloved friend is dead, Patroklos, whom I cherished beyond all friends, as the equal of my own soul; I am bereft of him." His rage at Patroklos’ death and at his own hand in that death turns Achilles into an unthinking killing machine; the anger of grief has taken over, not to be purged until Priam’s courageous visit to Achille’s tent. Priam kisses the hand of his son’s killer, beseeching him to "remember your father… Pity me with him in mind, since I am more pitiful even than he; I have dared what no other mortal on earth ever dared, to stretch out my lips to the hand of the man who murdered my children." The simple humanity of Priam’s act finally unlocks Achilles’ own grief. With this purging, Achilles’ mind begins functioning once again, and he finally sees the nature of his own actions and of Priam’s own humanity. He sees a young man who has committed senseless slaughter in an extended act of rage; he sees an old man driven to the very limits of the humanly possible in a bid to retrieve that which he most loves. “In the grip of wonder they do not see enemies. They see truly… They see a son a father should be proud of and a father a son should revere.” [Joe Sachs] They see the world anew even as they grieve, as does the thoughtful reader of this drama, and Achilles begins to make amends for his behaviour. The character of Achilles achieves intellectual insight through the actions of Priam, and consequently mastery of himself. “Achilles,” observes Leon Golden, “is a classic case study of the psychotherapeutic process, which begins with the attainment of intellectual epiphany and which leads to the mature control of emotion and the responsible interaction with other human beings.” Such insights are the result of well-worked tragedy. They are conspicuously absent however from your typical summer blockbuster; they do not tangibly appear in Troy, the film. Where The Iliad ends with the burial of Hector, the film ends instead with the destruction of Troy. This is an appropriate contrast – the book as tragedy has as its climax the transformation of Achilles; the film as blockbuster has as its climax the spectacle of Troy in ruins. It is an especially appropriate contrast because, as Aristotle observed somewhat derisively, “the production of spectacular effects depends more on the art of the stage machinist than on that of the poet.” There are no poets in Hollywood today, certainly not those whom Aristotle called “superior poets [who] rely on the inner structure of the play rather than spectacle to arouse pity and fear.” We have instead only the “stage machinists” - “those who rely heavily on spectacle [to] create a sense, not of the terrible, but only of the monstrous.” Aristotle ranks spectacle least important of the five elements of tragedy, however in Hollywood spectacle is all. In Culver City, spectacle trumps insight every time. Aristotle would definitely not have approved. So, was the film at least entertaining then? Well, if the plot is dramatically weak and your lead actor is unable even to spell the word ‘insight’ there is little even a superior machinist such as Wolfgang Peterson can do to remedy it – a great pity, since his Das Boot really is superior tragedy of such quality I’m sure Aristotle himself would have celebrated it. Of Troy I suggest you decide for yourself, dear reader – but do read the book as well. And do consider the nature of tragedy – it really is a blockbuster of an artistic concept, one that unlocks the door to understanding the true nature of art.
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