It's all over now, the Greeks have taken Troy and have killed every male in the place. The wooden horse idea worked beautifully and now it's to divide up the spoils which in this case is the women of Troy, both high and low born.
Highest born of the lot is Hecuba, widow of the late King Priam and mother of Hector and Paris, both dead now. Imagine Eleanor of Aquitaine if her husband and all those loving sons had been slain in a cataclysm. Then you have some idea of what Katharine Hepburn's performance as Hecuba is all about.
Hepburn is aided and abetted in this film by three other international stars and each of their stories is told in relation to Hecuba. As Cassandra, Hepburn's daughter, Genevieve Bujold takes refuge in madness. The Gods gave her the gift of prophecy with the caveat that no one would believe her prophecies and it's all come too true. Vanessa Redgrave is Andromache, widow of Hector who has her little son killed by order of the Greeks to make the triumph complete before becoming part of the Spartan king's harem.
Then there's the one whose hormones started it all. Fair Helen, older and not terribly wiser, played by Irene Papas. Her scenes with Hepburn have some real bite to them, the best in the film. And Irene Papas is the only Greek in this Greek tragedy.
It's a powerful film, an anti-war film made at the time Vietnam was still a war zone. It only had limited release at the time it was out, it wasn't exactly box office material.
But it's a good film adaption of a classic and nice that one of Euripedes plays is preserved for us by four of the best players around of the female genders.
In the years labeled BC good woman's parts were actually being written.
Highest born of the lot is Hecuba, widow of the late King Priam and mother of Hector and Paris, both dead now. Imagine Eleanor of Aquitaine if her husband and all those loving sons had been slain in a cataclysm. Then you have some idea of what Katharine Hepburn's performance as Hecuba is all about.
Hepburn is aided and abetted in this film by three other international stars and each of their stories is told in relation to Hecuba. As Cassandra, Hepburn's daughter, Genevieve Bujold takes refuge in madness. The Gods gave her the gift of prophecy with the caveat that no one would believe her prophecies and it's all come too true. Vanessa Redgrave is Andromache, widow of Hector who has her little son killed by order of the Greeks to make the triumph complete before becoming part of the Spartan king's harem.
Then there's the one whose hormones started it all. Fair Helen, older and not terribly wiser, played by Irene Papas. Her scenes with Hepburn have some real bite to them, the best in the film. And Irene Papas is the only Greek in this Greek tragedy.
It's a powerful film, an anti-war film made at the time Vietnam was still a war zone. It only had limited release at the time it was out, it wasn't exactly box office material.
But it's a good film adaption of a classic and nice that one of Euripedes plays is preserved for us by four of the best players around of the female genders.
In the years labeled BC good woman's parts were actually being written.