The film stars Rossana Podestà, Stanley Baker, Sir Cedric Hardwicke and Jacques Sernas, with Niall MacGinnis, Maxwell Reed, Nora Swinburne, Robert Douglas, Torin Thatcher, Harry Andrews, Janette Scott, Ronald Lewis, Eduardo Ciannelli, Esmond Knight and Brigitte Bardot as Andraste, Helen's handmaiden, her first film production shot outside France.

[4] The film retells the story of the Trojan War in 1100 B.C., albeit with some major changes from the Iliad's storyline; Paris of Troy sails to Sparta to secure a peace treaty between the two powerful city-states.

The scene of the Greeks' initial assault on the walls of Troy features a series of shots that are directly copied from a sequence in the Persian attack on Babylon in D. W. Griffiths' silent film classic Intolerance.

This project makes several departures from the original story, including showing Paris as a hero and great leader, and most of the Greek lords as treacherous and opportunistic pirates who are using Helen's flight as an excuse to win the treasures of Troy.

Bosley Crowther of The New York Times wrote that some parts were "well done", including the Greek descent from the Trojan horse which "has the air of great adventure that one expects from this tale", but "the human drama in the legend ... is completely lost or never realized in the utter banalities of the script, in the clumsiness of the English dialogue and in the inexcusable acting cliches.

The Warner film satisfies the demands for beauty, and also attains triumphant effects, which give real life to ancient battles with spear, bow and arrow, fire, sword and javelin.

Unfortunately, the breathtaking quality of the production values is not matched by the stilted story, which takes considerable dramatic license with the Homer version of the events leading up to the Trojan war, and which are at best only moderately interesting.