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Hack&Lube · 11-25-2023, 01:58 AM

Ridley Scott's Napoleon produced by Apple belongs on Apple TV.

I know it's hard to condense a prolific 28 years of a legendary individual down to 2.5 hours but this isn't the way to do it. It's a jumbled mess of chaotic cuts and jumps that don't have any structure.

This is a thoroughly 1-dimension depiction of Napoleon. Joaquin Phoenix is horribly miscast and gives one of the worst performances of his career. This is likely due to a bad script and bad direction. His voice is the wrong timbre & cadence, his entire presentation is a comic-book Penguin caricature.

Ridley Scott does nothing to explain the motivations of Napoleon aside from a trite attempt to frame his life within the borders of him being an almost-autistic dork dealing with his obsession with a woman. Then he casually throws in the 3,000,000 Napoleon killed before the closing credits without having explored any of the actual themes of Napoleon and Revolutionary France that led to this with any insight or meaning.

The few battles are poorly explained. The brilliant maneuvers and cunning of Napoleon's Marshalls are all ignored. Strategy is barely perceived. It's just a melee of crowds running into each other interspersed with awkward grunts & stares by Phoenix.

Here are two better versions of The Battle of Waterloo:

11-25-2023, 01:58 AM	#7504
Hack&Lube Atomic Nerd Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Calgary Exp:	Ridley Scott's Napoleon produced by Apple belongs on Apple TV. I know it's hard to condense a prolific 28 years of a legendary individual down to 2.5 hours but this isn't the way to do it. It's a jumbled mess of chaotic cuts and jumps that don't have any structure. This is a thoroughly 1-dimension depiction of Napoleon. Joaquin Phoenix is horribly miscast and gives one of the worst performances of his career. This is likely due to a bad script and bad direction. His voice is the wrong timbre & cadence, his entire presentation is a comic-book Penguin caricature. Ridley Scott does nothing to explain the motivations of Napoleon aside from a trite attempt to frame his life within the borders of him being an almost-autistic dork dealing with his obsession with a woman. Then he casually throws in the 3,000,000 Napoleon killed before the closing credits without having explored any of the actual themes of Napoleon and Revolutionary France that led to this with any insight or meaning. The few battles are poorly explained. The brilliant maneuvers and cunning of Napoleon's Marshalls are all ignored. Strategy is barely perceived. It's just a melee of crowds running into each other interspersed with awkward grunts & stares by Phoenix. Here are two better versions of The Battle of Waterloo: YouTube Video YouTube Video Last edited by Hack&Lube; 11-25-2023 at 02:57 PM.