The Academy bows to what Hollywood is ridiculed for

Rating: 5/10 (11 April 2001)

First of all, Gladiator is NOT an epic!!!! I know there are sites that claim that historically it is true, but let's be honest...no emperor will ever fight a Gladiator. EVER!!! No matter who the Gladiator really is, just imagine Spartacus fighting the emperor. Umm...no!
Second of all --- there is no way Gladiator deserved the Oscar for movie of the year...Sure it deserved to get all the technical decorations and computer animation and whatever else they did to make the Coliseum and all the special effects, but BEST MOVIE?? Is the Academy on crack?

Third of all -- there was no strong acting...NONE!! There were some touching scenes and some beautiful scenes of nature and blood for that matter (if you find that thrilling), but not one actor did a wonderful job acting...They were all predictable. Of course the girl loved the hero and the father didn't love the son, etc., etc. A cliche on top of cliche is all this movie is made of and then it gets an Oscar. Well at least next year the Oscars will be better because they couldn't possibly screw up more this year.

And lastly, when I leave a movie theater, I would like to have something to think about because of a movie I just saw. Some sort of a greater, bigger picture. Here we had a point that being dishonest and weak fires back! That's an original! And it certainly take three hours to deliver that point to the audience. I am not even arguing for good movies to be recognized because given what I think is good may not be the standard for everyone else, but let us not recognize something that is unworthy of it. I was also disappointed in Russel Crowe because I did not expect him to go from LA Confidential and The Insider to crap like Gladiator.