This is one of those films that was epic in the theater. Netflix and sitting in your sweats on your own couch is great, but some films are on a whole other level when viewed on a big screen. Those epic wide shots and sweeping camera angles play so much better and hit those emotional chords so deeply when experienced on the big screen. Add to that the feeling of the bass shaking your chest, the surround sound providing that immersive experience, and you just can’t beat it.
This is one of those movies that if you are scrolling through channels looking for a specific movie and this one pops up that you stop searching and watch gladiator instead because it’s just that good
Fun history facts... The emperor Marcus Aurelius was a real emperor, and is widely regarded as one of the seven best emperors to have lived in the Roman era. He was a philosopher King, and his book "meditations" is still widely read today. His real life son, Commodus, really did succeed him and really did fight in the arena and was, by all accounts, a horrible emperor as well.
@@dabreal82 The two are not mutually exclusive. History can be interesting, fun, educational, sad.... Just because it doesn't evoke the same emotion in you doesn't mean it doesn't do it for others. I'm not even sure why you replied... it didn't add anything of value to the conversation. Thanks for the response though, I guess?
Guys the tattoo says SPQR, that Is "for the senate and the people of Rome" (in latin Senatus PopulusQue Romanorum), and It was the tattoo every Roman legionary had on the shoulder. I'm italian and live in Rome, and i tell you that still today you can find SPQR written almost at every corner or on the manholes all around the city.. also, there's much people living in Rome today and actually keeping to make those tattoos on their shoulder
The actor who plays the owner of the gladiatorial school, who counsels Maximus to 'win the crowd', is Oliver Reed- his career goes back to the '60s, & he's played many roles- leading man, villain, & 'character' roles, as here. This was his final film- he passed away soon after from the effects of longtime alcoholism. He posthumously received a BAFTA award (British Academy of Film & Television Arts) as best supporting actor for this performance!
That is a good point that you have made about the late Oliver Reed, but I have read that he actually died during the production of the film, and that's why his death scene was filmed from behind him, therefore his face would not need to be seen, as a stand-in actor played his part when he was stabbed to death.
The initials tattled on his arm SPQR(Senatatus Populusque Romanus) means The Senate and People of Rome. It was a Latin Phrase that was essentially the motto of first the Republic and then the Empire. The Initials would often appear on Roman battle standards especially under the Aqulia standards, the Aquila standards where Metallic Eagle statutes on a pole and each Legion of the Roman army had one. The Roman military was divided into legions. The size of these varied over the long history of Rome but at the point the film us set it Elinor be 5000 men to a Legion. The legion was further divided into 10 cohorts of 480 men. The cohorts where divided into 6 centuries of around 80 men. The century was divided into tent groups of 8 men who shared a large tent to sleep in, cooked food together and fought as a swuad similiar to a modern day infantry squad. The commander of the Legion was called a Legatus (basically a general). Below him where officers known as Tribunes, both of these ranks where held by noblemen. Below these where the Centurions. These where the equivalent of Senior non commissioned officers like Warrant officers or Sergeants major in modern armies. The Centurions commanded the centuries. they had to be a veteran soldier of several decades of experience. The symbols of their position. Was a horse hair crest on their helmet that went side to side rather than front to back. The senior Centurion lead the first Century of the legion and this one was sometimes double strength(160 instead of 80 men). He was k own as the Primus Pilius, the first spear. He often was more experienced than the Legate and the tribunes. Maxumus was a Legate, a general. The film though a fictional story has several real characters as Marcus Aurelliys, and his children Commodus and Lucilla whwre real historical figures. Also Maximus being called Spaniard and having a connection from his childhood to Commodus and Lucilla is a nod to the fact that before he was Emperor, Marcus Aurellius had been the Roman Governor of Hispania(modern Spain and Portugal) . maximus character therefore is implied to have been the son of a Roman official who served under Marcus Aurellius during his time in Spain, who had been raised with the children of Marcus Aurellius and joined the army and rose in the ranks thanks to a combination if his ability as a soldier and commander and the patronage of Marcus Aurellius. emperor Marcus Aurellius ended up being most rendered as a philosopher after all. He is considered one of the Great proponents of Stoicism and one of his written works his Meditations is still taught in Western Philosophy courses.
One of the greatest films of all time. Emotional, costumes are fantastic, music soulful, writing was on point, especially the dialogue, and shots looking great.
The opening battle scene was filmed in Bourne Woods in Surrey, England. It was in line for deforestation until Ridley Scott heard about it, and did the forestry Commission a favour, by doing their job for them.
Now I know I fart dust, because Mrs. October doesn't know who Russell Crowe is. 😎 Rome was so incredibly advanced that we really truly didn't surpass them till about 1900. They came within a hair of their own industrial revolution.
Please. Watch Daniel Day Lewis in The Last of the Mohicans. I guarantee you will love it. For the soundtrack alone. But also the acting, the story, and for how good it is for its time.
I get why the kiss between Maximus and Lucilla may be uneasy. But the movie establishes that, by now, it's been about a year since Maximus’ wife was killed, so enough time has passed. Also, it’s clear that Maximus and Lucilla have prior history, so he’s not just kissing some rando. I look at their kiss as one of affection, gratitude, good luck, and closure. Also, this movie uses the “thumbs up/down” gestures as we do, for the sake of simplicity. But in ancient Rome, “thumbs down” meant “let him stay on the ground” (i.e. “let him live”), whereas “thumbs up” meant “dispatch him up out of this life” (i.e. “kill him”).
@@bradbutcher8762 I was actually hoping they'd get together, her husband died, his wife died, he'd be a good step father to her son and they could start a new family, she proved herself as a good person (just stuck in politics) and clearly they had something before. I think they were each others first love and likely wanted to be together but at the time couldn't, her first words to him when they reunited in Germania was "my father favours you now, it was not always so" ...I think they were together and she was pressured to marry someone else who was from the nobility and that's why he was clearly bitter, avoiding her, he still had feelings and was hurt which is why he was avoiding her eyes, he's an honourable man and wanted to be faithful to his wife, laudable... but my point is, them getting together about a year after his wife's death and more than a year after her husbands death (which btw I find sus, perhaps Commodus killed him out of jealousy???) is fine. I didn't even know people took issue with it until I was watching the reaction videos (only few did and some comments, most didn't though, and that makes sense to me). I was actually shipping them, so it's a shame he died :(
"At my signal, unleash hell"... Everything is great in this movie: the writing (so many amazing lines there), the acting (not only the duel between Russell Crowe and Joaquin Phoenix, but the rest of the cast as well) , the epic precise directing by Ridley Scott, who brought a whole genre back to life, the cinematography or the unforgettable soundtrack by Hans Zimmer.
Nice and interesting reactions from you two. It looks like the younger generation has no notion that great movies with nice and credible special effects could be produced before their time, i.e. in the early 2000s and before. At 36:34 this is definitely not "moldy bread". It looks like you never saw proper bread before apart from sliced loafs packed in plastic bags. Proper bread is artisanal bread prepared and baked with traditional methods, and is vastly superior in quality and taste than the stuff sold in supermarkets.
45:49 Proximo was actually originally supposed to survive til the end of the movie, but they had to change it when the actor, Oliver Reed, died during filming.
I could see how Jack Gleeson drew inspiration for Jofffrey from Joaquin Phoenix's portrayal as Commodus. Joffrey was like a younger version of Commodus.
You guys should check some more Ancient Rome movies like Spartacus, Ben Hur, Quo Vidas, Cleopatra, and Fall of the Roman Empire, which was inspiration for the first act of Gladiator
@@TheOctobersReact You should also put the Spartacus TV on your list, too. It's a masterpiece. Great acting, 300-style visuals, awesome fights, ripped guys, lots of sex, and original dialogue. Watch the 1960 movie first, though.
"Proximus" it´s played by Oliver Reed. A great british actor, with a very interesting life (personally I love his anecdotes and experiences). I highly recommend you to discover more of this stunning celebrity.
I was watching a behind the scenes on this film. You can tell a great actor when they ask a director, do you want just tears or tears and snot and can call it up at a moments notice. Oliver Reed.(the crusty old ex-gladiator) died during the filming so they used a double for his murder scene.
Yeah, I hear people talking about how amazing this looks for being way back in 2000, I definitely can't help thinking they should be watching Cleopatra and thinking about "way back"... "Way back"?! 2000?! What the heck is... ... hang on, where's my cane??
Movies always gets this wrong: In ancient Rome, thumbs up meant kill him and thumb sideways meant let him live. A thumb thrusting up represented a sword thrust. Thumbs down wasn't part of the equation.
Don't be so sure about that. Rome survived for 1,000 years. When in that 1,000 years was the thumb sideways the thing? Did it never change. A lot of "experts" (I don't mean you, I mean a lot of youtubers and historians) say stuff as though it wasn't true when it actually might have been true at a different time period. The Roman customs changed over time and I think eventually thumbs up became a thing.
We learnt at the University in Arthistory that thumbs up meant heaven (death), thumbs down meant stay on Earth (life). There´s a lot of interpretations, none definite proof.
This is my all time favorite movie. Love your reactions BTW. The one thing I will say is that everyone your age that makes these reactions say the same thing. "suprised how well it was done" This movie came out in a time of GREAT movies. 1999-2005 is an era of great movies.....I miss it.
What a great reaction to a fantastic movie. I was taking a college history class on Rome at the time this became popular and although not everything is factual it sparked many great conversations with the professor who taught the class. Also, your thumbnails always make me laugh. My dude looks like his favorite sports team is about to lose the game and she has a great smile with slight surprise like I do when my garden starts to come in. 😆
Actually the Thumbs Up was meaning of " I approve the execution " and " Thumbs Down was for " I disagree the execution ". Hollywood thought it was quite weird on screen, so they changed it for the opposite. It's looks "better" with Thumbs Up nowadays
The guy that played Maximus' owner was a guy named Oliver Reed. He died during filming this - but you should defo look into him more. He was an absolute hellraiser. 🙂
according to my Greco-Roman studies instructor, the thumbs up/thumbs down was reversed in antiquity... thumbs up meant the opposite of what it does today.
49:06 was only training, Maximus has experience with survival in all our battles. He even fought with worse wounds than that. Commodus only did training fights, rules, and someone telling you when to stop. There is a difference between fighting for survival and fighting for training
The wardrobe was so fantastic. They were definitely wearing the original, pre Versace and Gucci here☺- especially Joaquin. Great movie(a multiple times watch for me). Great reaction guys!
This was epic film that hadn't been since 60's Sword and Sandals era. This film is amazing still. I could say this is its own Era Ben-Hur film that still looks awesome after decades and is full of great performances. Another good Russel Crow Film is: Master and Commander: Far Sight of the World or if you like comedy: the Nice Guys.
What you said at 26:47 with people being distracted from politics with games in roman times...it's happening today but with technology and social media. And it will never change untill people wake up.
The late, great Richard Harris, here playing Marcus Aeurelius, was a legend in many ways. If you want to have some fun, go online and look up interviews with Harris and his good friend Peter O'Toole. There are many stories the two tell of drinking binges, acting on stage, and missing weekends.
I remember going to see this with a couple friends at the theater when it came out in 2000. I was a year out of graduating high school. There are a lot of movies I’d love to see y’all react to on this channel. So many good ones out there. I know y’all are still going through Marvel,Game of Thrones, and I know y’all also mentioned doing Star Wars at some point (can’t wait for that). But in due time! Ha ha!
Few people catch that the entire movie is his life flashing before his eyes. Yes the scene of him walking through the fields of grain was him in Elysium.
Another great Russell Crowe movie is Master and Commander if you haven't already reacted to it. It's another epic historically based movie not to be missed.
The most realistic seething anger put to film to this day. Russel Crowe might have some emotional issues that play into that role, but still... just wow. You can feel his justified rage even after all those years.
Man, I’ve loved Joaquin’s acting since this film. But I agree that kiss between he and Livia was out of character for Maximus. It went against his purpose.
Russell Crowe is one of the best actors of all time. He's played all kinds of different roles and was also the lead singer of a rock band in the 90's called 30 Odd Foot of Grunts. Y'all definitely need to check out some more of his movies. Here's a list of some of his best movies. The Quick and the Dead (Also starring a young Leonardo DiCaprio) Master and Commander : The Far Side of the World (Also starring Paul Bettany who plays Jarvis/Vision) A Beautiful Mind (Also starring Paul Bettany) Mystery Alaska (Also starring Burt Reynolds) Cinderella Man (Also starring Paul Giamatti) 3 :10 to Yuma (Also starring Christian Bale) American Gangster (Also starring Denzel Washington) Les Misérables (Also starring Hugh Jackman) The Insider (Also starring Al Pacino) The Next Three Days (Also starring Liam Neeson)
Graccus, the Senator, was played by Derek Jacobi who also played the leading role in the BBC production of I, Claudius (the story that Commodus referenced when he was holding Lucius "hostage")...such a magnificent actor. Jacobi plays Claudius (became Emperor following the assassination of Caligula) from the age of 18 to 64ish. Others in the cast are: Sian Philips (Clash of the Titans, Dune), Brian Blessed (Black Adder, Much Ado About Nothing), John Hurt (Alien, Harry Potter), and Patrick Stewart (Star Trek TNG) Another film with Russell Crowe I would recommend is "A Good Year" where he inherits a wine estate and learns what is really important in life.
Playing it smarter was something already addressed by Ridley Scott. Lucille told Maximus that she knew he was lying because he was never any good at it. I'm sure he was aware that Commodus would've realized he was sincere in supporting him.
The great thing about this movie is that it has the ability to change and grow as you, yourself, change and grow. 10 years from now if you watch it again, through your evolved perspective as a person, the movie will convey a completely new message. That is truly what makes this movie so amazing.
My personal opinion, this is one of the 3 greatest movies ever. I have it in third place, but it has probably the best bad guy ever. Phoenix killed his role. I love the three friends I love the dialogue and Proximo is such a good Gray character with lightside leanings. Lucilla does great with her role, which is very smart writing and the line "you have a talent for survival" is the coldest slick dis I've seen in movies
An interesting factoid: The singer of "Honor Him" and "Now We Are Free", Lisa Gerrard, was chosen by Hans Zimmer in part because when she sings, she sings in a language she created when she was a young girl. She says only she and God understand it, so she often sings to Him.
"They brought out the writers for this movie!" Actually, they didn't. Crowe improvides a large majority of his dialogue, including his soliloquy about what his home looked like. The script was only about 30 percent complete when they started shooting. Since I've heard that, it's always bugged me that Crowe didn't get a writer's credit for this one.
My favorite little treasure is an ancient Roman coin of Faustina the II, wife of Marcus Aurelius and mother of Commodus. Gladiator is a timeless classic. So glad you both enjoyed it. Maybe check out HBO's series Rome...it's only two seasons but very well done. Pre G.o.T. Howdy from Oregon Octobers.☺💚
No idea who Russell Crowe is? Man, I feel old. Check out *Fightin' Around The World.* The outstanding actor playing Proximo, *Oliver Reed,* like his character, died during the making of the movie so his last scene(s) had to be done with CG, it's noticeable in the scene when he's talking to Maximus who asks him "Are you in danger of becoming a good man?". RIP The young actor who plays Lucius, *Spencer Treat Clark,* is also in *Unbreakable* with *Bruce Willis* and *Samuel L. Jackson* and in *Glass,* also in another great movie you guys should check out that NO ONE has reacted to called *Arlington Road* with *Jeff Bridges* from *The Big Lebowski* and *Tim Robbins* from *The Shawshank Redemption,* movies that I honestly thought you guys had seen and you should definitely check out. You may know Jeff Bridges as Obadiah Stane, the bad guy from Iron Man. *Gladiator* combines the story lines from *Spartacus* (1960) and *The Falll Of The Roman Empire* (1964)
One sad detail that many misses is that Commodus really tried to engage, love and spend time with Lucius. In that way he wanted but his own father never did. Also, Aurelius asks Maximus "How will the future remember me?". Aurelius is known as tone of the greatest ceasars, and, his writings of philosophy and leadership are studied even today. Hannibal Lecter even quotes Aurelius to teach Clarice in "Silence of the lambs".
I absolutely love this movie. I still remember watching it as a kid and crying at the end❤ If you liked Russell Crowe in this movie you should know that in my opinion he hasn't made any movie that's not great! I suggest you to react to the Nice Guys also staring Ryan Goslin 👍
❤❤❤Ridley Scott is one of my favorite directors he’s done everything from Blade Runner, Legend, Hannibal to Black Rain, Prometheus, Death on the Nile, etc.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but did anybody else notice that right at the moment the female fighter gets cut in half (30:40) you can see a crewmember in a black hoodie in one of the chariots? :)
Hey Octobers, this was a fantastic movie and I'm glad you enjoyed it. If you like Russell Crowe, you should check out Master and Commander, a seafaring adventure. Also, check out Joaquin Phoenix in Joker.
So in Greek Mythology the underworld was divided into two parts. Tartarus the place of the wicked dead overseen and ruled by Zeus's brother Hades (Pluto) in the Roman pantheon. The righteous dead went to the fields of Elyssium also known as the Elyssian fields. When The Romans conquered the Greeks they just matched up their gods to the Greek ones. Zeus = Jupiter, Hera = Juno, Ares god of war becomes Mars, Aphrodite goddess of Love becomes Venus, Hermes becomes Mercury, Poseidon becomes Neptune etc. In the Bible you have two afterlife's as well. Hades or Hell also called Sheol for the wicked dead and Paradise or Abraham's bosom the abode of the righteous dead. In between the two is the great abyss which no one can cross. 😮 This movie was Oliver Reed's (Proximo) final movie. He actually died towards the end of filming so they had to use standins and digital CGI face swapping to finish the film. 😮 In the Coliseum the gladiatorial games were called bread and circuses...free bread for the masses of the poor and circuses for the spectacle of the arena. You could have one on one combats, man vs. animal combats, squad vs squad combats or just general melee combats. Very few gladiators survived the experience. 😮
FYI. When you mention about the time that this film may have been set, the Colosseum in Rome, as featured late on in the film, was opened in 80 AD, so it would have been a bit later than that. Also, when you talk of the Roman army being advanced at that time, the most advanced society, both in cultural and military standards of the time was actually said to have been the Chinese, for a few centuries prior and many afterward. The Great Wall of China was built in 220 BC, and it's still standing up quite well today.
My dear Georgia friends, please let me say that I LIKE this movie. Don’t take my comments to mean I don’t. I’m a BIG History guy. So, this movie does use some historicity: Marcus Aurelius was a Roman emperor and considered one of the best. Commodus did follow him and is considered one of the worst but it’s difficult to nail that down. Commodus did NOT kill his father, we know he was hundreds of miles away from his father at his death. No Roman emperor ever died in the Collosseum, though a few would stage ‘matches’ against a weakened and starved opponent. We have only two very short accounts of the thumbs up/down and all they say is “….a hand motion indicated the sponsor’s desire.” Maybe pointing up meant ‘send him to the gods’ and down meant ‘keep him here.’ Was it a finger or a thumb, we just don’t know. My dear friend Anthony is SO smart, he picked up on the close link between the games and politics. A young Roman aristocrat, seeking higher office would begin the ‘Coursus Honorium.’ It was a fairly standardized route to high power: the young man would be educated, most likely in Greece or by a Greek tutor, then a stint in the Army as a junior officer to learn how the Army worked. Them was a lower office, often in charge of putting on games, often at his own expense. It’s, sort of, how corruption was built into the system: once you’d done the lower offices, you’re ready for higher….. but you were dead broke or in debt. Your next posting might be as a governor of a province. So, you’re now in charge of a province, like Pontius Pilate was the governor of Judea. What do you want as governor? Peace, stability and to squeeze the province for money to replace what you’d spent to land the job. How do you squeeze a province? Easy, dispatch tax collectors. Think back to how controversial it was for Jesus to have a tax collector rolling with him. Citizens of provinces HATED tax collectors.
Now, for the politics. The Roman Republic (When Rome was run by a Senate and elevated two men to become Consuls for one year terms) ended when Julius Caesar and his great-nephew Octavian (soon to become emperor Augustus) became Rome’s first emperor. The Senate still existed but it was just an honorary office - Emperor says ‘yes,’ Senate says ‘no,’ it’s going to be ‘yes.’ In the movie, Marcus Aurelius says he wants to give power back to the people, to the Senate but NO emperor pursued this path exactly for the reasons Commodus said: the Senate just debates endlessly. Emperors represent a singular, unified command. It’s just more efficient.
As an indication of the sentimental power of the Senate with the people, Maximus removes his tattoo with a blade. His tattoo is SPQR: Senatus Populus Quod Romana - “The Senate and People ARE Rome.” When your channel blows up and you have the ability to travel to Rome to see the sights, you’ll see SPQR everywhere; carved into stone, on sewer drains, everywhere. This sign appears throughout Roman history, even when Rome was ruled as an empire and neither the Senate or the people actually had any power. SPQR was as meaningful to the people of Rome as the American flag is to us, so no emperor ever considered disbanding the Senate. They didn’t have to, they just took all the Senate’s power away and let them be a powerless organization, easily ignored. The real problem all Roman emperors had to deal with was they headed a multicultural, multi-lingual nation of immense proportions in an age where it might take as long as 6 months to get a message, such as “The people are revolting, they’re killing Roman people and burning Roman settlements! What do you want me to do?” to go from the edge of the empire back to Rome, however much longer to figure out what to do, even longer to get troops to where they needed to be. Relatively early during the empire, emperors figured out that the empire was simply too big for one man to run it. All sorts of solutions were tried, like having 4 emperors at one time or splitting the entire Roman Empire into two empires that usually cooperated, sometimes not. However, giving power back to the Senate was a non-starter: the emperors were looking for efficiency, large bodies of rich, egotistical men trying to settle on a single solution is not a formula for success.
For the games themselves, we know quite a bit about them. They were all day affairs with a break for lunch. In the mornings prisoners were executed in gruesome, crowd-pleasing ways. After that, specially trained bestiari or ‘beast fighters,’ would fight against just about every species you can think of. We have depictions of these beast fights in surviving Roman art. We see lots of lions and tigers but no lions with manes and no tigers with stripes. Biologists speculate that the lions and tigers we see today lived in such remote areas the super efficient beast hunters never found them and the modern versions of these cats were the only sub-species to survive. As a sort of metric for how efficient Rome’s hunters were, a delicacy at the nicest parties was hummingbird tongue pies. Can you imagine how many hummingbirds you’d have to collect to make a pie out of their tongues?
So, after the beast fights, everyone would go have a nice lunch while stage-hands removed the bodies and got set for the main event in the afternoon; man vs man gladiatorial games. The earliest account of Roman gladiatorial games date back to when Rome was a single community on one of seven hills around the Tiber River. We have an account of the Romans winning an early battlefield victory and forcing prisoners of war to fight to the death as part of the funeral rites for slain Roman soldiers. The idea seems to have taken off from there. Consider the three phases of the games and what they meant. The games were all about reinforcing the superiority of Rome: we kill those who have broken our laws, we conquer nature (the beasts) and we force our enslaved enemy to fight for our entertainment. We LITERALLY rule! Slaves were most frequently acquired as a result of battle and conquest. Consider, if Rome stops making war on her neighbors, what happens to their entertainment industry? The popularity of the games certainly encouraged Rome to keep up their conquering ways. Remember Marcus Aurelius’ line, “There’s always another people to conquer.” That’s the Roman outlook in a nutshell. When I described the Roman entertainment industry, it truly was that. Gladiators were housed (imprisoned) in a ludus (school) run by a lanista. Proximo went from gladiator to lanista and this was probably fairly common. A possible intermediate step was for a former successful gladiator to transition to become a magistri, the ‘coach/trainer’ of gladiators, about like a drill sergeant.
Gladiators occupied a strange place in Roman society. They were slaves and successful ones were also superstars. After a fight a guy backstage would scrape the sweat off a victorious gladiator and sell it as an aphrodisiac and the demand was HUGE. We find graffiti on the walls of Pompeii’s streets of cartoons of named gladiators, indicating their popularity with and support from the people. In rare occasions a down on his luck, big, strong Roman man might, essentially, sell himself to a lanista, figuring “I might as well make a living killing people,” but that was rare. Even more rare were instances of female gladiators squaring off with each other but the accounts that survive indicate the writers turned their noses up at this, going out of their way to describe the women who did this as repulsive. Rome economically was similar to the height of the British empire when England controlled colonies around the world. The view in both empires was that the far-flung possession’s purpose was to send their best products and most of their money to support the capital city. Once the Roman Empire grew beyond the Italian peninsula, administrators discovered that the farmland around the city of Rome couldn’t feed the city’s population. At its height the city of Rome housed over a million souls, one of the first cities in history to achieve that feat. Egypt, once added to the empire, became the Kansas and Nebraska and California of Rome; its breadbasket. It took a sizable fleet of transport ships every single day to feed Rome. Over time the emperors developed a policy of ‘panem et circensis,’ “Bread and circuses.” Food and entertainment. In ‘Hunger Games,’ the capital city is called ‘Panem,’ a shortening of that phrase. What it meant, though, practically, was the ‘bargain’ between Roman ruler and ruled: “You keep us fed and entertained and you can pretty much do whatever you like.” Woe to the emperor not able to fulfill either condition. We have a gruesome account of, I believe the Huns besieging Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. The city was starving but the Huns couldn’t break through the walls. The emperor felt it was important to keep putting on gladiator games to distract the people from the dire circumstances. The famine was so bad that, as gladiators fell, the crowd called out to the guys removing the corpses, “How much for that meat? Sell us that meat, we’re starving!”
In real history, Commodus actually ruled jointly with his father Marcus Aurelius for a little over a decade until his father actually did die of natural causes. Commodus was quite uninterested in ruling at first, until the Senate decided that they'd try to officially strip the Emperor's power, which caused him to take a VERY keen interest. He became much like a certain narcissistic orange man-baby dictator we know of today, actually. Commodus ruled with an iron fist after this, and showed just how narcissistic and crazy he actually was. He proclaimed himself to be the reincarnation of Hercules, had statues and busts of himself erected all over the city, held games in his honor for months at a time (in which he participated and always won, naturally), and even renamed the months of the year after his own self-bestowed names. He kept the mob appeased with panem et circenses (bread and circuses), and the Senators were fearful of opposing him openly lest they be executed. Finally, however, the Senate had had enough, and hired assassins to kill the Emperor. The first one poisoned his breakfast but Commodus vomited it up, but the second one, the second was his wrestling partner, who ended up strangling him in his bath. After his death, a power struggle known as the Year of the Five Emperors began. Commodus is widely regarded as one of the worst Emperors Rome ever had, and saw the end of the great Pax Romana period during his insane reign.
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This is one of those films that was epic in the theater. Netflix and sitting in your sweats on your own couch is great, but some films are on a whole other level when viewed on a big screen. Those epic wide shots and sweeping camera angles play so much better and hit those emotional chords so deeply when experienced on the big screen. Add to that the feeling of the bass shaking your chest, the surround sound providing that immersive experience, and you just can’t beat it.
This is one of those movies that if you are scrolling through channels looking for a specific movie and this one pops up that you stop searching and watch gladiator instead because it’s just that good
I agree . I love this masterpeice of a film
@djwalker7823 It's one of those few movies you can watch over and over again and always be entertained and always take something new away from it.
Fun history facts... The emperor Marcus Aurelius was a real emperor, and is widely regarded as one of the seven best emperors to have lived in the Roman era. He was a philosopher King, and his book "meditations" is still widely read today. His real life son, Commodus, really did succeed him and really did fight in the arena and was, by all accounts, a horrible emperor as well.
Not a fun fact. Just history...
@@dabreal82 The two are not mutually exclusive. History can be interesting, fun, educational, sad.... Just because it doesn't evoke the same emotion in you doesn't mean it doesn't do it for others. I'm not even sure why you replied... it didn't add anything of value to the conversation. Thanks for the response though, I guess?
And the real Commodus got killed by an Gladiator. He got betrayed.
Historians, we love yous
There were no fun facts in that comment. I think you assume people don't have access to the internet lol
Guys the tattoo says SPQR, that Is "for the senate and the people of Rome" (in latin Senatus PopulusQue Romanorum), and It was the tattoo every Roman legionary had on the shoulder.
I'm italian and live in Rome, and i tell you that still today you can find SPQR written almost at every corner or on the manholes all around the city.. also, there's much people living in Rome today and actually keeping to make those tattoos on their shoulder
nice. its always in the details, thanks for that brother
Italians are awesome
It shouldn’t surprise you anymore that movies from decades ago were head over heels better than the shit we have now
The actor who plays the owner of the gladiatorial school, who counsels Maximus to 'win the crowd', is Oliver Reed- his career goes back to the '60s, & he's played many roles- leading man, villain, & 'character' roles, as here. This was his final film- he passed away soon after from the effects of longtime alcoholism. He posthumously received a BAFTA award (British Academy of Film & Television Arts) as best supporting actor for this performance!
That is a good point that you have made about the late Oliver Reed, but I have read that he actually died during the production of the film, and that's why his death scene was filmed from behind him, therefore his face would not need to be seen, as a stand-in actor played his part when he was stabbed to death.
@@davem9208 Wow, that's interesting, if true... thanks for the comment!
He died during filming. His character had a bigger role and they had to do early CGI for some scenes for him. Prob my fav film of all time.
Some of the best, historical lines are in this movie," What you do in life will echo for an eternity." Is one of my personal faves.
The initials tattled on his arm SPQR(Senatatus Populusque Romanus) means The Senate and People of Rome. It was a Latin Phrase that was essentially the motto of first the Republic and then the Empire. The Initials would often appear on Roman battle standards especially under the Aqulia standards, the Aquila standards where Metallic Eagle statutes on a pole and each Legion of the Roman army had one.
The Roman military was divided into legions. The size of these varied over the long history of Rome but at the point the film us set it Elinor be 5000 men to a Legion. The legion was further divided into 10 cohorts of 480 men. The cohorts where divided into 6 centuries of around 80 men. The century was divided into tent groups of 8 men who shared a large tent to sleep in, cooked food together and fought as a swuad similiar to a modern day infantry squad.
The commander of the Legion was called a Legatus (basically a general). Below him where officers known as Tribunes, both of these ranks where held by noblemen.
Below these where the Centurions. These where the equivalent of Senior non commissioned officers like Warrant officers or Sergeants major in modern armies. The Centurions commanded the centuries. they had to be a veteran soldier of several decades of experience. The symbols of their position. Was a horse hair crest on their helmet that went side to side rather than front to back. The senior Centurion lead the first Century of the legion and this one was sometimes double strength(160 instead of 80 men). He was k own as the Primus Pilius, the first spear. He often was more experienced than the Legate and the tribunes.
Maxumus was a Legate, a general. The film though a fictional story has several real characters as Marcus Aurelliys, and his children Commodus and Lucilla whwre real historical figures. Also Maximus being called Spaniard and having a connection from his childhood to Commodus and Lucilla is a nod to the fact that before he was Emperor, Marcus Aurellius had been the Roman Governor of Hispania(modern Spain and Portugal) . maximus character therefore is implied to have been the son of a Roman official who served under Marcus Aurellius during his time in Spain, who had been raised with the children of Marcus Aurellius and joined the army and rose in the ranks thanks to a combination if his ability as a soldier and commander and the patronage of Marcus Aurellius.
emperor Marcus Aurellius ended up being most rendered as a philosopher after all. He is considered one of the Great proponents of Stoicism and one of his written works his Meditations is still taught in Western Philosophy courses.
The tattoo on Maximus arm is SPQR. It means "senatus populusque romanus" . which translates to "The Senate, the people, and Rome"
I may one day get that tattoo.
One of the greatest films of all time. Emotional, costumes are fantastic, music soulful, writing was on point, especially the dialogue, and shots looking great.
The opening battle scene was filmed in Bourne Woods in Surrey, England. It was in line for deforestation until Ridley Scott heard about it, and did the forestry Commission a favour, by doing their job for them.
One of the best movies out there, Russell Crowe is a beast and a Legendary actor. Like one of the best to walk this Earth
Maximus & the princess had a past. She said she loved him in the past & he said she laughed more. They had a history. Even Commodus alludes to it.
I was looking for this comment - Commodus even commented that Maximus broke her heart...
Her son is Maximus’s son
@@technofilejr3401I assume if that's the case, that's how Gladiator 2 begins? I've read up enough about the sequal that it would make perfect sense
amazing how these 2000s movies feel like from another planet compared to todays movies... lotr especially
agreed 10000000%
Salah el din@@TheOctobersReact
Now I know I fart dust, because Mrs. October doesn't know who Russell Crowe is. 😎
Rome was so incredibly advanced that we really truly didn't surpass them till about 1900. They came within a hair of their own industrial revolution.
His wife is dead. Her husband is dead. Lighten up dude. Just a kiss.
Love is complicated. You should lighten up. 👍🏾
The emperor at the opening is the late Richard Harris. He is probably best known for playing the original Dumbledore from H.P.
RIP
The character Aurelius Dumbledore was named in honor of Richard Harris.
Also The Count of Monte Christo he was the priest that trained Edmond in prison
Nice theory, but can you prove that?
❤He is known for Camelot, A Man Called Horse and a ton of other prolific roles, younger generation only know him as Dumbledore
Please. Watch Daniel Day Lewis in The Last of the Mohicans. I guarantee you will love it. For the soundtrack alone. But also the acting, the story, and for how good it is for its time.
Second this.
And you’re right, the score is superb.
Another great film with Russell Crowe is "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World."
I get why the kiss between Maximus and Lucilla may be uneasy. But the movie establishes that, by now, it's been about a year since Maximus’ wife was killed, so enough time has passed. Also, it’s clear that Maximus and Lucilla have prior history, so he’s not just kissing some rando. I look at their kiss as one of affection, gratitude, good luck, and closure.
Also, this movie uses the “thumbs up/down” gestures as we do, for the sake of simplicity. But in ancient Rome, “thumbs down” meant “let him stay on the ground” (i.e. “let him live”), whereas “thumbs up” meant “dispatch him up out of this life” (i.e. “kill him”).
Right...I've always looked at the kiss as a goodbye more than anything...even if he escaped successfully, there was no guarantees
@@bradbutcher8762 I was actually hoping they'd get together, her husband died, his wife died, he'd be a good step father to her son and they could start a new family, she proved herself as a good person (just stuck in politics) and clearly they had something before. I think they were each others first love and likely wanted to be together but at the time couldn't, her first words to him when they reunited in Germania was "my father favours you now, it was not always so" ...I think they were together and she was pressured to marry someone else who was from the nobility and that's why he was clearly bitter, avoiding her, he still had feelings and was hurt which is why he was avoiding her eyes, he's an honourable man and wanted to be faithful to his wife, laudable... but my point is, them getting together about a year after his wife's death and more than a year after her husbands death (which btw I find sus, perhaps Commodus killed him out of jealousy???) is fine. I didn't even know people took issue with it until I was watching the reaction videos (only few did and some comments, most didn't though, and that makes sense to me). I was actually shipping them, so it's a shame he died :(
"At my signal, unleash hell"... Everything is great in this movie: the writing (so many amazing lines there), the acting (not only the duel between Russell Crowe and Joaquin Phoenix, but the rest of the cast as well) , the epic precise directing by Ridley Scott, who brought a whole genre back to life, the cinematography or the unforgettable soundtrack by Hans Zimmer.
Nice and interesting reactions from you two.
It looks like the younger generation has no notion that great movies with nice and credible special effects could be produced before their time, i.e. in the early 2000s and before.
At 36:34 this is definitely not "moldy bread". It looks like you never saw proper bread before apart from sliced loafs packed in plastic bags. Proper bread is artisanal bread prepared and baked with traditional methods, and is vastly superior in quality and taste than the stuff sold in supermarkets.
45:49 Proximo was actually originally supposed to survive til the end of the movie, but they had to change it when the actor, Oliver Reed, died during filming.
I could see how Jack Gleeson drew inspiration for Jofffrey from Joaquin Phoenix's portrayal as Commodus. Joffrey was like a younger version of Commodus.
Guys, the 2000’s is not a long time ago, it’s practically yesterday!
You guys should check some more Ancient Rome movies like Spartacus, Ben Hur, Quo Vidas, Cleopatra, and Fall of the Roman Empire, which was inspiration for the first act of Gladiator
we agree keep the suggestions flowing!
Or the HBO series Rome. :)
@@TheOctobersReact You should also put the Spartacus TV on your list, too. It's a masterpiece. Great acting, 300-style visuals, awesome fights, ripped guys, lots of sex, and original dialogue. Watch the 1960 movie first, though.
@@Hyperi0nn Yes! I was so sad when Ray Stevenson died.
@@Hyperi0nn One of the greatest HBO shows for sure.
"Proximus" it´s played by Oliver Reed. A great british actor, with a very interesting life (personally I love his anecdotes and experiences). I highly recommend you to discover more of this stunning celebrity.
I was watching a behind the scenes on this film. You can tell a great actor when they ask a director, do you want just tears or tears and snot and can call it up at a moments notice.
Oliver Reed.(the crusty old ex-gladiator) died during the filming so they used a double for his murder scene.
Yeah, I hear people talking about how amazing this looks for being way back in 2000, I definitely can't help thinking they should be watching Cleopatra and thinking about "way back"...
"Way back"?! 2000?! What the heck is... ... hang on, where's my cane??
Bread and circuses. Still happens today with 'sports'.
1:19 This is set in 180 AD, so it’s about 220 years after Julius Caesar was assassinated in 44 BC.
Joaquin Phoenix’s name is pronounced “Wah-keen.” The “J” is silent and the “qu” sounds like a “k.”
Now do quinoa 😂
the "W" is silent too. also invisible.
The J isn't silent, it's pronounced like a W, just like you spelled it
My brother's name is Joaquin.
Say 'walking',, now leave the 'L' sound out.
@@YoureMrLebowskithe w identifies as visible though
Movies always gets this wrong: In ancient Rome, thumbs up meant kill him and thumb sideways meant let him live. A thumb thrusting up represented a sword thrust. Thumbs down wasn't part of the equation.
Don't be so sure about that. Rome survived for 1,000 years. When in that 1,000 years was the thumb sideways the thing? Did it never change. A lot of "experts" (I don't mean you, I mean a lot of youtubers and historians) say stuff as though it wasn't true when it actually might have been true at a different time period. The Roman customs changed over time and I think eventually thumbs up became a thing.
We learnt at the University in Arthistory that thumbs up meant heaven (death), thumbs down meant stay on Earth (life). There´s a lot of interpretations, none definite proof.
@@geraldherrmann787 That's very interesting!
This is my all time favorite movie. Love your reactions BTW. The one thing I will say is that everyone your age that makes these reactions say the same thing. "suprised how well it was done" This movie came out in a time of GREAT movies. 1999-2005 is an era of great movies.....I miss it.
16:48 Elysium was what the Romans called the afterlife.
What a great reaction to a fantastic movie. I was taking a college history class on Rome at the time this became popular and although not everything is factual it sparked many great conversations with the professor who taught the class. Also, your thumbnails always make me laugh. My dude looks like his favorite sports team is about to lose the game and she has a great smile with slight surprise like I do when my garden starts to come in. 😆
One of the ten best movies ever made for me. I tear up at the end every time.
This should be followed-up by BEN HUR from 1959.
Actually the Thumbs Up was meaning of " I approve the execution " and " Thumbs Down was for " I disagree the execution ". Hollywood thought it was quite weird on screen, so they changed it for the opposite. It's looks "better" with Thumbs Up nowadays
Music by the incomparable Hans Zimmer and the vocalist is the amazing Lisa Gerrard.
The acting in this movie is some of the best of all time. "Am i not merciful!" He fucking dealt that line
That was an ad-lib. In the script the first "am I not merciful" is where the scene was supposed to end.
My favorite movie with Joaquin (pronounced Wahkeen) is “Quills”with Geoffrey Rush.
Best Dreamworks picture ever
Bread and circuses keep the people distracted, not much has changed on that score...
Panem et Circensis
The guy that played Maximus' owner was a guy named Oliver Reed. He died during filming this - but you should defo look into him more. He was an absolute hellraiser. 🙂
MF Doom out there killin' fools in the Colosseum.
😂
according to my Greco-Roman studies instructor, the thumbs up/thumbs down was reversed in antiquity... thumbs up meant the opposite of what it does today.
but there is no evidence attesting to the use of the thumbs up/down among the ancient Romans.
it is a nineteenth-century invention in storytelling
Actually kill was thumbs against the throat
Huge fan of this movie! I love ancient history, and as an anthropology major in college this is my type of film. Thanks for covering this one!
24:34 you can see a crew member at the far left of the screen wearing a regular shirt and jeans lol
49:06 was only training, Maximus has experience with survival in all our battles. He even fought with worse wounds than that. Commodus only did training fights, rules, and someone telling you when to stop. There is a difference between fighting for survival and fighting for training
When Commodus was practicing "fighting" against multiple people, it was choreographed. Thats why you see hom going through it slowly the first time.
The wardrobe was so fantastic. They were definitely wearing the original, pre Versace and Gucci here☺- especially Joaquin. Great movie(a multiple times watch for me). Great reaction guys!
You'll see 2 to 3 other things in this that GoT resembles when you get to the bigger GoT battles, as well as the fighting pits.
Agreed. If they liked the battle scenes here, they're going to love what's coming up in GoT.
This was epic film that hadn't been since 60's Sword and Sandals era. This film is amazing still. I could say this is its own Era Ben-Hur film that still looks awesome after decades and is full of great performances. Another good Russel Crow Film is: Master and Commander: Far Sight of the World or if you like comedy: the Nice Guys.
One of the greatest soundtracks of all time imo.
What you said at 26:47 with people being distracted from politics with games in roman times...it's happening today but with technology and social media. And it will never change untill people wake up.
The late, great Richard Harris, here playing Marcus Aeurelius, was a legend in many ways. If you want to have some fun, go online and look up interviews with Harris and his good friend Peter O'Toole. There are many stories the two tell of drinking binges, acting on stage, and missing weekends.
ayo i luv ur commentary and i'm glad you finally saw this ur right it *RLY* holds up. smh they're making a follow up now but such is life 🤷♀
yes everything seems to be rebooting lol
I remember going to see this with a couple friends at the theater when it came out in 2000. I was a year out of graduating high school. There are a lot of movies I’d love to see y’all react to on this channel. So many good ones out there. I know y’all are still going through Marvel,Game of Thrones, and I know y’all also mentioned doing Star Wars at some point (can’t wait for that). But in due time! Ha ha!
Few people catch that the entire movie is his life flashing before his eyes. Yes the scene of him walking through the fields of grain was him in Elysium.
Joaquin Phoenix, my favorite in this movie, everyone hated, but for me, he'd played the villain perfectly
Russell Crowe not only did his own stunts ,( and yes he was injured several times). He is also an expert horseman and loves horses.
Great conservation in end, love your commentary!
Thank you kindly!
Another great Russell Crowe movie is Master and Commander if you haven't already reacted to it. It's another epic historically based movie not to be missed.
The most realistic seething anger put to film to this day.
Russel Crowe might have some emotional issues that play into that role, but still... just wow.
You can feel his justified rage even after all those years.
Love this film and always enjoy your reactions.
Best line is Proximo “you sold me queer giraffes” 🤣
Man, I’ve loved Joaquin’s acting since this film. But I agree that kiss between he and Livia was out of character for Maximus. It went against his purpose.
Russell Crowe is one of the best actors of all time. He's played all kinds of different roles and was also the lead singer of a rock band in the 90's called 30 Odd Foot of Grunts. Y'all definitely need to check out some more of his movies. Here's a list of some of his best movies.
The Quick and the Dead (Also starring a young Leonardo DiCaprio)
Master and Commander : The Far Side of the World (Also starring Paul Bettany who plays Jarvis/Vision)
A Beautiful Mind (Also starring Paul Bettany)
Mystery Alaska (Also starring Burt Reynolds)
Cinderella Man (Also starring Paul Giamatti)
3 :10 to Yuma (Also starring Christian Bale)
American Gangster (Also starring Denzel Washington)
Les Misérables (Also starring Hugh Jackman)
The Insider (Also starring Al Pacino)
The Next Three Days (Also starring Liam Neeson)
This is definitely historical fiction. But Marcus Arelius was a great man and Comodus was a douche.
SN: I love the lines of this movie, one of my favorite is, "Today I Saw A Slave Become More Powerful Than The Emperor Of Rome!!!" Powerful stuff.
Graccus, the Senator, was played by Derek Jacobi who also played the leading role in the BBC production of I, Claudius (the story that Commodus referenced when he was holding Lucius "hostage")...such a magnificent actor. Jacobi plays Claudius (became Emperor following the assassination of Caligula) from the age of 18 to 64ish. Others in the cast are: Sian Philips (Clash of the Titans, Dune), Brian Blessed (Black Adder, Much Ado About Nothing), John Hurt (Alien, Harry Potter), and Patrick Stewart (Star Trek TNG)
Another film with Russell Crowe I would recommend is "A Good Year" where he inherits a wine estate and learns what is really important in life.
First Guy to ever say the Movie was short 😁its just he was enjoying the Movie so much that he thought it was short
Playing it smarter was something already addressed by Ridley Scott. Lucille told Maximus that she knew he was lying because he was never any good at it. I'm sure he was aware that Commodus would've realized he was sincere in supporting him.
River would be so proud of his brother.... rhis performance and many others really make joaquin a true pillar of hollywood.
I dropped EVERYTHING to come watch this 😊
The great thing about this movie is that it has the ability to change and grow as you, yourself, change and grow. 10 years from now if you watch it again, through your evolved perspective as a person, the movie will convey a completely new message. That is truly what makes this movie so amazing.
My personal opinion, this is one of the 3 greatest movies ever. I have it in third place, but it has probably the best bad guy ever. Phoenix killed his role. I love the three friends I love the dialogue and Proximo is such a good Gray character with lightside leanings. Lucilla does great with her role, which is very smart writing and the line "you have a talent for survival" is the coldest slick dis I've seen in movies
3:58 "The Upper Management" is one of the greatest human beings who ever walked on this Planet.
An interesting factoid: The singer of "Honor Him" and "Now We Are Free", Lisa Gerrard, was chosen by Hans Zimmer in part because when she sings, she sings in a language she created when she was a young girl. She says only she and God understand it, so she often sings to Him.
"They brought out the writers for this movie!"
Actually, they didn't. Crowe improvides a large majority of his dialogue, including his soliloquy about what his home looked like. The script was only about 30 percent complete when they started shooting. Since I've heard that, it's always bugged me that Crowe didn't get a writer's credit for this one.
My favorite little treasure is an ancient Roman coin of Faustina the II, wife of Marcus Aurelius and mother of Commodus.
Gladiator is a timeless classic. So glad you both enjoyed it. Maybe check out HBO's series Rome...it's only two seasons but very well done. Pre G.o.T.
Howdy from Oregon Octobers.☺💚
No idea who Russell Crowe is? Man, I feel old. Check out *Fightin' Around The World.*
The outstanding actor playing Proximo, *Oliver Reed,* like his character, died during the making of the movie so his last scene(s) had to be done with CG, it's noticeable in the scene when he's talking to Maximus who asks him "Are you in danger of becoming a good man?". RIP
The young actor who plays Lucius, *Spencer Treat Clark,* is also in *Unbreakable* with *Bruce Willis* and *Samuel L. Jackson* and in *Glass,* also in another great movie you guys should check out that NO ONE has reacted to called *Arlington Road* with *Jeff Bridges* from *The Big Lebowski* and *Tim Robbins* from *The Shawshank Redemption,* movies that I honestly thought you guys had seen and you should definitely check out. You may know Jeff Bridges as Obadiah Stane, the bad guy from Iron Man.
*Gladiator* combines the story lines from *Spartacus* (1960) and *The Falll Of The Roman Empire* (1964)
' I hope she kicks it', ( the Emperor's lifeless body) ' I hope she spits on it'. Why was that not part of the script? 😂
The script was adapted from Anthony Mann's The Fall of the Roman Empire, which was influenced by historian Gibbon's Fall of the Roman Empire.
One sad detail that many misses is that Commodus really tried to engage, love and spend time with Lucius. In that way he wanted but his own father never did. Also, Aurelius asks Maximus "How will the future remember me?". Aurelius is known as tone of the greatest ceasars, and, his writings of philosophy and leadership are studied even today. Hannibal Lecter even quotes Aurelius to teach Clarice in "Silence of the lambs".
I absolutely love this movie. I still remember watching it as a kid and crying at the end❤ If you liked Russell Crowe in this movie you should know that in my opinion he hasn't made any movie that's not great! I suggest you to react to the Nice Guys also staring Ryan Goslin 👍
❤❤❤Ridley Scott is one of my favorite directors he’s done everything from Blade Runner, Legend, Hannibal to Black Rain, Prometheus, Death on the Nile, etc.
I saw this in theaters when I was 10. It was my first R movie and a favorite of mine to this day!
Correct me if I'm wrong, but did anybody else notice that right at the moment the female fighter gets cut in half (30:40) you can see a crewmember in a black hoodie in one of the chariots? :)
Both this film and the Lord of the Rings trilogy came out at the same time, and changed the way battle scenes were filmed forever
Hey Octobers, this was a fantastic movie and I'm glad you enjoyed it. If you like Russell Crowe, you should check out Master and Commander, a seafaring adventure. Also, check out Joaquin Phoenix in Joker.
You guys should watch Kingdom of Heaven(2005), very good film.
If i was to compare no one is more alike from Game of Thrones as Ned to Maximus and Joffrey to Commodus. They are both SO MUCH alike
So in Greek Mythology the underworld was divided into two parts. Tartarus the place of the wicked dead overseen and ruled by Zeus's brother Hades (Pluto) in the Roman pantheon. The righteous dead went to the fields of Elyssium also known as the Elyssian fields.
When The Romans conquered the Greeks they just matched up their gods to the Greek ones. Zeus = Jupiter, Hera = Juno, Ares god of war becomes Mars, Aphrodite goddess of Love becomes Venus, Hermes becomes Mercury, Poseidon becomes Neptune etc.
In the Bible you have two afterlife's as well. Hades or Hell also called Sheol for the wicked dead and Paradise or Abraham's bosom the abode of the righteous dead. In between the two is the great abyss which no one can cross. 😮
This movie was Oliver Reed's (Proximo) final movie. He actually died towards the end of filming so they had to use standins and digital CGI face swapping to finish the film. 😮
In the Coliseum the gladiatorial games were called bread and circuses...free bread for the masses of the poor and circuses for the spectacle of the arena. You could have one on one combats, man vs. animal combats, squad vs squad combats or just general melee combats. Very few gladiators survived the experience. 😮
My favorite movie of all time since the year 2000. Great reaction! Best score of all time thanks to Mr Zimmer.
More and more people are coming around to this movie being one of the greatest of all time
Say the words “He was gladiator” fast a few times in a row and tell me what you hear. You can also substitute he with she when you say it.
😂😂😂
FYI. When you mention about the time that this film may have been set, the Colosseum in Rome, as featured late on in the film, was opened in 80 AD, so it would have been a bit later than that. Also, when you talk of the Roman army being advanced at that time, the most advanced society, both in cultural and military standards of the time was actually said to have been the Chinese, for a few centuries prior and many afterward. The Great Wall of China was built in 220 BC, and it's still standing up quite well today.
My dear Georgia friends, please let me say that I LIKE this movie. Don’t take my comments to mean I don’t.
I’m a BIG History guy.
So, this movie does use some historicity: Marcus Aurelius was a Roman emperor and considered one of the best. Commodus did follow him and is considered one of the worst but it’s difficult to nail that down.
Commodus did NOT kill his father, we know he was hundreds of miles away from his father at his death.
No Roman emperor ever died in the Collosseum, though a few would stage ‘matches’ against a weakened and starved opponent.
We have only two very short accounts of the thumbs up/down and all they say is “….a hand motion indicated the sponsor’s desire.” Maybe pointing up meant ‘send him to the gods’ and down meant ‘keep him here.’ Was it a finger or a thumb, we just don’t know.
My dear friend Anthony is SO smart, he picked up on the close link between the games and politics.
A young Roman aristocrat, seeking higher office would begin the ‘Coursus Honorium.’ It was a fairly standardized route to high power: the young man would be educated, most likely in Greece or by a Greek tutor, then a stint in the Army as a junior officer to learn how the Army worked. Them was a lower office, often in charge of putting on games, often at his own expense.
It’s, sort of, how corruption was built into the system: once you’d done the lower offices, you’re ready for higher….. but you were dead broke or in debt.
Your next posting might be as a governor of a province.
So, you’re now in charge of a province, like Pontius Pilate was the governor of Judea.
What do you want as governor? Peace, stability and to squeeze the province for money to replace what you’d spent to land the job.
How do you squeeze a province? Easy, dispatch tax collectors. Think back to how controversial it was for Jesus to have a tax collector rolling with him. Citizens of provinces HATED tax collectors.
Now, for the politics. The Roman Republic (When Rome was run by a Senate and elevated two men to become Consuls for one year terms) ended when Julius Caesar and his great-nephew Octavian (soon to become emperor Augustus) became Rome’s first emperor.
The Senate still existed but it was just an honorary office - Emperor says ‘yes,’ Senate says ‘no,’ it’s going to be ‘yes.’
In the movie, Marcus Aurelius says he wants to give power back to the people, to the Senate but NO emperor pursued this path exactly for the reasons Commodus said: the Senate just debates endlessly. Emperors represent a singular, unified command. It’s just more efficient.
As an indication of the sentimental power of the Senate with the people, Maximus removes his tattoo with a blade. His tattoo is SPQR: Senatus Populus Quod Romana - “The Senate and People ARE Rome.”
When your channel blows up and you have the ability to travel to Rome to see the sights, you’ll see SPQR everywhere; carved into stone, on sewer drains, everywhere.
This sign appears throughout Roman history, even when Rome was ruled as an empire and neither the Senate or the people actually had any power.
SPQR was as meaningful to the people of Rome as the American flag is to us, so no emperor ever considered disbanding the Senate. They didn’t have to, they just took all the Senate’s power away and let them be a powerless organization, easily ignored.
The real problem all Roman emperors had to deal with was they headed a multicultural, multi-lingual nation of immense proportions in an age where it might take as long as 6 months to get a message, such as “The people are revolting, they’re killing Roman people and burning Roman settlements! What do you want me to do?” to go from the edge of the empire back to Rome, however much longer to figure out what to do, even longer to get troops to where they needed to be.
Relatively early during the empire, emperors figured out that the empire was simply too big for one man to run it.
All sorts of solutions were tried, like having 4 emperors at one time or splitting the entire Roman Empire into two empires that usually cooperated, sometimes not.
However, giving power back to the Senate was a non-starter: the emperors were looking for efficiency, large bodies of rich, egotistical men trying to settle on a single solution is not a formula for success.
For the games themselves, we know quite a bit about them. They were all day affairs with a break for lunch.
In the mornings prisoners were executed in gruesome, crowd-pleasing ways.
After that, specially trained bestiari or ‘beast fighters,’ would fight against just about every species you can think of.
We have depictions of these beast fights in surviving Roman art. We see lots of lions and tigers but no lions with manes and no tigers with stripes.
Biologists speculate that the lions and tigers we see today lived in such remote areas the super efficient beast hunters never found them and the modern versions of these cats were the only sub-species to survive.
As a sort of metric for how efficient Rome’s hunters were, a delicacy at the nicest parties was hummingbird tongue pies. Can you imagine how many hummingbirds you’d have to collect to make a pie out of their tongues?
So, after the beast fights, everyone would go have a nice lunch while stage-hands removed the bodies and got set for the main event in the afternoon; man vs man gladiatorial games.
The earliest account of Roman gladiatorial games date back to when Rome was a single community on one of seven hills around the Tiber River. We have an account of the Romans winning an early battlefield victory and forcing prisoners of war to fight to the death as part of the funeral rites for slain Roman soldiers.
The idea seems to have taken off from there.
Consider the three phases of the games and what they meant. The games were all about reinforcing the superiority of Rome: we kill those who have broken our laws, we conquer nature (the beasts) and we force our enslaved enemy to fight for our entertainment. We LITERALLY rule!
Slaves were most frequently acquired as a result of battle and conquest. Consider, if Rome stops making war on her neighbors, what happens to their entertainment industry?
The popularity of the games certainly encouraged Rome to keep up their conquering ways. Remember Marcus Aurelius’ line, “There’s always another people to conquer.”
That’s the Roman outlook in a nutshell.
When I described the Roman entertainment industry, it truly was that.
Gladiators were housed (imprisoned) in a ludus (school) run by a lanista. Proximo went from gladiator to lanista and this was probably fairly common.
A possible intermediate step was for a former successful gladiator to transition to become a magistri, the ‘coach/trainer’ of gladiators, about like a drill sergeant.
Gladiators occupied a strange place in Roman society. They were slaves and successful ones were also superstars. After a fight a guy backstage would scrape the sweat off a victorious gladiator and sell it as an aphrodisiac and the demand was HUGE.
We find graffiti on the walls of Pompeii’s streets of cartoons of named gladiators, indicating their popularity with and support from the people.
In rare occasions a down on his luck, big, strong Roman man might, essentially, sell himself to a lanista, figuring “I might as well make a living killing people,” but that was rare.
Even more rare were instances of female gladiators squaring off with each other but the accounts that survive indicate the writers turned their noses up at this, going out of their way to describe the women who did this as repulsive.
Rome economically was similar to the height of the British empire when England controlled colonies around the world. The view in both empires was that the far-flung possession’s purpose was to send their best products and most of their money to support the capital city. Once the Roman Empire grew beyond the Italian peninsula, administrators discovered that the farmland around the city of Rome couldn’t feed the city’s population. At its height the city of Rome housed over a million souls, one of the first cities in history to achieve that feat.
Egypt, once added to the empire, became the Kansas and Nebraska and California of Rome; its breadbasket.
It took a sizable fleet of transport ships every single day to feed Rome.
Over time the emperors developed a policy of ‘panem et circensis,’ “Bread and circuses.” Food and entertainment.
In ‘Hunger Games,’ the capital city is called ‘Panem,’ a shortening of that phrase.
What it meant, though, practically, was the ‘bargain’ between Roman ruler and ruled: “You keep us fed and entertained and you can pretty much do whatever you like.”
Woe to the emperor not able to fulfill either condition.
We have a gruesome account of, I believe the Huns besieging Constantinople, the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. The city was starving but the Huns couldn’t break through the walls. The emperor felt it was important to keep putting on gladiator games to distract the people from the dire circumstances.
The famine was so bad that, as gladiators fell, the crowd called out to the guys removing the corpses, “How much for that meat? Sell us that meat, we’re starving!”
In real history, Commodus actually ruled jointly with his father Marcus Aurelius for a little over a decade until his father actually did die of natural causes. Commodus was quite uninterested in ruling at first, until the Senate decided that they'd try to officially strip the Emperor's power, which caused him to take a VERY keen interest. He became much like a certain narcissistic orange man-baby dictator we know of today, actually.
Commodus ruled with an iron fist after this, and showed just how narcissistic and crazy he actually was. He proclaimed himself to be the reincarnation of Hercules, had statues and busts of himself erected all over the city, held games in his honor for months at a time (in which he participated and always won, naturally), and even renamed the months of the year after his own self-bestowed names. He kept the mob appeased with panem et circenses (bread and circuses), and the Senators were fearful of opposing him openly lest they be executed.
Finally, however, the Senate had had enough, and hired assassins to kill the Emperor. The first one poisoned his breakfast but Commodus vomited it up, but the second one, the second was his wrestling partner, who ended up strangling him in his bath. After his death, a power struggle known as the Year of the Five Emperors began.
Commodus is widely regarded as one of the worst Emperors Rome ever had, and saw the end of the great Pax Romana period during his insane reign.