“The French don’t even like themselves,” responded the director Ridley Scott about the criticism in France of his recent film, Napoleon, starring the Oscar winner for the Joker, Joaquin Phoenix. However, criticism in the United Kingdom has accompanied him: The Guardian gave it 5 stars, and The Times (4) He described it as a “spectacular epic story.”
“While the film depicts the life of Napoleon Bonaparte as a military, strategic and conquering genius, in reality it is largely his relationship with his wife, Josephine de Beauharnais (played by Vanessa Kirby), as well as his complex — sometimes childish — personality. but always tyrannical—the one at the center of the story,” says Forbes.
“When you get into the idea of relationships, you understand: ‘OK, he was immature, he didn’t know how to be with a woman (…) How can you apply that to this particular scene? “I feel comfortable in weird sex scenes here, because it feels like this is the time to see this side of his personality, which feels really unexpected,” Phoenix told Forbes.
Peru Premiere. November 2024. Photo: diffusion
The actor finds in Scott an open and receptive director. He “has discovered everything and yet he is also able to spin spontaneously” when new ideas are suggested to him. Phoenix works with him again 23 years after he was cast as the emperor in Gladiator. “The studio didn’t want me to Gladiator. In fact, Ridley was given an ultimatum and he fought for me and it was an extraordinary experience,” he told the BBC.
An “angry and honest” director
The film lasts 2 hours and 38 minutes and begins with the execution of Marie Antoinette in 1793. A Napoleon we will see him—over three decades—change his body language the more he gains power. “Historical inaccuracies,” criticized historians and the director insulted French critics. “Don’t think that insulting an entire country is enough for Scott. Speaking to Jonathan Dean of The Sunday Times, he also reserved some ire for historians, some of whom have suggested that Napoleon may not be the most rigorously accurate film ever made. Scott responded by addressing the entire community of historians. “Excuse me, buddy, were you there?” He got angry. “No? Well, shut up then,” narrates The Guardian.
Scott responded to the BBC about why he should bring to the cinema a visual spectacle that contrasts the intimacy of a couple’s relationship with the actions of a man who caused the death of around three million soldiers and civilians. “It’s so fascinating. Revered, hated, loved… more famous than any man, leader or politician in history. How can you not want to go there?”
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