An epic that details the chequered rise and fall of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and his relentless journey to power through the prism of his addictive, volatile relationship with his w... Read allAn epic that details the chequered rise and fall of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and his relentless journey to power through the prism of his addictive, volatile relationship with his wife, Josephine.An epic that details the chequered rise and fall of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte and his relentless journey to power through the prism of his addictive, volatile relationship with his wife, Josephine.
- Nominated for 3 Oscars
- 5 wins & 41 nominations total
- Director
- Writer
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaEugene de Beauharnais, the 12 year old boy who requests his father's sword from Napoleon in the film, became an able politician and military commander in his own right. Napoleon cared deeply for Eugene even formally adopting him in 1806 and making him heir presumptive to the Italian throne and Viceroy of Italy where he was de facto ruler. Eugene followed Napoleon on most of his campaigns. In 1809 Eugene commanded his own campaign with the French 'Army of Italy' beating the Austrians in nearly every battle.
- GoofsAfter being defeated at the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon surrendered to the British on-board HMS Bellerophon. Although receiving many guests, he never met the Duke of Wellington face-to-face in real life.
- Quotes
Napoleon Bonaparte: You think you're so great because you have boats!
- Crazy creditsThe opening credits in the poster and vignettes of the film start with "Columbia Pictures and Apple Original Films present", but the opening credits in the actual film start with "Apple Original Films present".
- Alternate versionsSir Ridley Scott confirmed that a director's cut with over 92 minutes of extra footage will be released to Apple TV+, although no release date for the director's cut has been revealed.
- ConnectionsFeatured in Jeremy Jahns: Napoleon - Movie Review (2023)
- SoundtracksÇa Ira !
Music by Jean Françaix
Lyrics by Sacha Guitry
Performed by Édith Piaf
Courtesy of Warner Music UK Ltd.
Featured review
An interesting failure
Ridley Scott directed one of the best movies ever made set during the Napoleonic Wars: unfortunately, that movie is not Napoleon but his cinematic debut, The Duellists, forty years ago.
Unsurprisingly, The Duellists had a strong source material (it was based on a novel by Joseph Conrad which it often followed almost verbatim), while Napoleon has an uneven screenplay by David Scarpa.
Even past the age of eighty Sir Ridley can still shoot pretty and energetic pictures but his hits and misses depend on the scripts he picks, and he hasn't always shown the best discernment.
The elephant in the room is the large amount of historical inaccuracies. Even as a history buff I can forgive many of those: cutting or simplifying events for the sake of narrative, or even some overdramatization like the meeting between Napoleon and Wellington (it never happened) or Napoleon being present at Marie Antoinette's execution (he wasn't); however, stuff like Napoleon charging with his troops at Waterloo is absolute cringe, a kid's (or a lout's) idea of history.
Still, the big problems here are characterization and pacing.
The movie is a demythologization (some would say emasculation) of Napoleon. If you want to take this route then fair enough, but the character here fails to be consistent. I can buy a Napoleon who is an egomaniac and an overrated tactician (like in Tolstoy's War and Peace). I do not buy one who is an anxious, insecure, uncharismatic cold fish but also a stern tactical genius and an effective leader of men, one who flees from Egypt because Josephine is unfaithful but is also an unflappable military mastermind.
Phoenix is a great actor and does what he can but the two sides of the character just don't gel with each other. You can't have parodic moments like Napoleon rolling down the stairs during his coup against the Directory, despondently pouting as he waits for the rain to stop at Waterloo or awkwardly climbing on a box to stand face to face with a pharaoh's mummy (with his diminutive stature becoming a not-too-subtle metaphor of his overall mediocrity)... AND THEN have him magnetically charm the French soldiers into obedience after the Elba. This gawky Napoleon would have been shot to pieces there.
The other problem is pacing. A single movie about the whole life of Napoleon is in itself absurd, like making "a movie about World War 2". There is material in Napoleon's life for a VERY dense miniseries (which Steven Spielberg is reportedly planning).
Napoleon's first wife Josephine (Vanessa Kirby) plays a huge role here but I would argue the movie has either too little or way too much of her. This needed to be either focused mostly on Napoleon's personal life or to drastically reduce the (fairly repetitive after a while) moments where Napoleon is obsessed with his wife.
As it is now, it tries to tell - but rushes through - twenty very eventful years of European history and yet devotes more time to Napoleon visiting Josephine after their divorce than to his Russian campaign.
It's like making a D-Day movie which keeps cutting back and forth from the Normandy landings to Hitler spending time with Eva Braun. You can have either The Longest Day or Der Untergang, not both.
Still, it's not worthless. There are some interesting moments and set-pieces and, while Phoenix is saddled with a contradictory character, Kirby at least is excellent.
6/10.
Unsurprisingly, The Duellists had a strong source material (it was based on a novel by Joseph Conrad which it often followed almost verbatim), while Napoleon has an uneven screenplay by David Scarpa.
Even past the age of eighty Sir Ridley can still shoot pretty and energetic pictures but his hits and misses depend on the scripts he picks, and he hasn't always shown the best discernment.
The elephant in the room is the large amount of historical inaccuracies. Even as a history buff I can forgive many of those: cutting or simplifying events for the sake of narrative, or even some overdramatization like the meeting between Napoleon and Wellington (it never happened) or Napoleon being present at Marie Antoinette's execution (he wasn't); however, stuff like Napoleon charging with his troops at Waterloo is absolute cringe, a kid's (or a lout's) idea of history.
Still, the big problems here are characterization and pacing.
The movie is a demythologization (some would say emasculation) of Napoleon. If you want to take this route then fair enough, but the character here fails to be consistent. I can buy a Napoleon who is an egomaniac and an overrated tactician (like in Tolstoy's War and Peace). I do not buy one who is an anxious, insecure, uncharismatic cold fish but also a stern tactical genius and an effective leader of men, one who flees from Egypt because Josephine is unfaithful but is also an unflappable military mastermind.
Phoenix is a great actor and does what he can but the two sides of the character just don't gel with each other. You can't have parodic moments like Napoleon rolling down the stairs during his coup against the Directory, despondently pouting as he waits for the rain to stop at Waterloo or awkwardly climbing on a box to stand face to face with a pharaoh's mummy (with his diminutive stature becoming a not-too-subtle metaphor of his overall mediocrity)... AND THEN have him magnetically charm the French soldiers into obedience after the Elba. This gawky Napoleon would have been shot to pieces there.
The other problem is pacing. A single movie about the whole life of Napoleon is in itself absurd, like making "a movie about World War 2". There is material in Napoleon's life for a VERY dense miniseries (which Steven Spielberg is reportedly planning).
Napoleon's first wife Josephine (Vanessa Kirby) plays a huge role here but I would argue the movie has either too little or way too much of her. This needed to be either focused mostly on Napoleon's personal life or to drastically reduce the (fairly repetitive after a while) moments where Napoleon is obsessed with his wife.
As it is now, it tries to tell - but rushes through - twenty very eventful years of European history and yet devotes more time to Napoleon visiting Josephine after their divorce than to his Russian campaign.
It's like making a D-Day movie which keeps cutting back and forth from the Normandy landings to Hitler spending time with Eva Braun. You can have either The Longest Day or Der Untergang, not both.
Still, it's not worthless. There are some interesting moments and set-pieces and, while Phoenix is saddled with a contradictory character, Kirby at least is excellent.
6/10.
helpful•61953
- petra_ste
- Dec 2, 2023
Details
- Release date
- Countries of origin
- Official site
- Languages
- Also known as
- Đế Chế Napoleon
- Filming locations
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
- Budget
- $200,000,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $61,524,375
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $20,638,887
- Nov 26, 2023
- Gross worldwide
- $221,394,838
- Runtime2 hours 38 minutes
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 2.39 : 1
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