Cartoon Classics: The Trojan War in Modern Animation

Stories of the ancient Greek heroes occupy a privileged position in the literature of antiquity. This is especially true of those heroes who took part in the Trojan War and whose exploits are recounted in Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. These lengthy and detailed poems follow larger-than-life heroes like Achilles, Odysseus and Ajax as they set out on quests and battle rivals in order to achieve lofty goals: the acquisition of wealth, of power, of honor, and of course, undying glory (or kleos). Important events in the Trojan War and in the lives of these heroes were also related in the poems of the epic cycle such as the Cypria and the Aethiopis, and while these survive only in fragments and later summaries, the stories they contained are still a familiar part of the wider heroic tradition.

When we think of ancient Greek culture, it is often these epic tales that first spring to mind, as they remain popular today. They also continue to be retold and reinterpreted in many artistic genres including literary and historical fiction, fine arts, theater, and perhaps most notably, live-action film and television.

These modern engagements have themselves been well chronicled and studied by scholars of classical antiquity, but there is one genre that has received little attention as of yet, and that is animation. In what follows, I aim to fill this gap by presenting an overview of animated works that depict events associated with the Trojan War (I will save depictions of the Odyssey for another post). I will also offer some initial observations on the unique approaches they take to this material and propose further avenues of inquiry. This work stems from my broader, ongoing web-based project called Animated Antiquity, an archive of animated representations of ancient Greek and Roman culture that is accompanied by background notes and commentary, where you can learn more about the films and TV shows discussed herein, as well as many others.

For all their popularity in the modern day, the stories of the Homeric heroes did not figure largely in the early era of animation, which spanned from roughly the early 1920s to the early 1940s. Because of the technical limitations of the art form, most early animation was short in length and featured rather simplistic narratives, quite the opposite of ancient epic. In addition, early animated films often focused on animal figures because they were much easier to draw than human figures. Interestingly though, the earliest preserved animated puppet film, Russian-Polish director Ladislas Starevich’s The Beautiful Leukanida, or the Battle between the Stag and Barbel Beetles (1912; 11 min.), which featured dead insects modified with string and wax as the actors, was inspired by the dispute between Paris and Menelaus over Helen in the Iliad. But aside from this allusive reference, we do not see explicit representations of any ancient Homeric story or character until 1946, just after the conclusion of World War II.

In this year the Terrytoons studio, under the leadership of animator Paul Terry, produced a Mighty Mouse short called The Trojan Horse, in which the story of the end of the Trojan War is retold with the mice as the Trojans and the cats as the Greeks. After an introduction to Priam’s court featuring sexy belly-dancing female mice, the cats are shown being lured to attack Troy by the smell of cheese. After fighting indecisively for a while, the cats deploy the horse and seem to have the upper hand, but the mice pray to Mighty Mouse to come and save the day. He does so by chasing the horse away from Troy and throwing it off a cliff. The cartoon ends with the mice celebrating Mighty Mouse’s triumph over the cats.

This cartoon is entertaining on many levels, in addition to Helen being replaced by cheese, what is perhaps most comical about it is the way it turns the traditional story of Troy’s fall completely on its head. The mice, while depicted at the outset in a way that draws upon orientalizing stereotypes (e.g., luxurious, dissolute, sexually passionate), are actually the heroes, winning the battle against their Greek feline foes in the end. And while Mighty Mouse, much like the gods in Homer’s Iliad, swoops down in answer to the mice’s prayers and affects the outcome of the battle, quite unlike those gods he is rewarded with lots of love from the sexy Trojan lady mice (we are a long way from Andromache and Hecuba here!). Clearly this is a strange retelling of the story of Troy, but it does something that we see frequently in other adaptations of ancient heroic epic: it aligns the genre with the typical image and narrative of the modern-day superhero.

One way this is achieved is through the use of a male voiceover. According to film theorist Kaja Silverman, this “voice on high” transcends the body and serves as an “exemplary” model of male subjectivity by conveying a sense of omniscience, detachment and authority (1988: 49; 163-64). Martin Lindner similarly notes how voiceover is frequently employed in films depicting the ancient world as a means to convey their “historical legitimacy” (2005: 67-85).  In the Homeric poems this effect is achieved through the use of a third-person omniscient narrator who communicates the full scope of the action, including the divine perspective. In all these cases the viewpoint adopted is meant to instill the audience with a clear sense of right and wrong, as well as with the promise of eventual justice, just like Mighty Mouse delivers to us in this short, even if it is not for the side we might expect.

This cartoon stands in contrast to a Mel-O-Toons limited animation short from 1959, also called The Trojan Horse. It too features an authoritative voiceover telling the story, but this time the narrative adheres to a more conventional path. The visual aesthetic has transitioned away from the “lifelike” and into the modernist style, graphic and often abstract, that would become prevalent in late 50s and early 60s animation. The Mel-o-Toons series featured folk tales, Greco-Roman myths, Biblical stories, and classic literary adaptations, and seems to have had more of an educational bent. In this context the appearance of the omniscient voiceover and the close adherence to the traditional tale also make sense. The only surprising thing, apart from the look of the cartoon, is its final pronouncement that “Brave Ulysses was named the greatest of the Greek heroes,” because of his success with the ruse of the horse.

The final direct encounter with the Trojan War in animation until the 90s comes from about the same time as the Mel-o-toons short, 1957 to be exact. But it approaches the story of the war from a different perspective and in a different animation style. In this year, the famed German director and foremost pioneer of silhouette-stop motion animation, Lotte Reiniger, produced a 15-minute version of Offenbach’s 1864 operetta, La belle Hélène retitled as Helen La Belle, which retold the judgement of Paris and his abduction of Helen in the style of a burlesque parody. Reininger’s gorgeously wrought version stays true to the spirit of the opera – there is no dialog, the music of the operetta accompanies the animation – and it displays many humorous touches, including the gods as capricious meddlers, a caricatured depiction of Menelaus as an old man, and Helen sailing away in pursuit of Paris on a giant goose.

The films discussed so far have put their focus on the beginning and end of war, neither of which actually take place in the period covered by Homer’s Iliad, though they were recounted in other lost poems of the epic cycle and by later ancient authors. This choice of focus by modern animators is largely due to the fact that each of these is a short film and is therefore not long enough to cover the story of the war in a comprehensive way. Beyond this technical concern there is also the issue of the graphic content that makes up the majority of Homer’s narrative. This is a story of war – of violence, death and loss – and most of it is therefore not suitable material for viewing by children.

In the United States cartoons have assumed children as their primary audience since the 50s and 60s, when animation moved from being viewed primarily in movie theaters to being viewed on TV. It was during this time that lots of low production-value content was churned out aimed primarily at kids, which was then quickly licensed out for lucrative merchandising contracts. For a long time animation geared toward adults was viewed as unprofitable, though thanks to the rise in popularity of Japanese anime and the creation of shows like South Park and Family Guy in the early 2000s this is no longer the case.

Given this context we should perhaps be surprised that the last Trojan War-themed film to survey is a “very adult retelling of the Iliad” from 1996 entitled Achilles. It is another short film made in the stop-motion style, this time by celebrated British puppet animator and theater director Barry Purves, and it was nominated for a BAFTA for Best Animation in 1996. You may be surprised to learn that this film is not “adult” in the sense that it depicts graphic violence (though there is some of that at the end); instead it focuses on the relationship between Achilles and Patroclus, depicting their sexual interaction in an explicit manner, while meditating on its influence on their experience of the Trojan War. (Note: this film is definitely NSFW.)

Clearly this film has some different aims than those discussed previously. From an artistic standpoint, the detail and technical expertise is outstanding, rivaling if not surpassing that displayed in Reiniger’s Helen La Belle. Purves also attempts to capture the epic sweep of the Iliad, from the taking of Briseis by Agamemnon to the deaths of Patroclus and Hector, and condense it, while retaining its dramatic arc. The death of Achilles is also included, though it does not take place in the Iliad, since he is the focus of the film. However, like its predecessors it features a voiceover (by famed I, Claudius actor Derek Jacobi!) that lends it that same sense of gravitas and male-centered power. This time the message is more meditative or philosophical than educational in tone, but it still seeks to make an important claim about the rightness of the film’s world view.

Most obviously, the film questions our expectations of what epic is supposed to be about. It suggests that this male-male romantic and sexual relationship (which Homer does not explicitly mention but which later ancient authors do), is as worthy of foregrounding and commemoration as the battles of the Greek heroes. On the explicit sexuality in the film, Barry Purves stated in an interview: “With Achilles the question was whether it was possible to bring eroticism into stop-motion, or would technique get in the way. I think it worked. There’s been little serious eroticism in animation. A lot of films poke fun at sex and flesh, but it seems to me that animation is an interesting medium for exploring our primal urges.” This film, in its juxtaposition of the erotic and the heroic, succeeds in pushing all kinds of boundaries – artistic, generic and cultural – which the animated medium makes uniquely possible.

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In each of the films considered, ancient epic functions for animators as an expansive and experimental vehicle of expression that is accessible enough to have broad appeal, especially to younger audiences, but frequently to older ones as well. While depicting the Trojan War itself and the events of Homer’s Iliad in particular have proven challenging because of both their wide scope and their mature subject matter, animators have still found innovative ways to approach the story, whether by condensing it, focusing on its beginning or ending, or by foregrounding its less serious episodes. In this regard, they have continued the tradition of creative transformation and reuse that has been a hallmark of epic storytelling since the days of Homer himself.

Works cited:

Hicks-Jenkins, Clive, “Interview with Barry Purves part 2: in the realm of the senses.” Clive Hicks-Jenkins’ Artlog: views from the artist’s studio. July 16, 2013. https://clivehicksjenkins.wordpress.com/2013/07/16/interview-with-barry-purves-part-2-in-the-realm-of-the-senses/

Lindner, Martin, “Zwischen Anspruch und Wahrscheinlichkeit. Legitimationsstrategien des Antikfilms,” in: Lindner, Martin (ed.): Drehbuch Geschichte. Die antike Welt im Film (Antike Kultur und Alte Geschichte 7), Münster: LIT Verlag, 2005, 67-85.

Silverman, Kaja. The Acoustic Mirror: The Female Voice in Psychoanalysis and Cinema. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988.