Ridley Scott's Napoleon, starring Joaquin Phoenix, on Apple TV+ in March 2024: Our review

The biopic Napoleon, directed by Ridley Scott, is due for release on Apple TV+ on March 1, 2024. This historical drama, produced by Apple Original Films in partnership with Sony Pictures, was released last November in cinemas before being broadcast on Apple TV+.

Napoleon is a biopic about the rise of Napoleon Bonaparte, an army general who became Emperor following his coup d'état. Ridley Scott is no stranger to period war stories(Gladiator, Kingdom of Heaven and, more recently, The Last Duel), and this time he wanted to tell the story of this legendary figure through the prism of his relationship with his wife, Josephine, played by Vanessa Kirby. The end of the Revolution, the seizure of power, battles all over the world, the fall at Waterloo - the Emperor's life from 1789 to 1815 is shown in this feature-length film (2h38 on the clock). But Ridley Scott seems to be bogged down in the process.

Although the film is a spectacular fresco, it's its biases that make us wary. Napoleon is portrayed as a soldier of genius, who wields the art of war to perfection, but we hardly ever see him strategize. The film is supposed to be seen through Josephine's prism, but she is barely present. Temporal ellipses sometimes confuse the narrative, while Napoleon is never seen conducting a policy as a head of state, even though the French crowds seem to worship him. The filmmaker wanted to tell the story of the woman behind the leader, but the two narratives merge, and the film seems to struggle to decide which point of view it favors.

Yet from the outset, Ridley Scott's Napoleon is a terrified, frail, even spineless little man. Once he meets Josephine, he becomes a sex-addicted tyrant, before becoming the enemy of the whole of Europe. One sequence crystallizes the entire film, and gives it the grandeur we expected when we went to see it: the Battle of Austerlitz. For once, all the film's strengths come together for a great moment of cinema, enough to convince you to buy your ticket.

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Official trailer for Napoleon (2023) :

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