Beauty to die for

IT was, admits director Wolfgang Petersen with a smile, a hard job seeing 3,000 beautiful women as he searched the world for someone to play Helen of Troy, the face that launched a thousand ships.

He corrects himself. He didn't actually see all 3,000 of the contenders, just 200 or so. But the moment he saw German actress Diane Kruger, he knew she was the one.

"I was slumping in my chair and watching Beautiful Woman No 168 and in that cynical mode when Diane popped up," he recalls. "I sat upright in my chair. She was so good and so beautiful. She was doing the audition in her hotel room in Canada with her boyfriend playing Paris. Producer Diana Rathbun and myself both went, 'this could be it'.

"She had that special quality in her eyes that you cannot explain, when you look right into the soul of someone and there's much more there than good acting and good looks. So we invited her and the rest is history."

The film's backers appeared not to be quite so keen. They would have preferred a big name in the role of Helen. But after "a little bit of nudging and arm-twisting", they agreed.

Kruger laughs when mention is made of the pressure of playing the most beautiful woman in the world, who not only launched ships but also caused wars.

"It's not so much about the physical aspect because there's only so much you can do about that, other than spent three hours in hair and make-up," says Kruger, who studied ballet from an early age but was forced to give up through injury.

"Apart from what she stands for physically, it was a really challenging part. I had very little experience prior to Troy. I'd never played such an emotionally complex character. When they cast me, I was really much more concerned with that.

"She needed to be very vulnerable, very sad, once she's in Troy she has a constant aura or burden of guilt that surrounds her. A lot of that comes through her eyes. There are a lot of scenes where she doesn't actually say anything and you still have to somehow have that come across."

She admits feeling a little overwhelmed at first in the company of such experienced actors, and worried that she wasn't such a strong performer. She plays tribute to Petersen especially for making her feel welcome. "Maybe it's because he was German, he made me feel very special," she says. "He could probably sense when I was insecure and comes up and saying something in German to make me feel better, which was nice. If there was anything I learnt, it was to stay calm when you have to do a big scene. They taught me to take your time and not be afraid to ask for time. They were very generous and treated me as an equal."

Former photographic model Kruger made her film debut alongside Dennis Hopper and Christopher Lambert in The Piano Player, released last year. She received a Caesar nomination last year for her role in the French film Mon Idol.

She recently completed her American film debut opposite Josh Hartnett and Troy co-star Rose Byrne in the romantic thriller Wicker Park.

Sydney-born Byrne has previously been seen as Amidala's handmaiden, Dorme, in Star Wars Episode II: Attack Of The Clones and the 1930s English romance I Capture The Castle. Troy offers her most high profile role - not least because she's Brad Pitt's romantic interest, Briseis.

Not that there was anything the least romantic about filming the scenes.

"Love scenes are always terribly awkward because you're wearing weird underwear and it's very technical. You've got tape all over your bum and you've got 40 men staring at your through cameras," she says.

"Even if you're trying to have a good time, it's impossible. And all the while you've got to simulate hopefully a really beautiful love scene. I find after one take it's okay and gets better, but it's good to have a sense of humour about it, laugh at how funny it is."

* As a boy at school, Wolfgang Petersen became a big fan of legendary Greek warrior Achilles. "We learnt old Greek and Latin, and then The Illiad came - and there was Achilles," he recalls.

"To me, he was like James Dean or Marlon Brando, the ultimate rebel. He was wonderful, he just lived by his own rules and nobody else's. He wouldn't accept any kind of authority, he was my guy. When you're 15 or 16, that's what you need."

So the director of Das Boat, Air Force One and In The Line Of Fire was thrilled to be offered the chance to direct the epic Troy.

"I really thought, 'my god, this is what I want to do. If there's a script that's any good - and we know it's difficult to get the mighty thing of the Iliad into a screenplay - I want to do it'.

"And, boy, the script was good. Then Brad Pitt right away said he wanted to play Achilles. Within a few weeks, the whole project was born.

"That was two years ago and now the whole thing is done. I had no idea that, after reading about it when I was 16, that this would eventually come to me."

* Troy (15) previews today in some cinemas and goes on general release tomorrow.

Published: 20/05/2004