Napoleon (2023 | USA | 158 minutes | Ridley Scott)
Ridley Scott’s new epic biopic on the life of Napoleon Bonepartd is so frustrating it’s maddening. Is it good? Sure. Few do epic films of grand proportions as well as Ridley Scott. Yet it also left me wanting so much more.
The life and times of Napoleon should give plenty of fodder for a biopic. He rose from humble beginnings on his way to becoming one of the most powerful people in the world’s history. The tagline on posters says “He came from nothing; he conquered everything.” It’s quite the story! Sure, several million people died along the way, but who’s counting?
The movie opens with the 1793 beheading of Marie Antoinette, France’s last queen. The same year, Napoleon burnishes his reputation with a victory for the French Republic at the Siege of Toulon. It’s not long before he’s in the enviable position of naming himself Emperor of France. He has three main obsessions: military strategy, his place in history, and the state of his marriage to Empress Josephine de Beauharnais. He is smitten with her but she’s less enamored but still agrees to marry him. Still, her infidelities are covered in the newspaper. Despite warnings that it would be considered “desertion,” he leaves his troops to fight in Egypt while he returns home to confront Josephine.
I’m just getting to this in the fourth paragraph, but Joaquin Phoenix plays Napoleon and the Oscar winner is, uhh, fine? I wouldn’t call it one of his top-tier performances. Vanessa Kirby co-stars as Josephine and she’s even more disappointing. Neither actor, nor the script from David Scarpa give viewers much to hold onto. I was looking for something I could learn about Napoleon that I didn’t know, or a different interpretation of history. Something I didn’t learn in high school history. Instead, we have some pissed off historians, a snotty (and ridiculous) retort from Scott, and some questions about whether the man who fancies himself the greatest military mind to ever live forgot to calculate that Russian winters are extremely cold.
I don’t think historians are wrong to be critical of this but I care less about historical accuracy in filmmaking these days mostly because I don’t think I could name a biopic or historical epic that historians did approve of.
As far as Napoleon as a film, it’s quite watchable. I had was impressed with the pacing and the reconstruction of war scenes. My blood was pumping in all the scenes where it was appropriate. Another Ridley Scott movie famously asks, “were you not entertained?” I was.
Napoleon is playing in theaters now. It will be available on AppleTV+ “at a later date“.