Napoleon by Ridley Scott

     

     It is hard for me to understand the rave reviews of Napoleon. Equally hard for the viewers is to understand the origins of Napoleon charisma from the movie . The history is twisted and garbled. For instance, it were Russian-Austrian allies who took the heights above the Austerlitz battlefield, and Napoleon's camp was below. The uphill attack of the strong position by the French, contrary to all contemporary tactics, decided the battle. In the current political climate I would not expect anything smacking of fairness in showcasing his Russian debacle, which broke the backbone of the Napoleonic system. Yet, the omission of Trafalgar and Volkerschlacht ("Battle of Nations") at Leipzig, the whole 1813 German campaign does not make sense. The absence of Metternich is as awkward as would be a movie about American Revolution missing Adams, Madison and Hamilton. 

    The most enduring heritage of the First Empire was the Code Napoleon. It is absent in the movie. Instead, the sex of Napoleon and Josephine, doggie style, is demonstrated at least twice. Why?

    Joaquin Phoenix, a great actor, simply was not given enough substance to act. Alexander I, who was 30 during the meeting on the Niemen and 37 after the fall of Paris -- a quite mature man in then scheme of things -- is shown as a youngster. Contrary to the historical feat of two emperors meeting on the raft in the middle of the river, they talk in an unremarkable park. The only brilliant act is Rupert Everett's Wellington in (again) poorly shown Battle of Waterloo. The whole failure of the Napoleonic enterprise is attributed to Waterloo, which was elucidated in a much better 1970 movie with Rod Steiger as Napoleon. General Arthur Wellesley, not yet even the Duke of Wellington, sitting as the head of the table before two emperors and three or four kings, is as incongruent as the Orthodox Church scene in Catherine the Great. 

    The 1814 act of abdication is not clear at all. In fact, after the Russian Army took Paris, Napoleon did not consider his position as hopeless. The people of Paris, who were not very important, but also his marshals forced him to abdicate simply because of general weariness of more than twenty years of warfare.