Filmed in England, Morocco and Malta, the film mixes computer graphics with reality to make the battle scenes and the Roman Colosseum come alive. It is fantastic as a work of artistic excellence. The violence of the movie is forceful and bloody. If you cannot take violence, you will not want to see this movie. I could not help comparing it to the wrestling matches of cable TV today.
People love live violence and it feeds their depravity.
Maximus desires to fight the battles as a general and go home to his wife, child and farm. Commodus thinks only of his personal, indulgent self and his ambition to succeed his father, Marcus Aurelius, who does not want his son to succeed to the throne. Commodus kills his father but Maximus refuses to pledge loyalty to the new Caesar and is ordered killed. He escapes and eventually ends up as a gladiator and does battle with Commodus. In the end, in Chuck Colson's words, the movie celebrates selflessness over selfishness, virtue over vice and loyalty over ambition.