Gladiator

Rating:
Summary: Phenom
Review: Gladiator, I have seen it 5 times. Each time I see it, it only gets better. Russell Crowe was the perfect pick for this role, he shines as usual as he effortlessly flows through this role. Although this movie is probably not 100% historically accurate, its principles of leadership & passion are undeniable. People will follow passionate leaders and this movie demonstrates that principle with great clarity. You really cannot go wrong with this DVD in your collection.

Joseph Dworak

Rating:
Summary: OKAY
Review: This movie was a little to bloody for my taste. The performances by Russel Crowe, Connie Nelson and Joaquin Phoenix (spelling?) were really good though. It's a good action \ drama movie. I especially liked the music and plan on getting the soundtrack. I recommend this movie to people who like action movies that take place in Ancient Greece \ Roman times.

Rating:
Summary: Great Flick
Review: Just simply a fantastic movie with wonderful charater portrayals on everyones part.

Rating:
Summary: Awesome! Ripley's best!
Review: Yes, this film is fiction. Moviegoers know this, and it's not the point. This movie was riveting down to the tinest detail, complete with spectacular scenery and superb acting.

Unlike many modern movies in which we the audience could care less for the characters (see Titanic, Forrest Gump), Ripley gets us involved deeply into personal lives, even that of the evil emperor Commodus. We loathe Commodus' cowardice, grieve the murder of Maximus' family, long for his vengeance to be realized, and even cheer with the specators as "barbarian hordes" defeat their numerically superior and better equipped "conquerers".

Maximus' character...a focused, battle hardened military general on one end, yet capable of being a loving father and husband on the other end...is just the type of hero today's moviegoers need after a ruthless bombardment of such prepubescent, homoerotic characters played by the likes of Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, and Chris O'Donnell.

Awesome action, acting, and graphics. To all one-star reviewers, I advise you to return to your homeland in Oz and ask the wizard for a good taste in movies...as well as a soul.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful Epic Film
Review: This is a terrific film in the spirt of Spartacus and Ben Hur. The characters are terrific and the script is top notch. It's a must see!

Rating:
Summary: Oscar worthy? Probably not, but highly entertaining
Review: This is a modern take on the Gladiator movie. A Roman general, Maximus, has loyally served on the German front. When a new and jealous Caesar, Commodus, ascends the throne, he orders Maximus and his family killed. Maximus excapes and ends up in a provincial arena as a gladiator slave. When Commodus decides to have a season of games in the Colliseum, Maximus's troupe travels to Rome and he searches for a way to avenge his family's death.

This is a typical story in terms of epic filmaking, and this film is most definitely an epic. From the Private Ryan-esque battle at the German front (featuring 1000 extras, flaming arrows, and mud!) to the CGI-generated recreation of the Colliseum, it's a treat to watch and soak in the atmosphere. The performances are uniformly good - Crowe was probably better in the Insider, but won his Oscar here as Maximus. It's a good thing Crowe can sustain interest, as he's onscreen something like 85% of the time! The supporting performances are also good.

This is a typical Ridley Scott film. He almost blows it with a couple of (as it turns out) non-fatal errors. The first is that the entire film (155 minutes!) is on the same level of intensity. Any mood for 2.5 hours is tough to take, but the oppressive sombreness of Gladiator is particularly dangerous. However, the gladitorial spectacles are sufficiently diverse to break it up. More annoying is the uniform drabness of the film. The colours are completely washed out greys and browns. This was done to match up the CGI (not quite up to the challenge in 1999), but the overall look is dull! Oddly, parts of the soundtrack then clash with the visuals because the music is too bright. The CGI is generally non-obtrusive (except when showing large crowds), so I can forgive this problem as well.

The DVD extras are quite nice, especially the hour-long documentary on gladitorial games. It's no surprise that the "real" characters in the film, such as Commodus, are not accurately portrayed, but does lend credence to the general accuracy of the situations - they may not have happened as filmed, but COULD have. There are cut scenes, the commentary by Scott and others is interesting, so the DVD is well worth getting.

Rating:
Summary: very watchable
Review: Personally I liked that film - especially the soundtrack. A film is of course not a history lesson. Still I don't see the harm if the producers had cared to stay closer to the circumstantial facts. Armory and clothing came close enough, except for crossbows, the Alsacean breed of the dog and the cell phone an extra had dropped in the second part. Especially Lucilla's haute couture came straight from wall paintings in Pompeii.

It looks good on the screen to see the Roman infantry trot up to their enemies in close formation and take cover behind their shields when the barbarians fired a volley of arrows. However that's not how it was done in those days. The Roman legioner was not a Greek hoplite who held formation with shields locked. The Roman infantry man had three paces of open space to his neighbors left and right, giving room for his moves. The second rank spread accordingly covering the gaps behind the first rank etc.

So instead of losing momentum and stop to receive the arrows and take the full shock of the opponent's onrush the Roman legion would pick up the pace, discharge their "pilum" - the spear or javelin- and go straight for the kill. A legioner coming at you would do exactly the same move, Shaka used to teach his Zulu warriors 1,500 years later: a sweeping move with the shield would deflect the opponents defense and the sword or assagai would go straight for the kill in one decisive stab into the undefended side.

Both, Shaka and the Romans kept the blade deliberately short, so that the fighter had to go on close quarter - which actually is an advantage because it leaves the opponent fewer options for fancy moves. Perhaps Hollywood is thinking that this industrial killing technique doesn't make good film-copy? In Shaka Zulu's case it was still effective enough to annihilate a complete British brigade fully equipped with Springfield rifles and field artillery.

The main thing of course are the gladiatorial combat scenes. In the film it is very simple: every gladiator is a slave (or convicted criminal), every encounter a fight to the death. Not so in ancient Rome: many gladiators were actually free born people from all walks of life - in one instance even an emperor - who had chosen the arena as a career. But like the professional boxers in modern times, or the Japanese sumo wrestlers, a fully trained gladiator was obliged to enlist in the stable of a licensed impresario.

Not every fight was a mortal combat. In fact far less than 30% of all combats ended with a kill. Gladiators fought for money, even slaves received a purse. (Slavery in antiquity didn't mean loss of wages: an enslaved mason received the same minimum wages as his free colleague, the difference being that the slave's owner took out his cut.) There were contract rates for different kinds of performance; comparably low for feigned combats to show off the combatants skills in good clean entertainment at, say, weddings and funerals. Only an extremely rich patron could actually afford to pay the rates for mortal encounters.

Historians also like to quibble at Proximo's accusation that Marcus Aurelius had shut down the arenas, apparently for humanitarian reasons. The truth here is that Marcus Aurelius, a civilian to boot, was forced to fend off an invasion from Persia. His generals performed brilliantly and even invaded Iraqi territory. But among the trophies they also brought back the small pox. The epidemic ravaged the Empire for a whole 15 years and reduced the army to a mere skeleton force, of which every hostile tribe from across the border took due notice. So the civilian Marcus Aurelius suddenly found himself confronted with the task to rebuild the army practically from scratch and to wage war on the intruders. He partly accomplished this by drafting all the gladiators, whether free or slave, from all over the empire. So the arenas closed for lack of fighters. So far I see no reason why the film could not have reflected these facts more faithfully.

That the emperor was assassinated is Hollywood's favorite myth. There is no evidence for a plot on his life. As a matter of fact - but this would of course spoil the story - Commodus was already co-emperor for six years before Marcus Aurelius died in the camp of exhaustion and disease. This was the whole idea: one Caesar at home and one in the field, so that the surviver would guarantee continuity. Commodus continued to reign without causing complaints for another six years, and only changed to the worse after a failed plot on his life. From then on his eccentricities ruined his reputation and he died in 192 from a mysterious "accident" in the gym.

Rating:
Summary: A great buy
Review: This DVD is the reason that people like me buy DVDs. There a re a lot of extras that give you insight into the film making process. You learn little tidbits that you would never have learned, and it doesn't hurt that the movie itself is fantastic!

Rating:
Summary: Definitely One Of The Best Movies You Will Ever Watch...
Review: I watched this movie in my latin class and thoroughly enjoyed it. Although not all of it is historically accurate, it comes close, and is one of the best movies you will ever watch. The music makes it even better. I definitely recommend Gladiator to anyone looking to see an awesome movie.

Rating:
Summary: Good Movie, Bad History
Review: I really enjoyed this film. The acting was very well performed, and it is a visually stunning film. I think it brings to life the time period better than any other film of its type. It is a great popcorn munching piece of eye-candy. But as an historian I really cringed with one of the premises of the movie. I also know that there are some people whose only information regarding historical events comes from watching Hollywood movies. That is not a good thing. Historical accuracy is not one of Hollywood's best attributes.

At the end of the film they would have you believe that the Empire was abolished and the Republic was restored. (Anti-monarchial sentiments?) But in reality that was not the case. The two emperors are historical figures who actually lived in real life. Emperor Marcus Aurelius ruled Rome from 161AD until 180AD, while his son, Commodus, excellently played by Joachin Pheonix, ruled from 180AD until his murder in 192AD. But hopefully most people are aware that there was not a restoration of the Roman Senate after the death of the emperor Commodus. The Empire in the West survived for another 284 years, while the Eastern, or Byzantine, Empire survived until 1453 when emperor Constantine XI was deposed by the Turks.

I think films such as this are good for capturing a way of life that can be hard for people to conceptualize, and they can also be an excellent impetus for investigating further into historical information.