Comparing Homer s Iliad With Wolfgang Petersen s Film...

In my response I am going to compare Homer’s Iliad with Wolfgang Petersen’s film Troy. The points I am going to compare are the fight between Paris and Menelaus, the role of the gods, the death of Patroclus and the fight between Hector and Achilles. The Iliad is an epic poem consisting of 23 books by Homer, which focuses on 50 days in the ninth year of the Trojan War, whereas the movie Troy directed by Wolfgang Petersen tells the whole 10 year story of the myth. The Trojan War happened in the Bronze Age and was a war between the Mycenaean-Greece kingdom and the kingdom of Troy. Homers Iliad is believed to be one of the first works of western literature and was set 500 years earlier than the time in which he lived. The Iliad is to be listened to, not read, unless you are the poet performing the epic. The poet would chant or sing the Iliad while being accompanied by lyre, to help tell the story. It had a set rhythm and metre in each line of the poem, which the poet had to follow but it is lost in translation as its original written language is Ancient Greek. The film Troy was released on the 14th May 2004 and is loosely based on the Iliad. Brad Pitt, who was 40 years old during the making of this movie, and stars as Achilles. The ending of the film is not from the Iliad but from Virgil’s Aeneid, as the Iliad ends with Hectors death and funeral. The Role of the Gods Throughout the Iliad, gods play an important role and are a focal point. They are always helping out and also