YMMV / Helen of Troy

• Aluminum Christmas Trees: Achilles and Patroclus not being lovers might seem like Hays Code era Bowderlization, but in reality the portrayal of them as lovers is Post-Homeric, and even then there were individuals who did not view them as lovers. In the Iliad, although they were portrayed as Ambiguously Bi, the most they were portrayed as were close friends and kinsmen, though in the film itself, the kinsmen bit is unmentioned.
• Draco in Leather Pants: Paris come across as this in the film. He's gone from being the villain of the myth to the hero of the movie.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Cedric Hardwicke as Priam, Stanley Baker as Achilles, Niall Mac Ginnis as Menelaus, Torin Thatcher as Ulysses, Robert Brown as Polydorus and Tonio Selwart as Alpheous in the 1956 film. The fact that so few of them are Trojans should be an indication of who is the more memorable side.
  • For the 2003 miniseries it is Rufus Sewell as Agamemnon, John Rhys-Davies as Priam, Emilia Fox as Cassandra, Stellan Skarsgard as Theseus and Jim Carter as Pirithous. Again it shows the Greeks are more memorable even if only one of the ones listed took part in the Trojan War.
• Evil Is Cool:
  • In the 1956 film Achilles, Menelaus and Ulysses are all portrayed as villains but that doesn't stop them from being more memorable than any of the heroes.
  • In the 2003 miniseries Agamemnon is only equalled in memorability by his Trojan counterpart Priam.
• Ron the Death Eater: Menelaus come across as this in the film. He's gone from being the hero of the myth to the villain of the movie.
• Unintentionally Sympathetic: Menelaus comes across as being far more sympathetic than Helen.
• Vanilla Protagonist: Paris and Helen are both rather standard characters of the Sword and Sandal genre here, with the former his Adaptational Heroism could even be called a contributor, and their respective actors are average at best, just plain bad at worse, causing them to be overshadowed by more interesting characters be it in the film or miniseries.