Gladiator II

Translated by Andrea Solazzo

More than two decades after the release of Gladiator, Ridley Scott returns to explore the world of ancient Rome with a sequel that is as long-awaited as it is controversial: Gladiator II. The film, starring Lucius (Paul Mescal), the illegitimate son of Maximus Decimus Meridius, opens with a familiar atmosphere, but promises, from the first minutes, a journey full of action, intrigue and spectacle. What emerges, however, is a cinematic product that seems to oscillate between an attempt to reproduce the epicness of the first film and a series of questionable narrative and stylistic choices, in which cinematic necessity and directorial haughtiness rule the day.

But let us go in order:

Lucius, presented as a humble peasant and soldier in the army of Numidia, finds himself once again caught up in the power games of a divided and corrupt Rome. Although he is the son of Maximus Decimus Meridius, a man he has never met and about whom he knows almost nothing, he constantly lives in the shadow of that legendary father. An absent and mythical figure who deeply conditions his path, but at the same time deprives him of a real emotional connection with the past. Thus, his thirst for revenge, although the driving force of his existence, lacks the complexity and emotional weight that had made Massimo an unforgettable hero.

Anger is the emotion that transforms Lucius from the film's protagonist into the instrument in the hands of three different figures who carry the action throughout the course of the film:

Marcus Acacius, who with the first battle in Numidia marks Annon's destiny, making him a slave and then a gladiator; allowing him to follow in his father's footsteps.

Macrinus who, after buying him to have him fight in his stable, understands the spectacular potential, but also the ties to power, that Annon has, and exploits them to his liking to reach the throne.

Lucilla, who before her death, is the bulwark of a Rome still loyal to Marcus Aurelius and his ideal of an empire transformed into a pseudo-democracy with the senate at its head. An ideal that is the towing hook used throughout the film.

Among them, Denzel Washington's performance and character, Macrinus, shines, in my opinion the film's absolute protagonist, a cunning and manipulative lanista who imposes the world of gladiators on Lucius. His performance, full of nuance and charisma, dominates every scene in which he appears, making clear, I repeat, a central problem of the film: the secondary characters are sometimes more interesting than the protagonist himself, to the point of completely overshadowing him.

Gladiator II attempts to balance breath-taking action scenes with intense drama. However, this ambition often results in an uneven outcome. The battles are visually impressive, but laden with anachronisms and implausible choices. The first sequence in Numidia, for instance, sees the Romans attacking with siege towers from ships, a fascinating idea, but historically and logistically implausible. Even the arena dynamics, although spectacular, seem closer to theatrical choreography than brutal and realistic combat.

The inclusion of sharks in the Colosseum is another example of an approach that privileges stage effect over historical credibility. Scott could defend himself by claiming that history is at the service of cinematic narrative, but the final effect is laughable, aggravated by unconvincing CGI.

Returning to the charge on the narrative side, the film is structured into three main acts, but each seems to suffer from a fundamental problem: lack of coherence. The first part, as already mentioned. is dominated by the figure of Marcus Acacius, Pedro Pascal, the Roman general who imprisons Lucius after the war and leads him on the road to his destiny, remaining, however, a marginal role. The second part, led by Macrinus, is undoubtedly the strongest thanks to the characterisation of the character and Washington's performance. However, the third part, which should represent the emotional and narrative climax, is lost in a forced attempt to replicate the emotions of the first film.

The narrative circularity - with Lucius retracing his father's steps, even in visual details such as the gesture of picking up the earth before combat - appears more like a lazy choice than a homage. This is all topped off with the idea of the "Roman dream", a sort of transposition of the American dream into the context of the empire, which further empties the soul of the story, reducing the greatness of Rome to a mere contemporary metaphor, made by an American for Americans.

The question that then arises for me is "was Gladiator II really necessary?" The film seems built more to satisfy a commercial need than to offer a meaningful chapter in the saga that began in 2000. The film, while visually spectacular and entertaining at times, lacks the narrative and emotional power that made Gladiator a classic and a film studied in university film courses for its greatness in terms of symbolism and punctuality in narrative construction.

Washington's performance is the main strength, but it is not enough to compensate for the weaknesses of a fragmentary screenplay and a direction that, at times, seems overly complacent.

Gladiator II is an ambitious film that tries to capture the essence of its predecessor but ends up being a shaky shadow cast by candlelight. With elaborate action scenes, endearing secondary characters and an undeniably seductive visual aesthetic, it entertains the generalist audience, but leaves with the feeling that the heart of the story has been sacrificed on the altar of spectacle.

As knowledgeable viewers, we can appreciate the return to the world of ancient Rome, but it is impossible to ignore that, unlike Maximus, Gladiator II does not completely win us over or make us feel truly "entertained".

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