Day 146: Gladiator (2000)

Movie #94 – Gladiator (2000) - 155 min, cert 15.

Maximus (Russell Crowe) is a successful General in the Roman army and a favourite of the Emperor. So much so that the Emperor tells him that he is going to name him as his successor. When the Emperor’s son Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) discovers this, he is outraged. He kills his father and tells his soldiers to take Maximus out into the woods and kill him. Maximum escapes and hurries back to his family only to find that they’ve also been murdered. He is captured, taken to Africa and sold as a slave to Proximo (Oliver Reed), a trainer of gladiators. His prowess with a sword and as a military tactician ensure a swift rise to the top of his new profession, and eventually he is taken to fight at the Colosseum in Rome, in front of the very man who destroyed his life.

Crowe seems ideally suited to this role. He does mean & moody better than anyone which is exactly what this part requires. There are some fine supporting performances from the late Oliver Reed (who died during filming), Richard Harris (as the murdered Emperor), Connie Nielsen (as Commodus’ sister) and Derek Jacobi, a perennial favourite of genre, as Gracchus a senator. I wasn’t so keen on Phoenix, I felt his performance lacked something that I couldn’t quite put a finger on. It’s great to see an actor like Reed bowing out with a really good performance.

The film has an epic look to it, with elaborate sets and fantastically choreographed battle sequences. Ridley Scott has made a broad range of films in his time, from the brilliant (Alien, Blade Runner) to the downright awful (G.I. Jane, 1492: Conquest of Paradise), but this is definitely in the former camp.

Score – 8/10.

Next up is Downfall, an account of Adolf Hitler’s final few days in his bunker in Berlin at the end of WWII. I have seen many humorous rip-offs of Hitler ranting at his officers in German with various silly subtitles attached, but I’ve never seen the original.