A KING'S TRAGI-COMEDY: THOUGHTS I HAD WHILE WATCHING NAPOLEON

By Ahona

I mean, you could see Napoleon as just a tragedy too the woman he loves returns only a fraction of it, the country he belongs to cannot contain his overwhelming ambition, the time he is born to reduce him to a wounded warlord. Only posterity knows the magnitude of Napoleon's impact. In about two-and- a-half-hours, Riddley Scott packs his life into a cinematically explosive capsule husband, soldier, legend, but most importantly - a man. Scott recounts the more important events of his life so neatly that the film becomes a catalogue, almost. The reason it is much, much more than that is because the film anchors you in the fragility of the man. He shivers nervously before emerging victorious. He approaches his beloved with an almost juvenile sense of romance. He weeps with happiness at the birth of his son. Scott does not allow you to worship the man for his greatness without looking at his flaws. He does not let you reduce him to a monster either.

The lensing of the story is what makes me glad that a director like Scott chose to tell it. In Scott's hands, Napoleon Bonaparte's oversized ambition, passionate intentions and abject tragedy is so rooted. Scott shows you both a legend and a human being. Spread across a big screen and yet fixated on the nature of the French Emperor, Riddley Scott portrays both the expanse and depth of the man. The conflicted nature of the man is what provides substance to this film. It is what makes it a tragicomedy. He conquers land but loses men. He toasts with kings but is deceived by his queen. He is shrewd enough to place his war camps strategically, but also unwise enough to charge into a Russian winter. He says brutally honest and funny lines, such as "You English think you are great because you have boats." In each piece of irony, Joaquin Phoenix delivers a Napoleon we'll remember. Max Hastings had written that Napoleon could be considered as "an enlightened despot who laid the foundations of modern Europe" or "a megalomaniac who wrought greater misery than any man before the coming of Hitler". Ridley Scott's mastery is in showing you that he was somehow both, and neither. The ability to span the complexity of the man, without reducing him to any one understanding is why this film deserves to be seen more widely. It is a fine example of how to recount history without being reductive.