Men Only

If you ask an American teenager what a Trojan is, chances are they'll tell you it's a rubber - 'Trojan' being the brand name of the States' most popular prophylactic. Call me puerile, but the unsafe connotations of the word 'Trojan' in relation to the sale of condoms has always seemed to me a source of some hilarity. For, as any fule kno, while the seductive Helen of Troy may have possessed the face that launched a thousand ships, the Trojans themselves were notable for foolishly allowing an apparently innocuous package through their impenetrable gates which promptly burst open, spilling Greek seamen everywhere, with disastrous consequences.

The frankly bizarre story of the Trojan horse (which comes not from Homer but from Virgil) forms the climax of Troy, Wolfgang Petersen's teen-friendly epic in which glamorous pin-ups like Brad Pitt and Orlando Bloom knock the crap out of each other amidst some spectacular period CGI scenery.

It's a sprawling two-and-three-quarter hours of a movie, at least one third of which is taken up with the sight of big shouty men plunging axes into each other's chests and punching each other in the face. And then, after some bloody swordfights, spectacular explosions, huge army charges and eye-popping sea invasions, it falls to Sean Bean to rub his chin thoughtfully while gazing at an equestrian toy and apparently thinking, "Hmm, let's forget all this rucking business and just hide inside an enormous wooden donkey instead..." The rest is history.