At first, Napoleon – written by David Scarpa and directed by Ridley Scott – gives the impression it has found a way to sidestep the drudgeries of the prestige Hollywood biopic. These films often assume a mechanical voice (“this happened, and then that happened”), but Scarpa’s script seems to overcome that by contrasting its protagonist’s (a stellar Joaquin Phoenix) successes on the battlefield with his turbulent marriage with Josephine (Vanessa Kirby). It shouldn’t come as a complete surprise that a man trained to outwit his enemies in war also treated his first wife as a conquest. Like any tempestuous love story we might have read about, there’s a tremendous push-and-pull between the characters essayed by Phoenix and Kirby. He’s a commoner, paving his way to the highest echelons of French society in the aftermath of the political vacuum left by the revolution in the late 18th century. She, a former aristocrat, is trying to find a way back to the comforts of her earlier life. Opportunism, convenience, co-dependency, and a certain kind of uninhibited love pervade their dynamic. Together, Napoleon and Josephine are like comets colliding with one another. Charting some of the major events in Napoleon’s life, Scott’s film coasts on their stormy dynamic for more than half of its 158-minute runtime. Things get significantly less zany after that. Scott, at 85, is showing no signs of slowing down and has recently brought us stories critiquing male entitlement (The Last Duel) and toxic familial bonds (House of Gucci) and here has plenty of compelling observations about the French ruler. But Napoleon becomes too straightforward once Kirby stops appearing on screen. Scott, best known for his irreverence for historical facts and ability to act fast and get things done, crafts a film that is nearly there but not quite. Napoleon opens with Marie Antoinette, the last Queen before the French Revolution, being escorted to the guillotine as the mobs jeer. The monarchy is about to be abolished, and the stage is set for French society’s noblemen to usurp the keys to rule a nation. At this point, the Bonaparte brothers from Corsica claim to know how to get the job done. Parts of France including Toulon – a port town of strategic significance – are under British occupation. When Napoleon reaches the town, he realises he will have to build his offence from the ground up. But Ridley Scott has not made this film as a paean to Napoleon’s bravery on the war front. As the film builds up to the battle sequence in Toulon, we can hear the heart of Phoenix’s Napoleon pounding. Right before he orders the cannons to mount their surprise attack, he shuts his ears – an action that we see him repeat a few more times as he leads his armies in Egypt, Austerlitz, and Waterloo.The film has its hilarious and borderline farcical moments more than once – especially in a scene when a coup d’etat is staged with the help of Napoleon’s army – and members of the committee are arrested from their homes. “I’m having breakfast, no one will touch me before I have my breakfast,” a member commands, only to be disobeyed. In another scene when the members of parliament are trying to manhandle Napoleon after he announces his reign, he manages to escape the building. Soon after, he convinces the soldiers to march into the building in front of him. “Shall we vote?” Napoleon asks politely, with dozens of rifles pointed at the parliamentarians. During a dinner party, when a domestic squabble about Josephine’s failure to conceive, gets out of hand, Napoleon yells, “Destiny has brought me this lamb chop!” It’s almost like Scott is intent on deconstructing the myth around the man, showcasing him almost as a cartoon character. It’s a great choice and Phoenix plays along without the slightest bit of vanity.Joaquin Phoenix is splendid, as the nervy, egotistical emperor. While plotting war, his ambition knows no bounds – but it’s love, respect and admiration he craves. From his peers, his mother and his wife. Following up his masterful, anxiety-inducing performance in Ari Aster’s Beau Is Afraid (2023), Phoenix’s turn in this almost presents itself as a lovely double bill. Phoenix’s last collaboration with Scott was Gladiator (2001), where he was brilliant as the scheming and petty Commodus, who wants to be revered without a fraction of the skill his character has in this film. As someone tragically bound in a royal marriage, weeping in solitary palaces, Vanessa Kirby’s performance is reminiscent of her outing as Princess Margaret in the first two seasons of The Crown (bonus trivia— her lover in the show, plays a key secondary character here). One of her shining moments in the film is when Josephine is required to read aloud a statement of divorce as she sniggers through sentences she doesn’t quite believe. It’s a brutal scene with both Kirby and Phoenix in fine form. Scott concludes his film by listing the death tolls in each of Napoleon’s five major wars, estimated to be a total of close to a million soldiers. The critique would’ve stung more if the film had afforded the dignity of leaving us with at least one soldier’s face from Napoleon’s army. Unfortunately, the film is so obsessed with its protagonist, that only Phoenix registers in the end. Fine actors like Tahar Rahim and Ben Miles, quietly fade from the canvas. It’s a shame that a film cautioning us about one of the most famous megalomaniacs forgot about the guy beside him.
