Napoleon is a new Apple TV original starring Joaquin Phoenix as the infamous Napoleon Bonaparte. The film follows the French Emporer's endless quest to seek power, and later, his fall from his influential position.

Napoleon is not the first time Joaquin Phoenix has played an insane villain (or anti-hero). The two that immediately come to mind for me are Commodus in Gladiator (2000) and Joker in Joker (2019). This complex character of Napoleon with violent tendencies and extreme ambitions seemed like a walk in the park for Phoenix. So of course, Phoenix smashes this role out of the park. Phoenix portrays a real-life person who is so complex and creates a character that is so layered and is just right. The slightest movements in Phoenix's portrayal seem thought through and give us generous insights into the character and the person.

However, as is quite on-brand for Phoenix, he doesn't give us a very likeable character. On the other hand, Phoenix's character is not hatable either. This, of course, is likely what was intended. It's a character that you're not sure what you think of him. Although this creates a film that is layered and complex, it does result in there not being any likeable characters. The supporting cast is either not particularly likeable, or is killed off early in the film. Perhaps no one likeable lived in the 18th century. The characters also seemed so far removed from a normal person that this resulted in a real lack of human element to the film. Even Phoenix's portrayal of Napoleon had nothing relatable.

There were three main aspects to this movie that echoed Nopoleon's last words: "France, the Army, Josephine." There was an equal amount of time spent on the politics of 18th-century France, the successful battles that he led, and his complicated relationship with his wife Josephine. I was expecting most of the focus of the film to be on his battle tactics and the many wars that he won and, although a significant portion was spent looking at these, only a third of the movie was spent looking at this aspect of his life. I think that in theory, spending an equal amount of time on these three aspects of Napoleon's life is a smart idea; the trailers were just misleading. Additionally, I don't think having an even spread resulted in a balanced movie. There seemed to be an unnecessary amount of time spent with Napoleon and Josephine which could have had the same effect with less screen time. Similarly, there was a large focus on French politics. However, as the politics throughout Napoleon's life were so confusing and convoluted, this aspect of the movie felt quite rushed. There was very little time explaining any context to the political situation in France, so those who did not know their French history (like me) were left struggling to keep up.

This movie is rated MA15+ in Australia which is the equivalent of R in the US. This was definitely the right film classification and this was obvious in the first five minutes. Was this unnecessary? That depends. I think that often something can be just as powerful, if not more powerful, if it is not shown on-screen. A classic example of this is the Star Wars tv show The Mandalorian. Now it is Star Wars so I'm going to be a bit biased here, however, this show has some violent moments but the camera will cut away at the last minute leaving the audience to guess what happened. This is sometimes more powerful than actually seeing what happened. It's hard to know what Napoleon could've been like if it aimed for a lower film classification in terms of its violence. In terms of its sexual themes, the film could have definitely been toned down a bit. I've talked about how too much time was spent with Napoleon and Josephine. Often, this was in quite an intimate setting. Again, this could have been just as powerful if not shown.

Going back to something good about Napoleon: it created a very realistic world. Through its costumes and sets, it created a very authentic 18th-century France.

Napoleon decided to follow the trend of movies being closer to three hours than two. Of course, there are plenty of examples of good three-hour movies (Oppenheimer sprang first to mind for me), but if a movie cannot keep you engaged for that period of time, then it is going to struggle to have the audience leaving feeling satisfied. Unfortunately, I felt myself falling asleep during Napoleon. The confusing politics likely didn't help with this, however, I think that the main culprit was the poor script. The things that came out of the character's mouths did not seem like things that a person would say. Perhaps this was intended to contribute towards the authentic 18th-century world but it mainly caused me to fall asleep.

I had high hopes for Napoleon. Unfortunately, these were not met. Knowing that the film was going to have an even spread between the army, French politics and Napoleon's lover may have changed my thoughts going into the film, but I was mainly disappointed at the significant lack of battles that were actually seen on-screen. The movie did a good job of creating an authentic world and complex characters, however, did not overall match my expectations.

Director: Ridley Scott

Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Vanessa Kirby

Year released: 2023

My rating: 6.5/10

Review by Tristan Carr

Last edited: 18/02/2024