Iliad Vs. Troy - the Book Vs. the Film

ILIAD VS. TROY

(The Book vs. the Film)

First off, Homer's Iliad was the main source of influence for Wolfgang Petersen's film, Troy, that is released in 2004. However, even though it is directly influenced by the poem, Troy does not stay true to the poem for the entire movie. Both texts deal with the same subject, the siege of troy which was ended with the trickery of the wooden horse. However the characters themselves are shown with different actions between the two texts which revels different motives and thoughts.

These differences are what are to be discussed today from within the film and the Iliad:

Within the Iliad, the war upon Troy lasted for 10, presumably very long years before the wooden horse ploy was developed and put into play, this is very different from what the film Troy depicts, which only has the war last for 17 days before the walls of Troy are breached from within inside. This difference is pretty massive, however there is very likely a practical reason for this length difference, in that there is just too much time to cover over the entire film within three hours, others the film would have had to be split into multiple different parts which it is possible the directors wouldn't have the budget to fund this massive project which would have been required over several films. The audience appeal would have very likely have diminished over the films, especially considering that there wasn't always action occurring, such as during the nights with politics taking place.

The plot of the book and the film has a very big difference especially on its coverage and focus. The coverage of the film starts all the way from why the Trojan-Greeks conflict started up to the death of Achilles and the fall of Troy. While on the other hand, the book' onset is narrowed down to the ninth year of the Trojan War wherein the conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon is intensified. Aside from this the book ends the epic in the change of Achilles character. From the difference of the said coverage, it can be derived that the focus of the book is on the wrath of Achilles being resolved, while the film is the settlement of the conflict of the Trojans and Greeks. Even if the film's focus is on a more general conflict, our hero Achilles is not totally thrown off the periphery. He still is a very important character in the story. The direction of the war became dependent on his participation. The film is also very compressed and comprehensive. And to fit everything into place, some twists on the characters was made. An example would be Briseis who was used to display the conflict between Achilles and Agamemnon. She is also used to put into story why Achilles changed his character like forgetting about the glory of war, letting the Myrmidons save themselves and sail home, and most important is the plotting of his death.

Other differences could be accounted on the change of audience. The audience of Iliad (Homer's audience, the Achaeans, etc.) and modern audience of the film is culturally miles apart. Someof the results are changes of setting, cutting off too many repeated wars, less mythological appearances shortening of the characters profiling. The films setting is limited by of course production budget, the Trojan land (beach, walls of troy, battlefield in front of city walls) lost the books' rivers, mountainside, Mt Olympus settings, etc. The wars that took place in the film was also limited to battles that inflicts significant turn of the plot like, the encounter that yields the Greeks Briseis, the battle without Myrmidons, the battle that slew Patroclus and that which caused the fall of Troy. Again, one of the reasons is budget and aside from that is audience. Modern audience will be bored with scenes that are insignificant to the general outcome. Lastly, the long character profiling would probably bore the audience but in Homer's case it will just stir his audiences' emotion once their place is mentioned, bringing up their honorable heritage.

On the Characters

One of the most significant change in character happened to Briseis. From a plain priestess from Khryse, she was converted as Hector's cousin. A change made to her was strategic to make the film comprehensive of all significant events. We know that the wrath of Achilles is unleashed after the "Briseis incident"; this incident is used by the book and film very differently. The