A Total War Saga: TROY officially revealed

Started by Martok, September 19, 2019, 11:48:46 AM

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Anguille


FlickJax

Well I will look at when finished, too many downers on TW lately :(  give them a chance

MengJiao

Quote from: Speedy on September 19, 2019, 07:58:44 PM
Such a fascinating time period and they focus on the boring old barbarian Greeks a minor sideshow of the time- big fail total war.

  The Myceneans were a sideshow but they weren't particularly "barbarian"...they had Linear B and citadels and such.  And then around 1250-1150 BC they collapsed like all the other Bronze Age Empires of the time (So Hittites, Assyrians, Akkadians etc.) except for Egypt (who defeated the "Sea Peoples" whoever they were) and survived the big crash at the end of the Bronze age.  So it was an incredibly dynamic period and its rather poorly represented by some Attic pots and a dopey war around Troy/Iluim.  On the other hand, even within the Greek tradition there are some cool things like the Fake Helen who went to Troy and the real Helen who went to Egypt (a very weird tale)....so there is some potential and the Gods could be cool...as you may recall, when the action opens in the Iliad, the Gods are on vacation in Eithiopia.

ArizonaTank

I wish they would get back to black powder. 
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Hofstadter

Black powder ai  was terrible though. They never formed lines
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Martok

Quote from: Anguille on September 20, 2019, 03:13:07 AM
Quote from: Gusington on September 19, 2019, 06:39:40 PM
^Never seen Troy 2004...I'll work on it.
Cool movie....you really should see it.
Agreed. 

MD's poo-pooing aside, it's a decent film.  Maybe not as good as Gladiator or Ben-Hur, but still worth watching.  If you have even just a mild affinity for sword-and-sandal epics, you owe it to yourself to sit down and watch Troy at least once. 




Quote from: ArizonaTank on September 20, 2019, 11:19:58 AM
I wish they would get back to black powder. 
I just don't get the appeal of a Total War title set in an era of gunpowder warfare, at least from the perspective of the battles.  I could see some interesting possibilities on the strategic level (dealing with the diplomatic & religious factors of the Thirty Years War could be intriguing, for instance), but the tactical appeal eludes me. 

That being said, I admit I wouldn't object to an Empire 2...as long they actually did it right this time.  Proper naval battles, a proper "imperial" atmosphere with Great Powers playing off against each other, and an AI that could actually find its ass with both hands would all be welcome. 
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besilarius

If you enjoy sword and sandle epics, there was an old Black&White one from the early 60s, think it may have been titled With Caesar's Legions.
In the climactic fight between the young, noble Roman and the hairy, shaggy barbarian, the fight was staged in front of a huge scrum of soldiers fighting in the background.  At the height of the action, with the Roman on the ropes and nearly getting skewered, an assistant director with a clipboard walks onto the set.  He points at different people, who rise from the dead and walk off.  Presumably telling them, "You're in the next scene, you're in the next scene."
And they never cut it!  The whole thing stayed in the final release.  Viewers loved it. 

Italian cinema was a real quirky mix.  I think in one that was shot under Mussolini, they filmed a Battle of Zama, and acutally killed an elephant.
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Ubercat

Quote from: besilarius on September 21, 2019, 06:47:20 AM
If you enjoy sword and sandle epics, there was an old Black&White one from the early 60s, think it may have been titled With Caesar's Legions.
In the climactic fight between the young, noble Roman and the hairy, shaggy barbarian, the fight was staged in front of a huge scrum of soldiers fighting in the background.  At the height of the action, with the Roman on the ropes and nearly getting skewered, an assistant director with a clipboard walks onto the set.  He points at different people, who rise from the dead and walk off.  Presumably telling them, "You're in the next scene, you're in the next scene."
And they never cut it!  The whole thing stayed in the final release.  Viewers loved it. 
...

It's got to be in YouTube. I did a search for that title and couldn't find it. Any ideas how to narrow it down?
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besilarius

#23
Sorry, no.  There used to be on local TV in Washington, DC, a show that only showed sword and sandal flicks on a Saturday night.  Would have been sometime around 1966.  This particular one was on a couple of times, but have no recollection of the title if it wasn't Caesar's Legions?
The one where an elephant was killed, am pretty certain was titled, Scipio Africanus.  In Italian, of course and was released late 1930s?

Ah, think this is it  https://www.amazon.com/Scipio-Africanus-Hannibal-Annibale-Ninchi/dp/B07143NHZJ

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scipio_Africanus:_The_Defeat_of_Hannibal

The film is presented from Scipio's point of view and covers the last part of the Second Punic War where Hannibal retreats from Italy to Carthage with haste to defend his home and fight the final battle of Zama. Hannibal is presented as an honorable foe who, like Scipio, is bound to follow his destiny and serve his nation no matter what the cost. Political intrigue arises when Hasdrubal's daughter, Queen Sophonisba, uses her seductive charms to coax her Numidian husband Syphax and his rival Massanisa to fight the Romans. The level of historical detail is probably the most faithful than any other film on Roman history. All of the clothing, architecture, military equipment and tactics are presented with exact accuracy. The legions are shown with the proper uniforms, armaments, and tactics of that period. The tactical maniple formations are shown as opposed to the cohort formations of the Late Republic. The quinquireme galleys were produced to exact scale and made fully functional: they also include the innovative hooked and swiveling boarding ramp (corvus) used during that time. The battle scene of Zama is the most impresive and graphic ever presented in a film on antiquity using 50 elephants and replicated at 1/10 the scale with 30,000 actors. The battle scene is extremely graphic even in comparison to modern films with some very violent close quarter combat. This is probably not a film for animal lovers as, unfortunately, some of the elephants were speared and butchered to add realism to the film: Mussolini felt that historical realism outweighed the lives of these poor animals. The English script, written and dubbed in 1937 by an American company, is also outstanding and as stoic as the speeches recited in Livy's histories on the wars with Hannibal.

And this appears to be the movie on Youtube:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7kIP5YZZYM
"Most gods throw dice, but Fate plays chess, and you don't find out until too late that he's been playing with two queens all along".  Terry Pratchett.

During filming of Airplane, Leslie Nielsen used a whoopee cushion to keep the cast off-balance. Hays said that Nielsen "played that thing like a maestro"

Tallulah Bankhead: "I'll come and make love to you at five o'clock. If I'm late, start without me."

"When all other trusts fail, turn to Flashman." — Abraham Lincoln.

"I have enjoyed very warm relations with my two husbands."
"With your eyes closed?"
"That helped."  Lauren Bacall

Master Chiefs are sneaky, dastardly, and snarky miscreants who thrive on the tears of Ensigns and belly dancers.   Admiral Gerry Bogan.

Speedy

LOL if someone finds the clipboard scene please post the timestamp.