Product: Gladiator [VHS] (2000)
Rating: 3.0
Ridley and the Argonauts
Yes, it's got all the trademark Ridley Scott gritty imagery and fantastic cinematography, plus the usual Scott posers, but as cinema it is the same old Hollywood Roman epic cliche with the same old bad-blooded, self-deluded, and obsessively criminal Emperor and the same old man-of-the-people, victimized warrior hero whose integrity miraculously overcomes the Roman system. Zzzz. What's worse, as history it's retarded. Nothing happened this way, folks, and there are countless anachronisms. I don't believe that the movie medium is anyplace to really get your history, but at least it shouldn't try to pretend to be historical when it's not even close to the facts. This is, pure and simple, an abuse of history for the purpose of glamour. At best, it's simply a costume drama fantasy. They should have changed it from Rome to Lemuria--then they could have added some dragons and fighting skeletons and emulated "Jason and the Argonauts," which is what this movie is closer to than Tacitus. Otherwise--a Roman general who's actually a man of the wheat--wow, powerful..zzzz. Take away the fight scenes and this is pretty boring stuff. But yes, the fight scenes were often wonderful. Too bad it wasn't Tacitus.