Ridley Scott’s Napoleon Film is an Exercise in Missed Opportunities
By placing so much emphasis on the relationship between Napoleon Bonaparte and Joséphine de Beauharnais, the film fails to fully examine the nature of Napoleon’s reign and the complex legacy of his rule.
Vanessa Kirby and Joaquin Phoenix in "Napoleon." Photograph: Apple TV+, Columbia Pictures
To most unfamiliar with Napoleon Bonaparte’s rise to power in Revolutionary France, the presence of his brother Lucien in the opening hour of Ridley Scott’s 2023 Napoleon may be a thrilling surprise. In the film’s depiction of the Coup of 18 Brumaire (November 9 in the French Republican calendar) in 1799 that dissolved the French Directory, Lucien, as President of the “Council of 500” legislature, dramatically holds his older brother at swordpoint and declares to the assembled grenadiers that he would assassinate Napoleon himself should the latter betray French revolutionary ideals. Lucien’s speech successfully rallies the grenadiers given the seriousness of his threat of fratricide, and they willingly follow Napoleon as he leads his coup. Consequently, Napoleon successfully dissolves the Council of 500 and paves the way for him to establish the French Consulate with himself at its head. By 1804, the Consulate would be dissolved as Napoleon was crowned Emperor of the French.
According to many historians, the events of the coup did in fact proceed in the manner the film depicts, with Lucien playing a pivotal role in the coup’s success. What makes the scene’s depiction of events all the more baffling then is how the film doesn’t follow through enough on examining why Napoleon chose to secure power for himself as Emperor beyond him considering a suggestion made by Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord. In fact, as much as the film centers on Napoleon being torn between his marriage with Joséphine de Beauharnais and his growing duties as Emperor, the film does not go into much detail on what those duties entail beyond Napoleon’s continued conquests of Europe. Even in showing the Napoleonic Wars, these military campaigns are depicted less to show Napoleon attempting to defend France from foreign absolutist monarchies threatened by the relatively liberal character of the First French Empire and more to show Napoleon’s general interest in becoming more powerful. It is for these omissions that, even with its impressively-long runtime at two and a half hours, the film feels strangely unfinished and unsatisfying by its conclusion.
“Portrait of Luciano Bonaparte in Villa Rufinella” by François-Xavier Fabre, displayed in the Napoleonic Museum.
The film’s biggest missed opportunity (and chance to provide a satisfying thematic arc) is examining the toll that Napoleon’s drift towards autocracy took on his relationships, for France, and for Europe. The film’s treatment of Lucien is once again a case in point here, as it shows neither how Lucien grew increasingly opposed to his brother’s rule nor why he failed to follow through on his public vow to assassinate Napoleon. Despite Napoleon’s attempts to keep Lucien in French imperial political structures, Lucien eventually grew disillusioned enough with his older brother’s rule that he went into self-imposed exile in Rome. Lucien would later go so far as to openly compare Napoleon to Julius Caesar in describing how his brother had succumbed to tyrannical impulses. Yet, Lucien’s decision not to follow through on his earlier pledge to kill Napoleon likely stemmed more from his desire for reconciliation, which happened only when Napoleon agreed to a constitutionally-restrained monarchy under the Charter of 1815 following his return from Elba during the Hundred Days Campaign. The more liberal nature of Napoleon’s restoration compared to the enlightened despotism of his previous imperial reign led Napoleon biographer Andrew Roberts to conclude that France and the rest of Europe would have gone in a more liberal direction had Napoleon proved victorious at Waterloo. Nevertheless, none of these nuances are depicted in the film, and Lucien’s presence is practically non-existent after the coup scenes.
The film leaves such plot threads dangling partly because it places so much attention on the disintegration of Napoleon’s marriage to Joséphine. Consequently, even if it’s hyperbolic to claim the film could be renamed “Barbie and Ken under the empire,” this emphasis is to the detriment of showing what Napoleon actually achieved during his reign besides his conquest of Europe. Much of Napoleon’s rule is over-simplified into implying that Napoleon’s conquests were more for personal glory and to install himself as an equal to more-established monarchies of Europe rather than for the benefit of France. Napoleon’s goal with securing an heir to the throne is shown as a growing obsession in the same realpolitik vein as well, with little to no attention paid to Napoleon’s political accomplishments while in power in both France and the rest of Europe.
“Napoleon.” Photograph: Apple TV+, Columbia Pictures
Scott’s film also does not examine the contradictions in the ideological justifications for Napoleon’s rule and military campaigns. Importantly, even before the implementation of the Charter of 1815, the First French Empire spread Enlightenment ideals against the aging feudal political system that still clung on in much of Europe, which the film does not depict in much detail. These achievements include the development of the Napoleonic Civil Code, Jewish emancipation, promoting public education, among other liberal-inspired reforms. Placed within the context of Napoleon’s despotism and attempts to establish client states across Europe, the justifications for Napoleon’s rule are inherently contradictory, and this is why Napoleon’s legacy remains hotly contested over two centuries later. For as much as he liberated Europe from feudalism, his own streak of autocracy (especially in the brutal Peninsular War that isn’t shown in the film) arguably shows that his primary objective was more for self-gain than for the benefit of others.
Yet, the sense that the film is unfinished may be addressed in a future cut of the film. Scott has stated that he is in the process of developing a 4 hour-long director’s cut of Napoleon to be released on Apple TV+. It will be interesting to see if the topics of family intrigue, the decline of revolutionary fervor, and the more liberal elements of Napoleon’s rule will be explored in more depth in this cut, although Scott has already claimed it will aim to provide more of Joséphine’s perspective of historical events. Scott is no stranger to director’s cuts either, having championed the film form as far back as re-cutting his 1982 film Blade Runner. Moreover, compared to his theatrical output, his director’s cuts have consistently won acclaim. This is especially notable for the director’s cut of Kingdom of Heaven, which, like Napoleon, is a historical epic drama, and is widely considered one of Scott’s finest films. As such, Scott himself will have a lot to live up to in this regard, but given the richness of the historical era, whether he succeeds will have less to do with the material he draws from and more how he chooses to depict that history.