Napoleon

This Thanksgiving, Napoleon, the newest film from Ridley Scott, was released in theaters. Napoleon follows the story of the famous French emperor in his rise to power and fall from grace. Ridley Scott is a very good filmmaker and the trailers made this look like such an epic film so I was very excited to see this one.

This film is a sweeping epic that tells a great story about Napoleon. It is a very slick-looking production with great visuals and storytelling. Many of the battle sequences and sets are so big in scale it is just so fun to watch. The battle sequences are easily the best part of the film as they are just so epic and so large in scale. The ice battle showcased in the trailer is by far the best sequence as it manages to showcase Napoleon's genius as a general. I also thought the cinematography and visuals very good. Apple always manages to put out stuff that looks very slick with minimal CGI but still great visuals. The character portrayal of Napoleon was very well done. While it does showcase his great abilities as a leader, it still does a great job of addressing his flaws and blind ambition. It doesn't portray him as a good man but as what he actually was, a great military leader. Joaquin Phoenix is great in the role of the Napoleon. He does a great job of conveying the confidence of the general while also portraying the brokenness when he has to leave Josephine. He portrays the imperfect man very well. Finally, I thought this movie was very insightful on who Napoleon was as a person. I learned a lot about his life that I did not know before.

While I did find this film very exciting and epic, there were a few key things that kept it back for me. The biggest issue was that the movie was a lot more focused on the relationship between Napoleon and Josephine than I was expecting. I thought it was going to be a war epic with some romance on the side. Instead, it turns out to be a romance film with some war on the side which is not what I was looking for in a movie about Napoleon. I also thought the flow of the movie was a bit odd at times. I focus the entire first act on Josephine's affair to kind of get Napoleon and Josephine's arc done and out of the way and then move on to everything else. I think it should have been a bit more integrated into the rest of the story.

Overall, this was a very epic film was large-scale battles and a great character study of Napoleon. However, it has a few structural flow issues that hold the movie back for me. It isn't a top-tier Ridley Scott film but it is still a very good movie.

Score 8/10 Grade: B+ Recommendation: check it out