Plot goes haywire - power surges abound

Rating: 10/10 (30 March 2001)

Gladiator overwhelmed the opposition in Academy voting this year. Yet those who cry "foul" are strikingly naive in their calls for some sort of recount. It is a prime example of Oscar voters going for a big winner when the "second-place" entries managed to cancel out one another's separate claims to be better overall films. This BEST PICTURE shows signs of being less than the sum of most of its commendable parts, due in greatest part to its haywire plot. Like the much feared power surges for people's home and work computers, it has plenty of emotional highs and striking brief scenes or cuts but they short-circuit the narrative that you want to puzzle through after the final credits. I believe the screenplay could have made some sort of "revisionist" sense about an introspective Emperor but he is throttled and overthrown in some sort of flip-flop of fortunes that's left unexplained. Don't blame Joaquin Phoenix for overacting when he seemingly improvises with the lurching dialogue. For anybody trying to make sense of slavery and gladiators, see a much better film from 1960, Spartacus. Back then actor Kirk Douglas and buddies were telling the director what the finished product should be. Nowadays, the director uses all the arrows in his quiver to nail us to the trees and we wonder what's hit us as the spectacle overpowers the story.