Gentlemen,
It just proves a good movie can have vague or poor historical connections. Also one has to look hard at historical documents. The two British Generals that ran the British Army in World War 1 (Haig and French) were very poor at what they did. Try to find that in the official record! Most of the surviving records on Alexander were written well after he was gone. Some were propaganda put out by interested parties (Ptolemy!).
There was a Gay community in Ancient Greece. The culture back then was much different than today. With 300 different city states, what could get one hung in one town could get you a clap on the back in another. Several cultures look very suspicious to my Judeo-Christian eyes 2000+ years later! I think a certain amount of what one would consider bisexual behavior today went on. Was it universal? Probably not.
Two examples come to mind, Sparta and Thebes. In Spartan training of young boys, the youngsters were segregated from females and trained by older boys. Sexual activity is probably impossible to prevent. Men tend to repeat in adulthood what they learned as boys. In Thebes we have the Sacred Band, a Phalanx unit composed of homosexual lovers. If the activity was illegal and offenders were subject to execution, where did they get the men? The Sacred Band was later imitated as far away as Carthage.
A few words about Greek Phalanx tactics. The Greeks invented the decisive battle. These part-time soldiers wanted to hurry up, fight and get back to their fields and shops. So they came, and went straight for the other guys until one side broke. That is when the real slaughter occurred, after one side dropped their shields and ran for it. Also when the weather got warm the guys in back often took off their armor, and sometimes their clothes! Shield, pike, sword and helmet were enough. Picture yourself in the middle, pushing and shoving the guy(s) in front. Then you notice the guy in back is "excited" by all the commotion. Don't know about you guys, but that would encourge me to push to get away from the guy! If you brought the phalanx to a halt, or refused to come to grips,you could defeat the phalanx. One needs Peltasts, Slingers, Archers and Cavalry to do this. Persians had all but Slingers. They made the mistake of letting the phalanx catch them!
Persians followed more traditional tactics. Each side squared off and fired missiles at each other until one side's morale broke. Then you chased them off the field. Cavalry and chariots were very useful here. Remember there were no stirrups in this era. One had to hold on to the horse with one's knees. Persians were also very good at siege tactics and engineering. That is how they took all the Ionian Greek cities.
Some notes on the Macedonian Royal Family. The further away you were from them, the less "Greek" you considered them. The Royals had a very violent history. Few Kings died peacefully in their bed of old age. Poison and assasination were very real threats. Macedonians were also fond of holding drunken feasts that could last several days. Philip and Alexander both had a history of being violent drunks. Alexander was ruthless and a mean drunk. You did not want to be close when he got enraged. He killed more than one party guest.
There was an excellent chance Alexander was poisoned in Babylon, which is what the movie tried to say. His generals were scared to death of him and tired of campaigning. Ptolemy is one of the prime suspects. Most drunken Greek orgies envolved wine cut with water. If you wanted to get drunk really fast, you drank wine uncut (mulled). This was often used to slip poison into the wine. Alexander drank a cup of mulled wine at the orgy before he collapsed.
Oh yeah, Olympios was portrayed very well. Most Greeks thought she was a witch, being a Priestess of the Cult of Dionyses (sp?). The snakes and drunken sexual orgies would have convinced me, too. Macedoniams did not consider her Greek either. She was a princess from Epirus.
I am not sure about Alexander being Blonde, either. It has to do with the old Greek word they used. I read it supposedly meant "Brown Haired". The old Greek word they used for Blonde also meant "Ancient White/Grey Hair". As far as some mainland Greeks being fair skinned these days, it could come from any of the Northern peoples that traveled through the area in the last 2000 years. The Romans and Byzantines in particular were fond of Northern Barbarian mercenaries. I think the Greeks were not too different looking than the Thracians or the Persians.
Pruitt