A few odd choices can’t keep Napoleon from conquering the screen
Sir Ridley Scott, the legendary director of Blade Runner, Alien, and Gladiator, is eighty-five. In an impressive stretch for his age (or any age) and profession, he has directed eight feature films in the last decade, with Gladiator 2 slated for next year. Who can blame Scott for working so prolifically — he loves making movies! It’s a treat to have a talented filmmaker churn out a steady flow of films, covering a wide range of genres. His latest, Napoleon, adds another historical epic to his filmography. Despite a few off-kilter artistic choices, Napoleon is an astounding visual achievement, a throwback Hollywood epic that only a few directors, like Scott, can still deliver.
If you want a history lesson about Napoleon Bonaparte’s rise to power and the Napoleonic Wars, please seek out the numerous podcasts and books on the subject. This is a Ridley Scott film, one which provides a mostly surface-level account of characters and events, as is the case for many of Scott’s historical epics — the truth is in the context, not the content. The actors don’t speak French, or even use a French accent. Joaquin Phoenix (Joker) plays Napoleon Bonaparte, the French military leader who quickly ascends the ranks to claim (for himself) the title of Emperor of France. Vanessa Kirby (Pieces of a Woman) plays Joséphine, Napoleon’s lover turned Empress. The film begins in medias res in the late 1700s when Napoleon is already earning a name for himself, then follows his rise to power, highlighting a few pivotal battles, including the Battle of Austerlitz. The film culminates at the Battle of Waterloo and with Napoleon’s ultimate fate — exile. (Sorry for spoiling a widely taught two-hundred-year-old history lesson.)
The battle scenes are visceral, bloody, and uncompromising. Scott and his team employ copious amounts of horses and extras, and the occasional seamless CGI or film splicing trickery, to capture opposing armies marching across European landscapes and engaging in violent combat. Only a few living directors can effectively handle such large-scale action set pieces, and perhaps none more consistently than Scott. The technical filmmaking is top-notch, and the performances rise to the challenge. Phoenix’s performance is calculatingly erratic, filled with improvisations. The script portrays Bonaparte with a noticeable level of buffoonery and insecurity, satirizing his legend to flip the iconography on its side, making the film surprisingly funny. However, Phoenix’s voiceover in a few scenes puts his indiscernible American accent in an awkward spotlight. Kirby is magnificently stoic as the temperate Empress Joséphine. Luckily, all signs point to there being even more of her performance in the four-hour director’s cut.
Yes, as with many of his prior films, Ridley Scott has already announced a forthcoming four-hour cut of the film (about one-and-a-half hours longer than the theatrical version). One can easily imagine, and hope, that the extended version will include more of Joséphine’s backstory and smooth out a few hastened sequences that fly through the state of affairs of numerous warring nations.
Unfortunately, I don’t believe the director’s cut will include a new musical score. Whether by choice or tight deadlines, Napoleon doesn’t feature a full-length original musical score. Missing are the leitmotifs and propulsive instrumentations of Scott’s films’ typical soundtracks. Instead, Napoleon seems to feature at least four distinct music styles. Composer Martin Phipps (The Crown), who provides the film’s sporadic music, misses a great opportunity to inject the film with a rousing musical accompaniment. Even so, Napoleon is part historical epic and part chamber piece, exhibiting shades of Gladiator and Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Favourite in equal measure. Perhaps, like Scott’s director’s cut of Kingdom of Heaven, which included an additional 45 critical minutes, the director’s cut of Napoleon will be a considerable improvement, deepening the film’s depiction of central characters and territorial disputes. That being said, the theatrical version of Napoleon, especially the battle scenes, is already worth the price of admission.
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Napoleon opens in Bay Area theaters on Wednesday, November 22nd.
