Product: Gladiator [VHS] (2000)
Rating: 1.0
Stimulus not storytelling
[I wrote this review some years ago under an anonymous account. I'm resubmitting it so that it will show up under My Reviews, as it sums up what I think about a lot of modern movie-making.]I strongly believe that the tremendous success of this movie at the box office and the awards is tragic testimony to how the art of film-making has declined from storytelling to mere sensory stimulation. Consider: music that never lets up; reverb added to every voice, even when characters are talking out in the open; constant use of quick camera cuts to ensure that you never have a chance to study or reflect on anything; every scene keyed to the same pitch of intensity, so that there is little to distinguish a fight in a small provincial amphitheatre from the climax in the Colosseum. It's all just a barrage of noise and light calculated to keep your reptile brain stimulated while your intellect shuts down.Compare this film toSpartacus, a movie that could not be made in this era because the younger generation, overstimulated by movies like Gladiator, would consider it boring. Despite the lack of computer FX, the action scenes in the earlier movie are so much more successful because (a) they stand out against the background of long, slow, quiet plot and character development and (b) they are coherent, unlike the muddled battles and fights of Gladiator, where you don't get much of an idea of what is going on besides general mayhem.It's really sad that manipulation of the senses has become so confused with artistry. Sad because more movies like this will be made, while we get to see fewer and fewer that offer any stimulation for the higher parts of the brain.