Helen of Troy (TV miniseries)
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| 'Helen of Troy' | |
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| Directed by | John Kent Harrison |
| Produced by | John Kent Harrison |
| Written by | Ronni Kern |
| Starring | Sienna Guillory Matthew Marsden Rufus Sewell Emilia Fox |
| Distributed by | Universal Studios |
| Release date(s) | 2003 |
| Running time | 177 min |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
Helen of Troy is a television miniseries based upon Homer's story of the Trojan War, as recounted in the epic poem, The Iliad. This TV miniseries also shares the name with a 1956 movie staring Stanley Baker. It stars Sienna Guillory as Helen, Matthew Marsden as Paris, Rufus Sewell as Agamemnon, James Callis as Menelaus, John Rhys-Davies as Priam, former Bond girl Maryam d'Abo as Hecuba, and Stellan Skarsgård as Theseus.
The film is placed in the early classical period rather than the correct early Bronze Age; the Greeks are shown with post-Bronze Age classical hoplite dress and arms. Made on a relatively low budget, Helen of Troy was released at a time when interest in the subject was high due to the soon-to-be-released Troy.
The film also focuses more on the life of Helen herself rather than simply the Trojan War. The entire first half deals with Helen's life before Troy, and includes a number of mythological facts that other versions either gloss over or omit, such as Helen's abduction by Theseus and the actual agreement of the Greek kings to use her marriage as their peace agreement.
In contrast to Troy (which was roughly based on The Iliad which itself only depicts some of the events of the final year of the war), the film tells much of the story of the War. Most notably, Helen of Troy features and discusses the intervention of the gods (the film's opening scene shows Hera, Athena and Aphrodite at the Judgement of Paris) as written by Homer. This does not mean, however, that it is more accurate, as a number of the characters (namely Paris, as stated above), do not resemble their Homeric counterparts. Both films feature the interpretation of Agamemnon as a power-hungry tyrant, although this Helen of Troy adds a new dimension by addressing Agamemnon's sacrifice of his daughter Iphigeneia to the gods.
