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November 16, 2024 - 4:30pm
Is Ridley Scott a good filmmaker? It is surprisingly difficult to say, just as it is difficult to say, even after watching Gladiator II, whether or not it is a good film. Yet the original Gladiator was a perfect film, in the same way a trashy three-minute pop song can be perfect. A creation of the studio system working at full pace within the constraints of the genre, a product designed to appeal to as many people as possible nevertheless achieved a kind of immortality: the purest, almost Platonic form of the Hollywood movie.
The sequel, notwithstanding some spectacular violence, not so much. But the differences between the two films, despite their almost identical plotlines, highlight how the culture has changed in the intervening quarter-century.
A titan of industry rather than an auteur, the fascination with Scott is how he soaks up and radiates the wider energies of the culture around him. If Gladiator reinvented the sword-and-sandal epic at the precise moment of America’s imperial zenith, 2001’s Black Hawk Down, through the uncanny prescience of its timing, caught the mood of the Global War on Terror which was both its result and downfall. His more or less explicit War on Terror epic, Kingdom of Heaven, still has the power to frustrate and delight in equal measure, recasting the Crusades through the lens of Boomer liberalism, soaking up the worldview of the then-fashionable New Atheism. By 2021’s underwatched The Last Duel, Scott had steered his craft towards the #MeToo wave: the enthusiasms of the current zeitgeist enter the director’s mind as raw material and are churned out, processed and packaged, as glossy spectacle.
What does Gladiator II tell us about the zeitgeist of 2024? It is a surprisingly Right-wing film: if the plot is laid out starkly, it could be a Mel Gibson script. A humble married farmer finds his homeland invaded; his wife is killed and he is dragged to the metropole of an overextended empire, now sunk into decadence. The Rome of Gladiator II is dirtier and more decrepit than that of Gladiator: its population, wont to burn the city down in fiery but peaceful protests, is significantly more diverse. In the civic nationalism of the lost Roman dream, wistfully expressed by an Indian gladiator-turned-healer, Scott explicitly makes his Rome modern America.
Echoing Francis Fukuyama’s The Last Man postscript to The End of History, Denzel Washington delivers an eccentric speech on Thymos in justifying his desire to bring the rotten edifice down. “Rome must fall,” he says. “I need only give it a push.” The villainous twin emperors, the source of the moral rot at the empire’s heart, are effete, spoilt children: in Scott’s portrayal they are also explicitly, strikingly queer in the modern sense. The abruptness of the film’s pivot from the reigning aesthetic and morality of the 2010s is genuinely startling.
If the Rome of Gladiator was still the shining city on a hill (or seven), which had merely lost its way through the chance rule of a bad emperor, the Rome of the sequel is inherently evil, louchely immoral at the centre and addicted to foreign wars without purpose. “I know the chaos they have wrought,” we are told of the Romans. “This city is diseased.” The director himself fears for the near future. “The big good wolf — the US — used to go: ‘Don’t do that.’ That’s all gone,” he said in an interview this week. “I think there’s something even worse down the line.” Or, as he has a character lament: “The dream of Rome is an old man’s fantasy… there is no other Rome.”
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SubscribeThe zeitgeist of 2024? Creating a desert of concrete dust and calling it a two-state solution?
Gaza delenda est.
“If the Rome of Gladiator was still the shining city on a hill (or seven), which had merely lost its way through the chance rule of a bad emperor”
I didn’t find the message of the original Gladiator nearly as optimistic as that. All the shots of the crowd baying for blood mercilessly, the lust for blood that ran through the society, and the hypocrisy and duplicity of the senators and politicians all pointed to a system where corruption and human nature had already condemned the empire to its eventual fate. The old Caesar Harris even seems to be having his come-to-Jesus moment only because he is dying, and is seemingly addicted to war.
I disagree here – I think Gladiator I did a good job of leveraging the ambiguity in the historical record. Marcus Aurelius is after all accorded the predicate of honorary Christian, who would’ve if he could’ve (and Gladiator II unsubtly pokes holes in this). Historically, he was the first of the Adoptive Emperor line to NOT adopt (with disastrous consequences), but to appoint his son – a problem Gladiator I neatly skirts around, and does so in concordance with historiography.
Gladiator II completely ditches history. From a historical point of view, nothing makes sense or maps onto history (Geta and Caracalla as portrayed have more to do with the historical Commodus, Marcus Aurelius’ son and successor, and Heliogabalus, Caracalla’s cousin and successor-but-one).
Just seen as a film script, it makes sense and is conclusive, but as history or gloss on contemporary politics, I don’t appreciate it.
I’m sorry, but however much a film-maker may be “in touch with the zeitgeist”, they’re no more capable of demonstrating how things will pan out than anyone else. They’re not “gods”. (And if i see anyone use the term New Atheism again i’ll probably choke myself through disgust at those who use tropes in place of a convincing argument.)
The film will no doubt be a spectacle, but it’s entertainment. Go ahead Ridley, entertain us, but all this “film/book becomes our history” is just nonsense. In fact, it’s one of the things that writers need to just stop doing, and get over themselves.
tropes in place of a convincing argument sounds like a fair description of New Atheism
Obviously Europeans have a huge fixation on the U.S.. However, what if Scott made a parallel movie about actual, linear descendant of the Roman Empire , e.g., the EU? What would that look like? Musical comedy with a Macron like lead?
The United States is the most direct descent of the Roman empire. It’s founding fathers were explicit in their desires to found a new Rome. They ended up with an expansionist Republic fuelled by a huge slave economy, which built temples to it’s emperors, just like Rome. Modern America is a continuation of this, and it’s societal fragmenting looks eerily like that of Rome’s. European or not, it’s a fascinating story.
The average American has said enough and we will now witness a resurgent in American values for the next 40 years! The age of Democratic neo-liberalism has proven to have metastasized into the gigantic fed bureaucracy, eating away at our freedoms, while bankrupting our economy! Here comes the wave of change- a reversal of fortunes in a very chaotic time period!
Sadly, the Yanks are totally unaware of your historical comparison and cant possibly know the tragedy you know awaits them. Still, you are welcome to believe it will disintegrate by failure to vote your way. And as a famous country singer observed “I hope that silly notion brings you cheer!”. IMO the U.S.can fail until after that guiding beacon of hope and light, the EU fails. We should all be careful about what we wish for….
It’d be a Carry On film.
Carry on Cleo was a hoot!
For a comical treatment of some of the themes discussed above (corruption, a collapsing empire), one might look at this:
https://erikhildinger.substack.com/p/chapter-1-of-fortuna-at-the-rudder
In leveraging Rome, there is always a tension between leveraging the glory of the Roman Empire, which was imperial, and the vigour of the Roman Republic (many “issues” there as well, only to mention Marius and Sulla).
Make no mistake – Rome was an extremely successful empire. Its last secular remnants held out until 1453, and its imperial organisation survives in the Catholic Church.
Machiavelli glorified republican Rome; the Italian fascists glorified “end justifies the means” elements of Roman history.
The contemporary lesson of Roman history is one understood by British politicians in the first half of the 20th century, and implemented after WW II: You can either be an empire or a democracy, but you cannot be both. Britain chose democracy (with a not-so-gentle push from its closest ally, the US).
The US today is actually one step further: The empire is already lost; so will the US engage in the already-lost fight to preserve the empire and in the process lose democracy, or will the US pull back from the brink, write off the empire, and re-focus on democracy?
It’s far too early. The Holy Roman Empire started with Charlemagne crowned emperor on Christmas Day 800. The HRE suffered many travails and (well) arguably never achieved “empire” level ever, but the final stake in its heart did not come until the Reichsdeputationshauptschluß in 1803, courtesy of Napoleon Bonaparte.
So a millennial run is fairly good innings in my books. The EU would do well to get close.
The writer spent too much time mucking around in the fantasy land of the academy. I’ll look for a proper movie reviewer to get a clearer idea of whether the film is worth seeing.
If you enjoy a spectacle, the film is absolutely worth watching – production values are lavish, appealing characters, good story.
If you’re into history – not so much.
If you want a parable on empire – please ignore.
My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions; loyal servant to the true Emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next. He/Him.
Brilliant comment.
Absolutely priceless. Beautifully sums up the ludicrous nature of modern society.
Thank you.
I tried to upvote you—99 percent of the time my attempts don’t work—because anyone who makes me laugh gets one. Great comment!
You are most kind. I have upvoted you, too.
Boring words salad
Republic becomes empire…empire overreaches and collapses…O Level Ancient History surely…
Only actual history is completely at odds with the film’s narrative. Yes, Caracalla (probably) had Geta murdered, but Caracalla was a no-nonsense soldier. Our history here is not particularly reliable, since the only records left to us are highly biased, as if you had to reconstruct the history of the last 30 years purely on the basis of Fox News reports.
Caracalla ruled for considerable time as sole ruler, and had significant achievements to his name (e.g. the Constitutio Antoniniana). Nor did Rome “fall”, not then, nor for another 250 years (in the West) or even more than a thousand years (in the East).
The image presented of Geta and Caracalla is a composite of Commodus (the villain of Gladiator I, and by all accounts a very strange person), and Heliogabalus/Elagabal, a cousin of Caracalla and Caracalla’s successor-but-one.
Very disappointing and meaningless.
I’d be more interested in whether this film on general release in China, Russia, N Korea or Iran? I won’t even ask about Afghanistan. A much more intriguing proposition and arguably much more revolutionary. Anyone know?
A good commentator usually, but this one seems like a miss. It’s reasonable to look for zeitgeist in the movies but one should be prepared to find only the most basic and unchanging fundamentals of crowd entertaining
The subtext of a film is always interesting but the subtext today is becoming more explicit, almost as if there is no need for one.
I’m 55.
I’ve been politically aware since I was 15.
In the forty years since I have listened to experts proclaiming the demise of the US is just around the corner.
Post Vietnam. Post Iranian hostage debacle. Post fall of the Berlin Wall. Post 9/11. Post Afghanistan pull out. Forgive me if I’ve missed out a key event.
America is in a re-birth phase. How it looks as a result of that phase is anyone’s guess. A movie about Ancient Rome is probably not a great barometer.
Your right! With Dem democracy we were headed for a popular vote Dictatorship, Trump ran on our Forefathers Republic, its a citizen Governmet! Like Cromwell with Britian who empowered the parliament to rule not a king.He started the first education system for all people in the globe! we lost that fo almost 6 decades after JFK was assissinated . Everything we face today started after that!
“louchely”? Please help…