Ridley Scott's Napoleon

The most interesting thing about Napoleon is his hypocrisy. He was a republican revolutionary who installed himself as monarch. He was an Enlightenment reformer who reinstated slavery in his empire. He modernised Europe with a staggering death toll. He was a deist, technologist, and futurist who leaned on religion for public stability. He was a conquerer who believed in nationalism. One of his advisors was openly gay, yet he legislated away some rights for women. He freed the Jews of the nations he conquered, but he was no friend of ethnic minorities. He was a dictator who fought directly on the battlefield. He was a master war strategist who lost everything to some strategic miscalculations.

Scott’s Napoleon explores none of these themes. In fact, it seems devoid of any thesis on the man other than war, and the men who wage it are very bad. This uninteresting and trite statement may be true. Still, by taking this angle, Scott missed the opportunity to make a genuinely great accounting of the life of one of history’s most consequential figures.

The shame of this is compounded by the great things about the movie, including great practical battle scenes, a good performance from Phoenix (when the script doesn’t lead him astray), and fantastic costuming and sets.

The script was overtly bad, particularly in some sections (“I’m eating my breakfast!” … “You think you’re so great 'cause you have boats!”). As a result, the on-screen romance was incredibly stiff and painful to watch, and most of the characters came across as petulant teenagers. There were good moments, though (“Shall we vote?”).

I suspect the purpose of this film was to refute the great man theory of history. This tact probably succeeded for viewers as cynical about history as Scott seems to be. But it only did so by disregarding the real history of Napoleon Bonaparte. And I’m not sure that audience needed any convincing.