A nice detail from (I suppose) Oliver Stone’s film on the life of Alexander the Great. We mostly see on depictions, images, reconstructions etc, the Macedonian phalanx in battle contact with the enemy force, fighting it (e.g. in the well-known exquisite artwork by Johnny Shumate below).

This image from Stone’s film depicts the phalanx in the phase of advancing to meet the enemy on the battlefield, sarissae upright position. I suppose that the sarissae (the Macedonian pikes) upright would be as terrifying a spectacle as the phalanx’s frontal attack with the sarissae in horizontal position.