Gladiator (2000)

 

Gladiator begins with an epic, brutal battle sequence that lasts about twelve minutes, and it’s a brilliant strategy to start with something so physical and action-packed. Director Ridley Scott has always been good at directing action movies, and while this might have easily been a throwback to those earlier, rather corny gladiator movies from the 1950s and 1960s, Scott’s film is filled with great sequences, many of them taking place in various arenas and featuring intense encounters between some of the biggest gladiators imaginable.

The film follows the story of the Roman General Maximus Decimus Meridius (played with more stoicism than probably necessary by Russell Crowe), who leads the Roman army to victory over the forces in Germania in the opening sequence. So beloved and revered and successful is Maximus that the Emperor, Marcus Aurelius (Richard Harris, who departs the move far too quickly), favors him over the presumptive heir to the throne, his son Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix, channeling evil personified). Commodus is not a good person and not a promising leader, and Phoenix lets us see the jealousy and hatred that have rotted him to the core of his being.

Marcus Aurelius dislikes his son so much that he plans to make Rome into a republic again rather than have Commodus succeed him, and he wants Maximus to be the leader under the new republic. Do you even have to guess how Commodus responds to this? In short order, he kills his own father, has Maximus’ wife and son murdered, and tries to have Maximus himself killed. Commodus assumes the title of Caesar and gives the people what he thinks they want or need: a seemingly endless supply of distractions like gladiator battles and bread. It keeps them pacified, but he seems to think that it will make them love him. Why are there so many movies about men who turn into awful humans because they think they didn’t get the love they deserved from their fathers? It must be because there are too many men in real life who turned out that way.

After being captured by slave traders while trying to recover from his wounds, Crowe’s Maximus starts developing a real talent for killing others in the battle arenas as a gladiator, and the series of scenes featuring those battles are among the best in the film. They’re particularly well shot. He acquires the nickname of “the Spaniard,” for reasons that were never fully clear to me. However, he becomes quite proficient at using his anger and hatred and pain to kill gladiators who would be expected to overpower him. By the time he delivers the famous “Are you not entertained?” line in the film, we have to agree that, yes, we are being very entertained, especially if we like watching grown men beat each up and blood flowing all over the ground of the arena.

Just as an aside, the fight scenes are so spectacular that The Boyfriend kept saying to me while we were watching the film again in preparation for Gladiator II that these battles were the Romans’ form of entertainment since they didn’t have movies or television. He’s not wrong, and I guess it’s pretty clear to anyone who watches the film that these “entertainments” were clearly used as a means to keep the people in check while their government engages in horrible acts. Thankfully, no one does any such actions these days. Right? Right?

Maximus’ goal, of course, is to get his revenge against Commodus, not necessarily to be a free man again, so as he keeps learning new and bloodier ways to kill someone, we acknowledge that he’s really in training to kill Commodus. He even tells the emperor this to his face after Commodus meets him in the middle of a large arena and asks Maximus to remove his mask. This, naturally, does not sit well with Commodus, so he starts scheming to have the gladiator killed. One of the most astonishing sequences has Maximus facing off against a gigantic guy from Gaul while chained tigers try to attack them if they ventures too closely to the large, hungry beasts. I don’t know how historically accurate such an approach might be, but it certainly does keep your attention.

The role of Maximus is a physically demanding role, and Crowe seems fully committed to the hard work of being an efficient killing machine in the arena. By the time he faces Commodus in the ring face-to-face, he’s clearly destined to kill the emperor, but you know that someone like the emperor is never going to play fair. He hasn’t been fair at any point during the film, so why should he start now? The ending of the film is a bit too, um, comfortable for my tastes, but after seeing flashbacks of his wife and son throughout the film, it’s no surprise that Maximus would want to “reunite” with them. There is often some sort of spiritual dimension to Scott’s film, and sometimes it’s more plausible or acceptable than at other times.

Gladiator features a strong supporting cast. I’ve already mentioned Harris, who has only a few moments on screen at the beginning. Djimon Hounsou plays a fellow gladiator, and the great Oliver Reed, in his final film role, plays Proximo, the “owner” and trainer of a band of gladiators. Derek Jacobi is Gracchus, a key member of the senate who faces reprisals from Commodus after the emperor learns that Gracchus and his own sister and others have been plotting against him – as you would if you were being ruled by a tyrant. The sister, Lucilla, is played by the talented Connie Nielsen. Her scenes with Crowe give more than a few hints that the two were former lovers, and they seem to have had a child together as well. How else can you have a sequel? The child in question is played by Spencer Treat Clark, whose face is very expressive.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t also mention the production design for the film. It’s very evocative of the era that it depicts, and the recreation of the Colosseum is spectacular. The locations of the emperor’s residence and of the senate meetings and even Gracchus’s house, which is seen only for a few seconds, get a great deal of attention. The production design was nominated for an Oscar, and the costume design deservedly won in its category. The various costumes demonstrate the kind of stratification of Roman society, and the smallest details on someone’s robes, for example, are visible and perfect. Scott’s films that cover historical periods are always very attuned to displaying what would have been common at the time. It’s just another element in a film that strives to be entertaining, and isn’t that what Maximus wanted for us, after all?

Oscar Wins: Best Picture, Best Actor (Russell Crowe), Best Sound, Best Costume Design, and Best Visual Effects

Other Oscar Nominations: Best Director (Ridley Scott), Best Supporting Actor (Joaquin Phoenix), Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen/Original Screenplay, Best Original Score, Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, and Best Film Editing

U-571 (2000)

 

The first ten minutes of U-571 are gripping and claustrophobic as we watch German sailors aboard a submarine enduring an attack of depth charges from a British destroyer. Their submarine gets disabled, and they are unable to defend themselves. It’s quite tense watching this opening sequence; it’s vaguely reminiscent of the great German film Das Boot from 1981. Unfortunately, after those initial moments, the plot starts to become rather preposterous. The Americans intercept the German sub’s distress signal and plan to get to the disabled sub before the Germans do. The goal is to capture an enigma code machine so that they can translate the messages being sent by the Germans. The plan involves using a submarine that’s been disguised to look more like a German one, including a Nazi emblem, and the sailors will also disguise themselves as Germans, putting on black leather jackets and carrying German guns. However, just as they capture the sub (far too easily, by the way) and get the German prisoners transferred to the American submarine and find the enigma machine (which looks very much like a plain typewriter, frankly), a German torpedo destroys the American sub. So the remaining American survivors (and one German prisoner, who you just know is going to try to sabotage their escape attempts) plan to use the disabled German sub to escape. They get into a torpedo fight with the resupply submarine that destroyed their American sub, and of course, in traditional Hollywood fashion, the German torpedoes miss (one of them just scrapes the hull), but the Americans destroy the German sub even though the firing mechanisms for torpedos on the disable sub were… well, disabled. The villains always are such bad shots in the movies made in America. As the Americans try to get the submarine to England, a German destroyer shows up and they have to dive to unsafe levels in order to avoid the potential danger from multiple depth charges. You should know how this ends, given that it’s an American movie about American sailors facing the Germans in World War II, and it’s already proven itself to be unrealistic. Both of the Oscar nominations for U-571 were for its sound achievements, and it really is a movie indebted to quality sound. The moments of fearful silence punctuated by the explosions of depth charges (punctuated by the visuals of those explosions) only enhance the power of those moments. Overall, the film is engrossing even though it stretches one’s disbelief. The plot also doesn’t help the actors much, though, putting them into situations whose resolutions are easy to anticipate. Matthew McConaghy plays Lt. Tyler, who at the film’s start is still upset over being denied command of his own submarine by his superior, played by Bill Paxton, because Lt. Commander Dahlgren doesn’t think Tyler is ready to risk the lives of the sailors he commands even if he has to do so for the greater good of the American effort during the war. You know what that means? Yes, he’ll have to take command of the submarine and he’ll have to quiet the resistance to his command and he’ll be awesome at commanding the submarine because he’s willing to risk the lives of the men under his command. If the rest of the movie were as compelling as the first ten minutes, which manage to avoid typical cliches of movies about submarines and war, U-571 would be a better film.

Oscar Win: Best Sound Editing

Other Nomination: Best Sound

102 Dalmatians (2000)

 

The makers of 102 Dalmatians tread some familiar territory in this sequel to the 1996 live-action version of the 1961 animated Disney classic. A young man with a Dalmatian, the now-grown Dipstick, and a young woman with a female Dalmatian named Dottie meet cute and decide to marry and start a family—of Dalmatian puppies. The humans are expecting too, of course, but the focus is on the dogs here, and even nanny Joan Plowright knows better that she is more of a dog wrangler. Enter the depraved force-of-nature that is Cruella de Vil, who has been in jail since the events of the 1996 film undergoing behavioral modification therapy under the guidance of Dr. Pavlov. (Yes, someone was having a little bit of fun.) Cruella no longer hates dogs and no longer wants to turn them into a coat…until the chimes of Big Ben bring her back to her previous mentality (cue implied Pavlovian joke here…). She enlists the aid of a French fashion designer, Le Pelt (Gerard Depardieu in a fully ridiculous performance that is upstaged by the nonsensical clothing he wears), to help her, and they and their henchmen (Hugh Laurie!) start rounding up enough Dalmatian puppies to make Cruella’s horrific vision a reality. There are outrageous action sequences where the animals trick the humans, just like in the two previous films, and Close is even more over-the-top in this version of Cruella. She’s in full diva/drag queen mode and, to be honest, is the most compelling part of the film. It’s tough to keep your eyes off her, and when almost anyone else is on the screen, you miss the high level of tension and energy she brings to the role. The costumes she gets to wear are worthy of attention as well and the only source of Oscar attention. Almost all of them are black and white with some red accents thrown in here and there. One of the biggest weaknesses of the film is its reliance on odd circumstances. For example, Dottie’s owner, Chloe (the rather colorless Alice Evans), is Cruella’s parole officer, putting the crazy fur obsessive in the direct path of three puppies to get her murderous intentions underway. And Chloe’s husband, Kevin Shepherd (Ioan Gruffudd), owns the only dog shelter in Westminster, and if Cruella violates the terms of her parole, her entire fortune gets divided up among the Westminster dog shelters. (The costume designer should also receive kudos for keeping Gruffudd in shorts for most of the film.) Once you get past those strange coincidences, though, 102 Dalmatians is rather entertaining, perhaps even more so than 101 Dalmatians from four years earlier since it doesn’t have to hew as closely to the more familiar plot of the 1961 classic.

Oscar Nomination: Best Costume Design

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was nominated for Best Picture of 2000, and it's one of the best movies of the past ten years, in my opinion. It's an intriguing mix of martial arts movie and romantic fable and historical drama, and all of the elements work in harmony with each other so well here. This film is better in the subtitled version than the dubbed version, so that's why it took me a while to get around to writing about it. Almost all of the movie channels (where I'm getting most of my material these days) seem to think that the dubbed version is more popular. I just can't fathom why anyone would want to watch people speaking words that don't match the movements of their mouth at all--at least, unironically, anyway.

The action of the movie begins with the theft of a beautiful green sword that has been offered as a gift by a famous warrior, Master Mu Bai (Chow Yun Fat). The woman he has loved for many years but whose affections he has denied and has been denied knows who has stolen the sword and attempts to return it to its new owner without Mu Bai becoming involved or embarrassed. Michelle Yeoh plays Shu Lien, and she's radiant here as someone who has fought beside Mu Bai and has always yearned for them to be together. They represent one of two primary romantic plots, and it's rewarding for me to see that someone above the age of, say, 40 can still be shown as a romantic lead.

The other romantic coupling involves Jiao Long, a young woman who has been trained the Jade Fox, a long time enemy of Mu Bai and Shu Lien and others on the side of "good." Jiao (Zhang Ziyi) is kidnapped during a journey across the deserts of China by a bandit named the Dark Cloud (Chen Chang). During her time as a prisoner, she begins to fall in love with Dark Cloud, of course, and they vow to prevent her arranged marriage so that the two of them can be together.

I don't know how many people will necessarily recall the romantic subplots first in discussing this movie, though. I expect what most remember are those astonishing fights among the trees. As the opponents leap from tree to tree, swords engaged in intense battle, it's as if they are floating above the ground. Similarly, the indoor battle scenes demonstrate such flexibility among the combatants, as they leap from wall to floor and from one level of a building to another, almost effortlessly, as if they could fly. This is pretty thrilling stuff to watch, and I can only imagine how much more spectacular it seemed on the big screen of a movie theater.

I've always admired Ang Lee's directorial efforts. He's incredibly talented and has worked within and across a wide range of genres. This film strikes me as perhaps his greatest achievement yet, thanks to his ability to thrill viewers with scenes like the one involving the older woman (Yeoh) and the younger woman (Zhang), obviously fighting for dominance in the male-centered world of martial arts and warriordom (if that's a word--it should be). Then he has the ability to entice viewers into moments of great serenity and repression, such as when Shu Lien cradles the head of Mu Bai as a poison moves through his bloodstream. The affection which she holds for him at that moment is quietly and beautifully expressed; she can't really tell him how she feels because it would be too painful to him. This really is a movie that is a masterful blend of traits from several different types of films.

Chocolat (2000)

Chocolat was nominated for Best Picture of 2000, and its inclusion as one of the five best films of that year is as much a fairy tale as the film itself. The story concerns a mother and daughter who move to a quaint French village (aren't they all quaint in the movies?) and set up a chocolate shop. What could seem more harmless? However, even fairy tales must have complications. Vianne opens her shop across from a church, and she stays open on Sundays (even during Lent). Naturally, she slowly begins to win over a few of the villagers through her patience and understanding and the seemingly magical nature of her chocolate recipes.

Still, there must be resistance to Vianne and her non-conformist ways (for example, she does not attend church--oh, the horror!). Chief among those who oppose her is Comte Paul de Reynaud, the mayor, who seems to have made a life out of denying himself pleasure. As played by Alfred Molina, Reynaud seems almost like a cartoon villain than a real person, a trait he shares with many other characters in this movie. I kept expecting him to twirl his mustache the way that the villains in old silent films used to do.

Everything comes to a head when a group of "river rats" arrive on the banks of the river outside town. Vianne is, of course, very welcoming, and who can blame her when the head of the these outcasts is played by Johnny Depp in full rogue mode. They soon start up a romance, further inflaming the anger of the townspeople who have been opposed to her from the beginning. I mean, really, this woman has done some outrageous things, like trying to reconcile a grandmother and her grandson over the objections of a very uptight daughter/mother. But when she starts cavorting with such undesirable people as "river people," well...

I don't know that I really have to tell you how all of this ends. It's a fairy tale, after all, and you should be able to figure things out on your own by now.

I know there's a message in here about acceptance and allowing people to be different. I understand that it's important to make movies about tolerance and understanding. I just wish that they weren't always as predictable as this one, and I could wish that just once we didn't have to learn about how we should all be loving toward each other by watching beautiful people like Juliette Binoche's Vianne "suffer" as outcasts. Put an unattractive person in the lead and then we'll talk.

Just one warning: Don't watch this film on an empty stomach. There is such a love of food and the making of meals and treats that you will quickly become hungry. Try to avoid devouring everything in the refrigerator while watching. You will be tempted.