Two thumbs way up but only for second...I wouldn't want to lose them.

Rating: 10/10 (18 May 2000)

I was reassured within the first five minutes of this film that Ridley Scott was present and accounted for. The opening battle scene was almost psychotronic in it's atmospherics...like a Roman version of Alien. Wow! I love this director. Russell Crowe has definitely arrived too. He takes charge immediately as a believable Maximus, a great general with character, courage and the loving loyalty of his men...men of one of history's greatest armies. ("When I give the signal, let loose hell.") This guy's an alpha-male with a capital alpha! The movie follows his destiny as he navigates the twists and turns of Roman politics, greed and power. He is betrayed by a vile dweeb, a dying Marcus Aurelius Ceasar's son, who orders Maximus and Max's wife and son killed. This succeeds for the family but Max escapes and is spun off on a Jean Valjean-like journey of redemption and obscured identity. Except instead of becoming a mayor, he becomes...you guessed it...a Gladiator. Apparently, he is a gifted scrapper and builds quite a reputation. He comes to Rome and settles up the score. Riveting. Engaging. Awesome. The acting is superb. The script is intelligent and marvelously credible considering the difficulty scriptwriters have with historical movies, at least as far as I'm concerned. And it is terrific history! Very accurate. This presupposes that I know some Roman history...well, of course, I do. It had some tragedy which my companion (my wife) always finds intollerable and of course I gave her my standard speech about how film is not always supposed to make you feel warm and fuzzy but rather challenged and sometimes jolted. And as usual, it was hopeless. No way any movie gets an Oscar vote from my wife when kids get killed. However, she made me proud by brightly acknowledging that the violence was not gratuitous, in fact she said "it was necessary to the advancing story arc and was done tastefully." At this point, I felt some pride from how well she had learned her Film 101 lessons. In summary, I was glued to the screen for 150 or so minutes and I believe that I saw the best Ridley Scott has ever done...certainly a must see. This may not be a "chick-friendly-flick" although you never know.
Lary9