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You are here: Home / TV & Movies / Movies / Diversionary Open Thread: Do You Like Gladiator Movies, Timmy?…

Diversionary Open Thread: Do You Like Gladiator Movies, Timmy?…

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(Lowkey Robinson’s impression here is damned good!)

I am not, generally, much of a Swords & Sandals fan, but I have a great weakness for Denzel Washington, so I’m looking forward to GLADIATOR II. Which I’ll probably end up streaming, because the Spousal Unit is already huffing about ‘gross historical inaccuracy’…

A sensible person does not demand authenticity from a wide-screen epi twenty years in the making, and yet the arguments are already generating publicity for Ridley Scott…

What I can’t figure out is whether Netflix’s supposed Hannibal epic is still in production:

Reader Interactions

46Comments

  3. 3.

    EM

    I thought the trailer looked awful. Over the top action sequences that look  more in line with an action movie or a superhero movie then a Gladiator film. Denzel Washington basically taking the character from training day and transporting it back in time. And rap music? And I would say the same thing if they were playing heavy metal music. Just totally out of place. It looks like they morphed the entire film just a conventional Garden variety generic action movie.

  7. 7.

    Martin

    I’m watching the 24 hours of LeMans which I wasn’t able to watch when it happened.

  10. 10.

    Phylllis

    Unfortunately for me the Braves game is a Fox broadcast tonight; it’s been wall-to-wall coverage of the incident since it happened. I guess its SB mowing TikToks for the foreseeable future

    ETA: Spoke too soon, the game is finally on.

  11. 11.

    Chris

    Yeah, I’d love to see a Hannibal movie. That guy’s entire story is absolutely filmworthily batshit insane awesome.

  14. 14.

    Phylllis

    @mrmoshpotato: Hubby prefers the radio broadcast, so when it’s on Fox or Apple or some other annoying alternate channel for no damn reason that I can fathom, I’ll mute the tv and listen to that.

  16. 16.

    NotMax

    Next up: Gladiator: The Musical?

    “Soon as we come up with enough rhymes for Crupellarii.”
    //

  17. 17.

    Cacti

    An NY accent for a movie set in ancient Rome is wrong. Everyone knows the Romans had upper class British accents.

  19. 19.

    SiubhanDuinne

     

    @cacti:

    Wasn’t there a movie set in medieval England in which Tony Curtis, in richest Brooklynese, proclaimed “Yondah lies duh cassel of my foddah”?

  21. 21.

    Phylllis

    @SiubhanDuinne: Is that not Spartacus? Right up there with Edward G. Robinson asking ‘Where’s your Messiah now?’ in full lower East Side.

    ETA: @Timill-I stand corrected.

  22. 22.

    NotMax

    @Cacti

    Flashing back on a Z-grade adventure flick set in Africa.

    One of the natives, in a nasal Brooklyn accent thicker than a malted milk: “Me no unnerstan white man.”

  24. 24.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @EM: Denzel Washington basically taking the character from training day and transporting it back in time.

    I think he is supposed to be Septimius Severus, Denzel sure looks the part.

  25. 25.

    Captain C

    I saw the original Gladiator in theaters and was really annoyed by how much they screwed up the Roman order of battle. No javelins at all against a horde of lightly-armored barbarians? Get dafuk outta here!

  26. 26.

    NotMax

    Sequels, sequels, sequels. Recycling is a Hollywood staple.

    BTW, when does Gone with the Wind 2 come out?
    //

  27. 27.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Captain C:

    Pila.  And yeah, the opening battle sequence, while the Roman infantry looked appropriately Early Imperial, the actual battle was just a series of annoying quick cuts.

    One thing I always look for in period films like that is whether or not they use stirrups.  The constant, really annoying quick cuts that the director used made it impossible at the beginning to determine that.

    For all the crap that Brad Pitt’s ‘Alexander’ got, the cavalry didn’t use stirrups.

  28. 28.

    Geminid

    @Chris: I wish we knew more about the Carthaginians. They were traders and sailors who dominated the Western Mediterranean and tried to keep the Western Atlantic trade to themselves. Their main competition was the Greeks until the Romans put together a fleet in the 1st Punic War.

    Carthage was not that populous, so they recruited the armies that fought Rome from the warlike peoples of North Africa and Spain.

    But they left few records and their history is obscure.

  29. 29.

    Splitting Image

    The most important thing I learned from Monty Python is that a certain amount of historical accuracy is crucial to setting up the punchline of a joke.

    Too much historical accuracy would ruin the joke. So it’s really about finding the right level of historical accuracy to make the film work. This observation works in other genres besides comedy.

  30. 30.

    moonbat

    If they can cast a New Zelander (Crowe) in a character called The Spaniard the entire movie, they they can cast Denzel Washington as a Libyan general turned emperor. Beside, Mr. Washington is very interesting to watch. ;)

  31. 31.

    Craig

    @Chris: I’m in for Hannibal. Lot of VFX elephants happening there. What I’ve always wanted to see is the story of the Consul Nero’s forced march across Italy to kill Hannibal’s brother Hasdrubal. Then he quick marched back south to re confront Hannibal and threw Hasdrubal’s head into Hannibal’s camp. That ended Hannibal’s ambition in Italy. One of the great stories of Rome.

  33. 33.

    Craig

    Not into Gladiator II. Not a popular opinion probably, but I find Ridely Scott to be a pretty mediocre director at best. Sure, Alien and Blade Runner changed cinema forever, since then mainly just pretentious schlock.

  34. 34.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Geminid:

    Google

    History of Carthage

    There’s tons of material that’s free online plus a gazillion academic works.  The three Punic Wars are very well documented by Roman historians.  The Wikipedia entry is very good.

    Ironically, next week at our big historical miniatures wargaming convention, an event I run will be the “Rise of Carthage” tournament whose end date is 275 BC.  Down the line we’ll do The Punic Wars so as to cover the far more publicized period of Carthaginian dominance.

  37. 37.

    Chris

    @Geminid:

    Don’t forget, originally Phoenician. Them and the Greeks planted colonies absolutely everywhere around the Med.

  38. 38.

    Geminid

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage: Do you wargame the battle in Sicily where Timolean and his small army caught the Carthaginians crossing a river? According to Plutarch, a large number of Carthaginian citizens fought. The result may have persuaded the Carthaginians to use more non-Carthaginians in their armies.

    I guess what I wish I knew more about is the Carthaginians’ Atlantic voyages.

  39. 39.

    Chris

    @Craig:

    Yeah, there are plenty of shining moments for Rome in that story (they did win the war, after all).

    One thing I will say for the Hannibal movie is if they are going to cast someone with Denzel Washington’s charisma in the role, better find someone equally badass to play Scipio.

  41. 41.

    Ken

    Denzel should have had an authentic Roman accent while speaking the Latin I assume the entire movie is in.

    Mel Gibson would have insisted on it.

  42. 42.

    Ken

    @Chris: Yeah, I’d love to see a Hannibal movie. That guy’s entire story is absolutely filmworthily batshit insane awesome.

    And a thousand elephants!!!

    (Terry Pratchett reference. Moving Pictures, to be specific.)

  45. 45.

    sab

    When did the Venetians start planting cities everywhere?

    I had an accounting boss who thought the Russell Crowe movie was set in the Middle Ages. Not the only thing she ever got wrong.

  46. 46.

    Anthony

    Rome was very diverse, being composed of (what we now call) Italians who spoke different languages and worshipped different gods. Throw in the (what we now call) Frenchman, Spanish, Africans, and Eastern Europeans, and sure, you can use any accent you want.

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