Napoleon Bonaparte, like his professed idol Alexander the Great, is a fascinating figure with an unparalleled run. His biography is chock full of legendary episodes that could make for superb cinematic storytelling. Alas, “Napoleon” is not that.
“Napoleon” dutifully visits some of the biggest moments in Bonaparte’s life as if only to sequentially scratch them off a checklist. A 2.5 hour runtime is simply woefully insufficient to give any context to these events. Look, Napoleon’s in Egypt. Now he’s First Consul. Oh wait, he’s emperor. Good thing Czar Alexander is his buddy. Ah, never mind, he’s invading Russia and Moscow is burning. Oh look now he’s abdicating. Or is he? All of this narrative whiplash makes every event ephemeral and stripped of its epic gravity.
Part of this whiplash is the fault of Napoleon’s unwieldly biography. He had an improbable life full of cataclysmic climaxes and hellish lows. It is easy to imagine any filmmaker being so tempted to capture such a grand narrative. But that doesn’t excuse anyone, especially Director Ridley Scott, from biting off more than they can chew.
Of all the film’s subjects, Napoleon’s relationship with his life-love Josephine is best delved into from start to finish, and rightly so. Vanessa Kirby and Joaquin Phoenix’s roles together feel properly neurotic, bipolar, and centralizing for Napoleon’s story.
We get a sense of how good of an actor Joaquin Phoenix is as a sardonic, contemplative, and at times angry Napoleon, but are given surprisingly little insight into Napoleon himself. What motivates Napoleon besides Josephine? Is he a uniquely great battlefield tactician? What was French imperial rule like over the conquered territories? Was he a tyrant? The film fails to even glancingly grapple with any interesting questions. In this way, an excellent cast of historical figures feels squandered by fleeting scenes given too little room to develop or breath. It is a shame that the guts of “Napoleon” could not be transplanted into a mini series format, because there is much potential in such a rich story.
Some moments of the film verge on greatness: the brawl during the Coup of 18 Brumaire at the Council of Five Hundred; Napoleon’s fateful encounter with the 5th Infantry Regiment on his march to Paris from Elba; contemplative conversations with Betsy Balcombe on Saint Helena. But again, these moments are starved of the space that might make them impactful.
“Napoleon” does undoubtedly showcase some glorious large scale battles: At Toulon; the fabled allied retreat over ice at Austerlitz; and like the good Englishman Ridley Scott is, the event with the most attention and largesse is Waterloo and the matchup with the Duke of Wellington.
I’m certain that “Napoleon” is the best possible version of this particular screenplay. But more than anything else, what “Napoleon” demonstrates is how ill advised it is to tackle Napoleon’s life from Toulon to Saint Helena in a single film. The drama of the Napoleonic era encompasses, to both Scott’s credit and detriment, complex events that are no doubt difficult for the parameters of the big screen. Maybe the promised 4 hour cut will feel deeper and less frenetic, but I’m skeptical that even a cut double that length would do better service.
“Napoleon” is not irredeemable. It looks great and is well made with polish on a technical level. It has impressive Napoleonic set pieces and battles, and a healthy dose of chaos whenever appropriate. But in deciding to pursue a near all encompassing lens of Napoleon’s life, Ridley Scott unfortunately overshot and made a film destined to be shelved alongside other half baked historical biographies.
73% C
As AJ Thinks 