Helen of Troy
Dec 3, 2011 6:02:16 GMT
Post by keftiugirl on Dec 3, 2011 6:02:16 GMT
Hah! You're probably right, anglophile! He was tricked! (Shakes fist at falseness of Hollywood.)
Walt, they did a bad job explaining that scene, but in the real story, Clytemnestra kills Agamemnon because he sacrifices Iphigenia at Aulis in order to get the winds back in the the Greek's favor so that they can sail off to Troy. Agie tells Cly that Iphigenia is to marry Achilles (who is supposed to be uber handsome), but when Iphigenia gets to Aulis, she is sacrificed instead. (In one Greek play, they have Artemis swooping in to save the girl - deus ex machina and all that jazz.)
Cly takes revenge by sleeping with Agie's cousin, Aegisthus, and plotting Agie's murder. The poor woman is pushed totally over the edge by the extra fact that Agie returns with Cassandra (daughter of Priam, princess of Troy, and seer) as a concubine.
The Atreus family has a horrible family history that includes lots of killing of family members by competing brothers and the eating of some...errr...immediate family of Aegisthus (his brothers, I think) by the elder generation. Aegisthus' own father is served the...er... meal...by his brother, who is Agamemon and Menelaus' own father (I think- I can't remember and it's like 1 AM now). So the whole House of Atreus is a tad dysfunctional to begin with & this is the lovely family into which Helen and Cly marry (I would have run away too!).
When Agie returns, it is to find Cly and Aegisthus (his cousin) as lovers who plot against Agie. They first do away with Agie in the bath, whose death is compared to a sacrifice of a bull. Then they kill Cassandra, who had been brought back to Mycenae. Cassandra, in the original play, titled Agamemon, is the narrator of the murder scene, which she describes in terms of a sacrifice, and she knows that she is next (because she is a seer), and she foretells her own death. She also narrates the horrid family history of the House of Atreus so that the audience understands why Cly & Aegisthus do what they do. However, Cly is the one who delivers the killing blow.
The play is followed by two more plays that explain what happens next (Cly's murder by her son, Orestes, who avenges his father's death, and Orestes search for cleansing from the matricide that he committed).
So I don't know why they needed to add in a fictional rape by Agie as I think that there is enough original material to be Hollywood - unless - the sacrifice & consumption of one's extended family, spousal marital indiscretions, a 10 year war, and the murder of one's husband and his concubine are all too tame for those Hollywood folks?
Walt, they did a bad job explaining that scene, but in the real story, Clytemnestra kills Agamemnon because he sacrifices Iphigenia at Aulis in order to get the winds back in the the Greek's favor so that they can sail off to Troy. Agie tells Cly that Iphigenia is to marry Achilles (who is supposed to be uber handsome), but when Iphigenia gets to Aulis, she is sacrificed instead. (In one Greek play, they have Artemis swooping in to save the girl - deus ex machina and all that jazz.)
Cly takes revenge by sleeping with Agie's cousin, Aegisthus, and plotting Agie's murder. The poor woman is pushed totally over the edge by the extra fact that Agie returns with Cassandra (daughter of Priam, princess of Troy, and seer) as a concubine.
The Atreus family has a horrible family history that includes lots of killing of family members by competing brothers and the eating of some...errr...immediate family of Aegisthus (his brothers, I think) by the elder generation. Aegisthus' own father is served the...er... meal...by his brother, who is Agamemon and Menelaus' own father (I think- I can't remember and it's like 1 AM now). So the whole House of Atreus is a tad dysfunctional to begin with & this is the lovely family into which Helen and Cly marry (I would have run away too!).
When Agie returns, it is to find Cly and Aegisthus (his cousin) as lovers who plot against Agie. They first do away with Agie in the bath, whose death is compared to a sacrifice of a bull. Then they kill Cassandra, who had been brought back to Mycenae. Cassandra, in the original play, titled Agamemon, is the narrator of the murder scene, which she describes in terms of a sacrifice, and she knows that she is next (because she is a seer), and she foretells her own death. She also narrates the horrid family history of the House of Atreus so that the audience understands why Cly & Aegisthus do what they do. However, Cly is the one who delivers the killing blow.
The play is followed by two more plays that explain what happens next (Cly's murder by her son, Orestes, who avenges his father's death, and Orestes search for cleansing from the matricide that he committed).
So I don't know why they needed to add in a fictional rape by Agie as I think that there is enough original material to be Hollywood - unless - the sacrifice & consumption of one's extended family, spousal marital indiscretions, a 10 year war, and the murder of one's husband and his concubine are all too tame for those Hollywood folks?
I thought my family tree was complicated ;D.
And- FINALLY-Sean Bean didn't freaking die!