![]() Liberties were taken with our touchstone myths – The Iliad, Beowulf. Sadly, as the decade limped along, films of this emotionally nutritious nature started to stray from these hallowed principles. ![]() Because that's the way we do things around here. But when push came to shove, when the flickering embers of liberty were about to be extinguished forever, we all knew that a hell-for-leather hero like Russell Crowe would arise out of nowhere and get western civilisation back on track. Sure, we've had our share of rough times down through the centuries, and sure, we occasionally got suckered into playing ball with the occasional no-good mass murderer. Gladiator was the kind of movie you could enjoy, even if it could have done without all that Enya keening, but it was also the kind of movie that made you feel good about western civilisation. Commodus, history tells us, was in fact a vogueing headcase who liked to dress up as a gladiator, to no great effect. Yet the thing I liked most about Ridley Scott's superb film was how closely it hewed to the historical record, in its portrayal of Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) as the depraved son of Marcus Aurelius, the zany old philosopher king himself. Augustus Caesar would have been proud of it. It was a sweeping epic with a computer-generated cast of thousands. It had everything you could want in a movie: glory, gore, guts, gladiators. When I saw Gladiator in 2000, I thought this was going to be just the best millennium ever. A shouting, fighting King Leonidas would certainly have made the Jennifer Anison vehicle The Bounty Hunter a lot more interesting.When I think back on this decade's spate of movies based on the great legends of European history, I remember how fantastically it started – with Gladiator – and how badly things went downhill after that: with Kingdom of Heaven, Troy, 300 and Beowulf. The actor plays the part so well, in fact, that perhaps he should have just played the same character across all of his movies. The historical epic 300 was a massive moment in Gerard Butler's career, pushing him into the A-list and making him a bonafide action hero. The International Olympic Committee has said that it'd like the worldwide event to still happen, even if it's held without spectators with the committee having asked the athletes to continue to train for their sports ahead of the summer games. The torch will continue its journey across the country through to March 19th and will end its journey in Athens on that date.ĭue to the ongoing issues surrounding coronavirus, the Olympic games could potentially face cancellation this year. Gerard Butler was invited to carry the Olympic torch from Mystras, Greece to Sparta. It was an empowering speech that Leonidas himself surely would have been proud of. He talked about how people continue to look up to them as symbols of heroism and he has been profoundly changed by their courage. In the speech, Butler paid tribute to the historical legacy of the Spartans. Where better to belt out the line once more than in Sparta, standing underneath the statue of the king he portrayed in 300. It is by far the actor's most famous line of dialogue, and it is great to see him resurrect it for this speech, with the crowd obviously loving it. All done in super-slow-motion, of course. Proving in no uncertain terms that Gerard Butler does, indeed, still have it, the actor delivered the iconic line that his character screams at an invader before kicking him down an endless pit. I stand here as a man profoundly changed by your courage and your history. I stand on the ground of a thousand heroes. From Romans right up to modern times, the US special forces, across the world, when people look to heroism you Spartans set the standard. For a standard set so high that generations of warriors would follow it. "How can you make a movie that explains how the Spartan code became a byword, became synonymous for a way of life.
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