Hey! It's a blockbuster! What more could you ask for!

Rating: 7/10 (12 July 2000)

For me, watching this capped a weekend of movies that started with Fight Club. This fairly mirthless picture is still lots of fun. The story is fairly unsophisticated, despite the film's length and palace intrigue story lines. Some of the effects and cinematography are stunning. The acting, if not particularly amazing, is still pretty solid.
Russell Crowe rocked, but I've liked him since Proof, and he was the best part of The Quick and the Dead. All the secondary characters are decent. It's a pretty good child actor that doesn't incite murderous instincts in me.
Fight Club was interesting, because it looked at fighting as a consequence of masculine ennui. Its characters fight to find a sense of themselves or their emotions, things that they've lost because they have lost their fathers. Gladiator's fighters battle because they have to, but Maximus, after initial apathy, also fights, to avenge the loss of his father figure. Tyler and Maximus both lead armies. Hmmm, maybe I should stop there.
Anyway, reasonably good fun. Nothing to stretch the brain over. Probably could have used some edits here or there, but then it wouldn't have that overlong "epic" feel. 7 out of 10.