Most realistic movie depictions of ancient warfare

[john m roberts]

I don't see this changing, the reason being that people find formation fighting boring and the greatest sin in Hollywood is boring the audience. The first 3 minutes of the Hot Gates batle in 300 was actually pretty good. It conveyed the tremendous effort and strain of men trying desperately to hold the integrity of their phalanx, covering immediately after thrusting, using their shields to push, etc. But 3 minutes is about as long as that sort of thing will hold most audiences' attention, and they had to let it break up into individual fights. Let's face it, those of us who appreciate accurate archaic battle tactics are a somewhat tiny minority.

For much of the history of movies, people have been conditioned by depictions of modern (post 19th century) battle. In modern warfare the formation is there, it's just so widespread and dispersed that it's invisible to observers so what we see is small-unit tactics within the context of a much larger battle - Tom Hanks' little group of Rangers in "Saving Private Ryan", for instance, or Winters' paratroopers in "Band of Brothers." You only see the formations in those scenes of guys back in London pushing unit markers around on a big map.

The Gaugamela battle in "Alexander" was very well done, but it paid much more attention to the chaotic cavalry engagements than to the slogging battle of the phalanxes against Persian infantry. That's showbiz.