Don't believe the hype!

Rating: 6/10 (5 June 2000)

Now don't get me wrong, Gladiator is not a bad film, it simply isn't as good as everyone seems to be saying it is. For some reason it has captured the imagination of what I call the James Bond audience, the people who only go to the movies once or twice a year and this has artificially inflated it's rating. There are plenty of other people writing about how good the film is, so I'm going to concentrate on it's flaws.
Firstly, it is far too long. Clearly the producers wanted to make an epic like in the old days, but they seemed to have assumed that epic means length. Wrong! I'm sure a half-decent producer could have taken at least half and hour out of the film. It takes far too long to get going. After the inital battle, which for me was the high-point of the film, there is no action for about 45 mins. This is the point where the plot takes place. The problem is, the characters are all so cardboard that the audience can easily work out what the plot is about, and five minutes here would have been more than ample.
The fight scenes were some of the worst I have ever seen. You would think Ridley Scott (or his second unit director) would have seen The Matrix, a Jackie Chan film, or at least one Martial Arts film. That is how to direct an interesting fight; long, stationary shots showing off the skills of the stuntmen, not close-ups and constant irritating cutting on movement. It was impossible to work out what was going on in most of the fight scenes.
Thirdly, there is far too much CGI. Yes it was impressive to recreate the Coliseum, but then they ruin the effect with overkill. And the CGI tigers were absolutely awful. Surely real tigers would have been cheaper and far more impressive.
Fourthly, historical accuracy... oh we don't need to bother with this, after all, it's only a movie...
And don't forget the wonderful array of accents!
I can't help comparing the film to Ben Hur or Spartacus and I'm afraid that Gladiator comes a poor second in terms of story and spectacle.