Par son ampleur, son ambition assez démesurée mais maîtrisée, les moyens déployés à la reconstitution de l'antiquité romaine et de ses folies, la beauté sans faille de la personnalité de son héros, la force des images, son histoire (qui prend de sérieuses libertés avec l'Histoire, mais on s'en moque puisque c'est pour servir la cause d'un art louable), Gladiator est un film somptueux.
Une véritable réussite.
A voir et à revoir (est-ce qu'on finit par s'habituer à la violence extrême des scènes de combat et d'horreurs sanguinaires ?). ( )

A Roman general becomes a slave gladiator.

Much of the movie is boring. The first hour or so is slow but promising, but then out of nowhere the main character is captured by a slave trader and it's like a completely different movie. The second movie would have made a great action movie - there's some very fun, badass fight choreography, and the story is too absurdly simple to justify anything else - but whenever it tries to be more (which is most of the time), it gets extremely hackneyed. The plot is obvious and recycled, the dialog is painfully corny, and the characters feel like they've been re-written by committee. ( )

I loved this film so much I saw it three times in theaters and then naturally bought the DVD. I don't know exactly why I loved this film so much. I won't make a claim it's one of the great films of all time. But I thought Joaquin Phoenix and Russell Crowe were great in their roles, and I loved the visuals. I loved to play that scene where we first see Rome from above again and again. And let's face it, even though it was horrible as history, I just loved reveling in an epic film with a larger than life hero fighting not just for his life but to restore the republic and liberty with it. ( )

1940

When a Roman General is betrayed, and his family murdered by an emperor's corrupt son, he comes to Rome as a gladiator to seek revenge.