Having had the extreme treat of seeing TROY last night, thanks to a sneak preview provided to the Air Force Base, I thought I'd share my thoughts.

(no spoilers) - as IF anything could "spoil" this one !!!

To borrow a line from "Big Fish"......
There are only two actors in the world; Orlando..... and everyone else.

My limited brain does not command the adjectives necessary to even attempt to describe what the on-screen presence of Orlando in TROY is like..... Legolas is "Perfect" - I'm still sure of that unalterable fact. So, what then, is the vision of a gloriously dark-eyed Orlando pulling back on the bow and firing an arrow with that same fluid intensity.........

When I saw "Pirates" the first time, I said "I thought I was prepared for the brown-eyed Orlando, but I was not".... with TROY..... I thought I was prepared for the half-naked Orlando.... but I was absolutely not....

Oh yeah -- the man can act too !!! His character, Paris, is definitely "a lover, not a fighter" so he is not all about the warrior this time - nor does he "practice three hours a day". :-) Even IF he were not quite so.... so.... so.... whatever it is that he IS.... Orlando could still break hearts with just the look in the depths of his eyes.

That said.....

TROY is a fantastic movie !!! It has all the elements of LOTR, except the magical. Perfectly casted, well scripted, and beautifully photographed. The only flaw that I could come up with, was that the music was not particularly good.

Just as with versions of the Camelot mythology, TROY takes liberties with "history" - at least what I knew of it, but the core story is there, and every main character is interesting. The movie is about human relationships and emotions, much more than about the battles and fighting - though those are spectacularly filmed (I think Peter Jackson would approve!)

Sean Bean needs to fire his agent at once! The fact that his name is in small print on the poster, and that he was not highlighted in the trailer, is absurd --- his character is very important to the story, and he was on screen far more than we anticipated, looking much handsomer than he does as Boromir; but that could be due to the fact that he smiles so much.

Brad Pitt was the most attractive I've seen him, with the exception of "Meet Joe Black". I was impressed with his performance - he is an "actor" not just a "movie star". Even better - to me - than Brad, was Eric Bana - very well cast as Orlando's older brother, with similar coloring, and an also wonderful performance.

That's all I'm going to give away. SEE IT - or it's your loss!! If I did not have to wait until next weekend to see TROY again, I wouldn't !