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List Price: $6.98 | | Label: Timeless Media Group
Salesrank: 64445
Released: May 8, 2006 |
| Our Price: $0.54 |
| Used Price: $80.17 |
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MPAA Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Alexander the Great was one of the most extraordinary people in history. King of Macedonia and one of the greatest military leaders of all time, he conquered much of the known world before he was 30 and was dead by the age of 32. In this color presentation set in 330 B.C., we join Alexander and his mighty army marching through Persia on a mission to conquer the world, but there is trouble brewing. Karonos, one of Alexander's most trusted generals, believes Alexander's campaign is foolhardy. He plans a coup, after which the war-weary soldiers can head home. Alexander the Great is a noteworthy film as a launching pad for several careers including soon-to-be Captain Kirk, William Shatner, as the man who leads his men into battle. There is a pre-Batman, Adam West as Cleander, Alexander's right hand man. The turn-coat Karonos is played by John Cassavetes, who would distinguish himself both as an actor and behind the camera as a director. Also on board is an aging Joseph Cotton who, like Alexander, is victimized by the betrayal of Karonos.
Alexander the Great Reviews:
William Shatner IS Alexander the Great 
2009-05-15 - The Shatman is Al the Great, the favorite of the gods, fighting for peace and freedom by, er, invading Persia in this 52-minute TV pilot from 1964 that ABC were so impressed with that they sat on it until 1968... As if that isn't enough of a casting leap, there's Adam West as his special friend Cleander, a very worse-for-wear Joseph Cotten as the surrogate father figure, John Cassavettes as a treacherous Greek general after Al's job, Simon Oakland as Cassavettes' sidekick and Cliff Osmond as a Persian general in command of an army four times the size of Al's - which, in real terms, means about 25 if you don't count the stock footage. Filmed in the kind of Californian foothills locations you'd later find Captain Kirk slugging it out with Abraham Lincoln and a lizard man and directed by Phil Karlson (The Phenix City Story, Kansas City Confidential), it all plays rather like a poor episode of The Time Tunnel with the sci-fi elements removed. It's easy to imagine Oliver Stone watching it to cheer himself up whenever he thinks about how his version(s) reception...
Timeless' DVD release is less than great - after the main titles it takes you straight to a menu rather than the rest of the show, while the running time is padded out with a cut and paste 'documentary' made up of trailer footage from other epics. Transfer quality is acceptable but nothing more.
Shatner is Alexander and......Help!
2009-03-26 - William Shatner, as every young actor does...has to start somewhere. ANd although his youth is no excuse - his performace has the Greek icon 'Alexander' is strong.
It's just everything else is week. His fellow cast is light on the seriousness of the part and the production value is a little scary.
Although if your a fan od Shatner, you might want this for the pure excercise of seeing the begingings of Shanter's often satarized 'acting style'. You will see his dramatic appraoch to anger and greed.
Overall the film is slow and weak, but I believe the only reason it was made available was because William Shatner is in it! 3-26-09.
The battle footage used in the ALEXANDER TV pilot... 
2008-07-28 - The battle footage used in the ALEXANDER THE GREAT TV pilot was lifted from the 1960 Steve Reeves epic GIANT OF MARATHON, which was about the Greeks battling invading Persians. The ALEXANDER pilot is campy fun, and certainly the casting director had an eye for talent (Shatner would soon be conquering the universe as Captain Kirk, and Adam West would soon be the caped crusader). The cast, including old pros Joseph Cotten, Simon Oakland, and the indie-minded John Cassavetes, fastidiously overact the material. The filmed-in-Greece battle scenes don't quite match the Utah-lensed combat inserts. Shatner is pretty good as the conqueror, but Ziva Rodann's strange role of Alexander's main squeeze/Princess/Exotic Dancer makes no sense at all. Fun for sword and sandal fans, it was nice to see the show again after a forty year lapse. The DVD quality is very acceptable, considering the scarcity of the program itself. It's no better or worse than the average Alpha DVD, but even that level of quality is more than I expected.
Interesting TV production 
2008-05-24 - First, it is totally amazing to me that this pilot was not released as a TV special around 1968 (when Shanter, Adam West, & Cassavetes) were all big names. If produced then instead of 1963 ,the production would of cost much, much more with this cast. It seems if it was released then, it would of had a guaranteed built-in TV audience and a successful broadcast.
As a TV sitcom it is an interesting production, I was expecting something alot cheaper looking instead it was quite respectable in costumes,sets and even a magnificent battle scene with Memnon at the end with hundreds if not thousands of extras. It is written as a TV sitcom, and I do not think a story of this magnitude lends itself to trite TV serial plots but the subject would of made an excellent TV movie multi-part serial ( a format that did not exist at the time.) I think all who find the subject of Alexander fascinating , will find this for the price to be an interesting production . Alexander's mistress/wife is a real bombshell with an hour glass figure.
Beam me away from this movie, Scotty!
2008-03-09 - I had read [...] that the TV-pilot starring William Shatner (before his Star Trek fame) was actually "the best Alexander out there." So, this evening my husband and I gave it a try. The cheesy music at the beginning should have been a warning. The actors didn't say their lines; they shouted them; the scenes consisted mostly of men on horseback galloping here and there; Alexander's love-interest looked ridiculously out of place with her bee-hive hairdo, false eyelashes, and thick eyeliner. In fact, everything about the movie oozed the artificiality of the 60's. My husband gave up on it after about twenty minutes, but I stuck it out for the full hour and a half. The only thing I can say in its favor is that its demise as a potential series allowed Shatner to go on to star in Star Trek. If his "Alexander" had been a success, we might never have known Capt. Kirk!
