Recently I have read a lot of critical comments by Iranians about Oliver Stone's "ALEXANDER". The common theme is about showing Persians as "Barbarians", or "Darius the third" as an idiot. Or, characterizing Roxan, the wife of Dariush III as a dark skinn African girl. I have not yet seen the movie, but after reading so many critics, I would like to make some comments in this regard:

1- Historical ignorance in Hollywood is not a new phenomenon. There are numerous examples of such "apparent mistakes". Remember "Gladiator" for example, the lovely film made by "Riddley Scott": The people from "Germania" (Germany) were shown as ruthless barbarians who would decapitate the messenger of peace sent by civilized "Romans". Or uncounted World War the Second films made in Hollywood which I have seen during my childhood and adolecence days, all of them showing the Germans as a bunch of stupid, inhumane killers. Or the so called "action films" in which the Muslims or Middle Easterns were stereotyped as mindless terrorists. Let alone tons of films made during "cold war" era, showing Soviet Union and all communist block as "bad guys".

2- We should not ignore the natural built in bias of the "story teller". If the film maker, or the historian, is from west, the bias is naturally towards west. If he is from east, the bias is towards east. Remember: in our school history books, we knew"Nader Shah" as "Nader Shah the Great", but definitely, if we read the history books in Indian schools, they would not agree with us that much about greatness of Nader Shah!

3- Do not scrutinize the leaf, instead look at the forest and a different picture will appear against your eyes: its only the matter of time and distance. "When in the dark of middle ages, the western think tanks were argueing how many angles could be placed on the tip of a needle, the Islamic scholars in Cordoba and Baghdad were discussing the most sophisticated issues of astronomy, physics, medicine and mathematics". Once the Greeks had the most famous philosofers of the world, today Greece is one of the least developed countires in Europe. Once Persian Empire was ruling a third of the world, today it is being labeled "a member of axis of evil". Once the sun was not setting in British Empire teritories, today its prime minister is refered, sarcastically, as "American puppy".

4- Why Alexander defeated the gigantic Persian Empire? He was a young military genius of his time, that we should admit. But here in Persia, there was something wrong as well. The kingdom was not the same founded by Kourosh (Cyrus). People were not backing up their government. "Dariush The Third" was not so great like his grand father after all! Reading the history one can find that people were suffering extremely in hands of the kingdom. As I read in the "Persian Boy", the detailed historical novel, there were armies of soldiers carrying the chariots of Dariush's wives and even his golden bath tub during his defence against Alexander! After Alexander defeated Persian Army, he took a victoriuos bath in Dariush's golden bath tub! One should beleive that Persians did not seriously defend their Empire against Alexander's attack.

5- Greece was the land of great philosophers, Socrates, Aristoltle, Plato, ... Aristotle was the teacher of Alexander. It is well documented that when Alexander heard about "Diogenes", another well known philosopher, he went to visit him. Diogenes was resting under the sun. Alexander stood close to him riding his horse and said: "ask something and I will grant it to you". Diogenes said: "You stand in front of me, and you' re hiding the sun, so, don' t take from me, the thing that you can not give me! "

6- It is good that we read Iranians objecting to "false historical references" in a Holywood movie. As far as such objections are logical, cool tempered, holistic, without any prejudice or racial bias, they would definitely have a positive effect. We should treat in a way to express the philosophy of our Cyrus The Great: "Tolerance".