A Shakespearean epic.

Rating: 9/10 (23 March 2012)

This movie is pure Shakespeare. I hadn't seen it in years and tonight was my first time watching it in Blu-Ray, which just elevated it to an even higher plane. All of the technical aspects of the film are wildly impressive. The costumes, the sets, the score, the cinematography in particular was an astonishing achievement. So many shots felt like they were paintings, the actors working on some master artist's canvas. Ridley Scott crafts an epic tale of the warrior Maximus, but it's interesting how intimate the sets themselves are. The battles take place within arenas and almost the entire film is in dark hallways, cells or rooms within large structures. Even the big battle scene that opens the film is on a small field, yet Scott is able to give the film such a grand scope. It speaks a lot to his skill as a director.
The blending of fantasy and reality, as Maximus is constantly looking into the afterlife, reaching out to be with his slain wife and son, is seamless and beautifully touching. We are given an inside look into what Maximus fights for, and Scott's direction is so clear in delivering that to us. It's truly some of the most precise direction I've seen, working from an immaculate script by David Franzoni, John Logan and William Nicholson. The fact that this was an original script still blows my mind. If I had gone in not knowing that I honestly would have thought that it was a Shakespeare adaptation of some play I had somehow never heard of. Dipped in themes as old and violent as revenge, betrayal, incest and battles both physical and political, the film feels like it was ripped straight from the man himself. The dialogue is some of the best of recent years, poetic without seeming like it's trying too hard, memorable without ever becoming unnatural to it's characters.
It's all played out by a tremendous ensemble, highlighted by the explosive force that is Russell Crowe. He turns Maximus into a stone badass, but in his eyes you can still manage to see a warm and honest soul. He's a good man who is forced into a dark place and the result is someone you would never want to have coming after you. As the man he's going after, Joaquin Phoenix is the ultimate slime, having so much fun in the depravity of the role but also managing to bring a surprising vulnerability to the part. I was very caught off guard the several times that I actually felt bad for his Commodus. The battles are wildly entertaining, appropriately violent and so immaculately choreographed, as is to be expected on a Scott production. Working in this genre is just another example of the superb diversity that both Scott and Crowe are capable of, and guiding this achievement is both men at the absolute top of their game.