Reilly Scott, the name is undoubtedly significant. He celebrated his 86th birthday on 30 November and is one of the few British directors still active in the world of cinema. As a director born before World War II, many of his films after the new millennium have become "imported blockbusters". Not only that, but his works in the seventies and eighties, such as "Alien", "Blade Runner" and "Black Rain", are known as classics and are loved by old fans. During the pandemic, he also directed two high-profile films, The Last Duel and The Gucci Family. As for why "Napoleon" was filmed, producer Kevin Walsh believes that Scott wants to carry on Kubrick's legacy. In 1927, French director Albert Gance had filmed the five-hour-long film of the same name, Napoleon, showing a unique perspective on the French emperor. In addition, Soviet director Sergei Bondarchuk's "Battle of Waterloo" also deeply reflects on Napoleon's success.
In the overseas reputation of "Napoleon", as the "Daily Telegraph" said, "only a true master can master such a magnificent and rich film". And The Guardian praised Joaquin Phoenix's performance as strong as the glass of burgundy he spilled in the movie. All this makes people look forward to "Napoleon". The French ** evaluation of the film "Napoleon" can be described as unrelenting: the French version of GQ expressed its dissatisfaction with the appearance of the French hero in the film with an American accent, saying that the performance was "very clumsy, unnatural, and not intentionally funny." And "Le Figaro" directly said that this movie can be renamed "Barbie and Ken under the Empire"!At the same time, at the beginning of the film, the scene of the French Revolution is shown, and the guillotine, which is going down at a speed of 25 kilometers per hour, can separate the corpse in just 1 50 seconds, and at the scene where both Louis XVI and Queen Marie are ghosts, Artillery Lieutenant Napoleon just watches from the sidelines. The revolutionary Robespierre, who preached that "terror is an extension of virtue", was also besieged in the later "Thermidorian Coup", first by suicide, and then by guillotine.
These undoubtedly also show the director's own coldness towards politics. In the protagonist poster, Napoleon played by Joaquin Phoenix wears the iconic two-horned felt hat and looks at the world, and the line in the upper right corner reads "He came from a humble beginning, but conquered everything", and the "conquest" here is obviously also a tribute to another emperor who also had great military achievements, Caesar's sentence "I came, I saw, I conquered". In Vanessa Kirby's portrait poster, the phrase "Josephine's world" connects the whole film in a closed loop: Napoleon's military exploits and the love and hatred between him and Josephine are juxtaposed and tightly entangled. Joaquin Phoenix's rendition did not mythologize him. At the age of 50, he played Napoleon in his youth, restrained and depressed, which is his clumsy way on the big screen this time. In the film, when the title "Napoléon" appears, it is the sound of a quill writing on a piece of paper as the background sound, which somewhat reveals Scott's ambition to write history with the film. After all, in the director's view, the Napoleonic era is the starting point of modern history, "he changed the world and rewrote the rules."
Perhaps Chinese audiences can look at this film with a more normal mind. The Siege of Toulon was Napoleon's battle of fame, but Joaquín Phoenix's rendition did not mythologize him. At the age of 50, he played Napoleon in his youth, restrained and depressed, which is his clumsy way on the big screen this time. "Napoleon": the emotional journey of a giant of historyIn the movie "Napoleon", we see a heroic and determined Napoleon, whose precise planning and leadership become part of the story. However, in addition to these heroic aspects, the film also shows Napoleon's almost comical signature action: whenever his own cannon roars, Napoleon can't help but cover his ears with his hands. This scene not only makes the "god of artillery" more like a mortal, but also may indicate his attitude towards comments from all sides. Napoleon in the film is not an immaculate hero, but a real, emotional, and vulnerable character. Vanessa Kirby's Josephine also has memorable details. Coming from an aristocratic background, she nearly got guillotined during the Jacobin rule, and appeared with short hair, showing her unwillingness to be entangled in her hair with a guillotine.
After her release, she tied a red ribbon around her neck, leading the fashion trend of French high society for a while. Although Phoenix is much older than Kirby in reality, according to historical facts, Josephine is 6 years older than Napoleon. In the film, Kirby plays the role very enchantingly, so Napoleon, who is still a blank sheet of paper in the history of love, will easily fall under her pomegranate skirt. The director shows Napoleon's side as a strategist and politician in the film, while also revealing his emotional world. Scott once said that Napoleon was an incredible strategist, a remarkable, intuitive, and ruthless statesman, but what fascinated him most was that "he was about to occupy Moscow, but in the back of his mind he was still thinking about all his wife's behavior in Paris." The roar of the cannons on the battlefield and the tearing and begging between the palace and the palace have activated the blazing ** between the two of them who love and kill each other. The light and shadow of Napoleon also have a classical texture like an oil painting. When shooting historical films, people always use natural light, and Rembrandt and Caravaggio are masters of using a single light source, a large window, a fireplace, or a candle.
In the film, the actors will try to speak their lines as close to the window or the candelabra as possible, and the positive light will always hit Napoleon, making the main character appear brighter while putting the others in shadow. In particular, the scene of his accession to the throne, from the costumes, props to the images, is a complete tribute to the French painter Jacques-Louis David's "Coronation of Napoleon I". This scene makes the audience feel as if they are in a historical picture scroll and feel the solemnity and glory of that era. The movie "Napoleon" not only shows Napoleon's strategic talent and political skills, but also shows his real side on an emotional level. Napoleon was not a mysterious legend, he had emotions, weaknesses, and his own pursuits and struggles. The film gives the audience a more comprehensive understanding of this historical giant, and his emotional journey is thus richer and deeper. "Napoleon": The Glory and Fall of the Giants of HistorySteven Scott, a director from a family of self-propelled soldiers, has already shown his excellent mastery of war scenes from different eras in "Gladiator" and "Black Hawk Down".
In his latest work, Napoleon, he recreates famous battles such as Toulon, Austerlitz (Battle of the Three Emperors) and Waterloo, to name a few, with great care. When Gladiator was filmed, CGI technology was just getting started, and now it can be presented with computer special effects. However, Scott, who advocates "real-life shooting", used 4 to 11 cameras to shoot in all directions at the same time to show the ceremonial advance of the infantry, the rapid rush of the cavalry, and the thunderous thunder of the artillery phalanx. These can be seen that the main creator is familiar with the drills and tactics of the year, and all strive to restore them truthfully. At the end of the film, the dying Napoleon is exiled to St. Helena, sitting at the dining table and watching the two children wielding knives and guns in front of them with wooden sticks, and asking them with great interest where is the capital of **"St. Petersburg, before Moscow. "Do you know who burned Moscow?It's me. "No, it should be burned by the ** people themselves. "Why?"It's common sense.
Hearing these words, Napoleon fell to the ground ......In the subtitles that followed, the number of Napoleon's armies killed in all of Napoleon's armies was shown, including 470,000 casualties in the 1812 invasion alone. One will succeed in ten thousand backbones, but no matter how brilliant the ambition and hegemony are, it will eventually lose to time and common sense. In this film, Scott recreates the glory and decadence of Napoleon through superb filming techniques and a profound historical plot. Viewers will be transported into this turbulent history and experience the wars and life of that era.