Review: Gladiator

By Acheron May 6, 2000 7:53 AM

Gladiator is set during the time of the fall of the Roman Empire, where a dying Marcus Aurelius (Richard Harris) sees the error in his ways of corruption and tries to put a stop to it by naming the leader of the Roman Army, General Maximus (Russell Crowe), as the alternate heir to the throne. However, the real heir, Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix), tries to stop that from happening by taking matters into his own hands. That is all I'll spoil. This film, directed by Ridley Scott (Alien, Thelma & Louise, Blade Runner), has it all. Great cinematography, great art direction, great story, score, acting, etc... It's about a 2.5 hour movie, a little on the long side, but you don't realize this because the story keeps you mesmerized. The battle scenes are nothing short of excellent, and there are enough of them spread out to keep the action fan intrested the whole time. The CG is tasteful. It could have been greatly overused, but there was just enough to make the story. The only thing I can say against it is that the CG that was used could have been a little better done. Conclusion: This movie is for pretty much everyone, not just your average action fan. If you liked Braveheart, then you will like Gladiator. Look for this to win some Oscars. I give this a 9.0/10.0.

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RE: Gladiator   reply

Posted by Jack (jack@dtheatre.com) on May 7, 2000 12:37 PM

How could the CG have been better done? I thought it was good.. I didn't like the way everything was a little to Hollywood (except the opening war scene which was awesome). I think the story lacked some. Joaquin Phoenix did a great Ceaser. I also didn't like the way everyone called Russell Crowe "The Spaniard" when he spoke with an obvious Australian accent but other than that the movie was well done.

RE: RE: Gladiator   reply

Posted by Acheron (denny@dtheatre.com) on May 7, 2000 1:14 PM

I don't think that it was too Hollywood(that's what KillBot said as well). Enlighten me. The CG that was used could have been better done. The people in the coliseum, the birds flying around the coliseum, and the tiger taking a whack at the guy all looked fabricated. It's not like they had all of this CG, and they needed to cut costs somewhere. Had they spent just a little more time on it, they could have made a few things, like what I mentioned, look a little more real, a little less fabricated. Other than that, I absolutely loved the movie.

gotta rag on you...   reply

Posted by Acheron (denny@dtheatre.com) on May 7, 2000 1:31 PM

"I also didn't like the way everyone called Russell Crowe "The Spaniard" when he spoke with an obvious Australian accent."

Ok, by his looks, he could be Spanish, most people at that time probably hadn't seen many Spaniards, and he didn't talk much when they gave him that name... 

But still.... 

If we were to go by your arguement, everyone would be speaking Latin, Old English, or in Germanic tounge. Australia wouldnt be discovered for over a thousand years, much less settled by the outlaws of Britian...So there would be no such thing as an Australian accent. 
;-)

A Better Titanic?   reply

Posted by Jack (jack@dtheatre.com) on May 7, 2000 1:46 PM

Much like Titanic where the effects were incredible but the movie sucked... Execpt that this one didn't suck. There was unnecessary romance for one thing. There were also many parts of the movie in which I could actually predict the next line. While I wouldn't say this movie is entirely predictable it was in a lot of spots. There were many things which would be expected in a hollywood movie from lines to styles of shooting etc..