Film / Alexander the Great (1968)

Alexander the Great, directed by Phil Karlson, was originally a 1964 television pilot for a series created by Robert Pirosh. It was released as a made-for-TV movie in 1968, after stars William Shatner and Adam West reached levels of fame which finally rendered it (in studio executives' opinion) "viewable".

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Alexander the Great contains examples of the following tropes:

• Beard of Evil: The Greeks? Clean-shaven good guys. The Persians? Bad guys with beards.

• Braids of Barbarism: Memnon looks like he's wearing a black mop head.
• Captain Obvious: Greek arrow, you say?
• Due to the Dead: Alexander makes sure Antigonus gets his.
• Dying Clue: A name written in blood is probably a pretty big hint.

• Historical Hero Upgrade: This version of Alexander is a consistently benevolent and magnanimous king who's a case of Good Is Not Soft at worst, and who states his primary goal is to put an end to the "barbarism" in Persia, implying he wouldn't be trying to conquer it if he had some other way to do that. In reality, Alexander kept pushing eastward after completing his conquest of the Achaemenid Empire. Before his death, he was making plans to invade Arabia and Italy and expand his domains in North Africa. While Alexander really was capable of great kindness and generosity, he was a notoriously volatile man who could also be very ruthless and even cruel to the point of borderline sadism.

• It's All My Fault: Antigonus, when he thinks Alexander is dead.
• Jabba Table Manners: Memnon addresses his troops with food falling out of his mouth.

• Mr. Fanservice: William! Shatner! the! entire! freaking! movie!

• Rank Scales with Asskicking: Justified when Alexander hacks Karonos to death in a few swings because that kinda was how you got to be king in those days.

• Shirtless Scene: Shirtless film.
• Start X to Stop X: Let's, attack the Persians, because
  Alexander: I came to put an end to wars forever!
• Suddenly Shouting:
  Karonos:THEN YOU'RE A BIGGER FOOL THAN I THOUGHT!
• World of Ham: Averted, surprisingly in a film which stars two of North America's largest hams. William Shatner is unusually subdued (for him) as the Ruler of the World, as is Adam West, who, despite being depicted as Alexander's BFF, has maybe three lines.