Things I like about GLADIATOR (warning: spoilers)

Rating: 8/10 (4 July 2000)

1. The battle scenes. Even on second viewing, they had me on the edge of my seat, teeth locked, fists clenched. "Are you not entertained?" Maximus demands. Yup, I sure was. I was scared, horrified, nerve-wracked and at times revolted. But bored? Hell, no!
2. Marcus Aurelius. In every other movie that shows Caesar Marcus Aurelius, the director slobbers all over him and makes him out as an all-wise philosopher. Ridley Scott portrays him more like what I feel he was: a well-intentioned fool.
3. There are NO CHRISTIANS in this movie! Scott broke Rule One in Roman-Epic-Making, which saith the plot must be at least tangentially about conflict between persecuted Christians and evil heathens. Of course, Christianity in Imperial Rome started out as just an insignificant player among many, many cults. For once we not only get a hero who isn't a Christian, but a hero who is devoutly and warmly pious in the old pagan traditions.
4. The acting. Everybody does a wonderful job. Crowe is so subtle that Phoenix upstages him, but they're both excellent. Crowe, as always, is a master at hinting at deep thoughts that just barely ripple the surface of his face. Phoenix gives us a wonderful villain, provoking both pity and disgust, whose footsteps on the path from good to evil are clearly visible behind him. Nielsen, Jacobi, and Hounsou all enrich the movie, and even Harris (perfectly cast) gives a good performance. And Oliver Reed is delightful; if he is playing himself, as the stories about him suggest, then he must have been an interesting man to know. It took a lot of good acting to rescue some of the lamer dialogue, but by God they did it.
5. The coliseum. Some of the rest of Rome looked too colorless and washed out to be believable, but the coliseum was spectacular. And those tigers! How magnificent! This truly was the "grandeur that was Rome."
6. Tragedy. Not only does Maximus die, but his death achieves almost nothing. We know the Republic will never be restored, the "light" that is Rome will be snuffed in the Dark Ages, the dream will die. But Maximus has kept his integrity; he has fulfilled his word to his emperor by seeing that Commodus will not rule Rome; he has done his part to try to restore the Republic, even if it is in vain, and that may not be such a small achievement.
7. Hans Zimmer's score. Somebody said he lifted it; I don't know if that's true, but if he did then he lifted it from the right place. It's simple and powerful, perfectly chosen for the scenes. The Celtic wailing was a bit much at times, but I don't think Zimmer did that part.
8. A small touch, but a good one. Lucilla, bending over the dying Maximus, does not say "I love you," which she surely must have been thinking. Instead, she says "Go to them." Which, when you think about it, is really a much better demonstration of how much she cared about Maximus than the more obvious line would have been.
And some things I didn't like...
1. The ending. Ten points for having the guts to kill the hero off. But Lucilla's and Gracchus' "truly this was the noblest Roman of them all"-type posturing was pompous and unnecessary. If we had to have an epitaph, it would have been better just to have Lucius say one sentence: "There will be no more games as long as I reign." Of course that would probably be historically inaccurate, but since when did that ever stop a good storyteller?
2. Tigers Lite? An adult male tiger weighs 500 pounds. I don't care if you're Arnold Schwarzenegger, if one of those things jumps on your back, you're going DOWN and staying there.
3. Maximus' home. Farmers that stand immobile, a mother and child we never get to know before they die. It all sounded so much better when Maximus described it then when we saw it.
But I'm just carping to show that I paid attention. GLADIATOR's a magnificent movie. For heaven's sake, fork over the money to see it on the big screen.