Paul W. S. Anderson’s Pompeii begins with a Celtic rebellion in Great Britain which was quickly put down by the Roman Legions. Only one person survives, a little boy who wanders through the woods after seeing his family killed until he is enslaved. He emerges 17 years later in London as a feared gladiator. Known as the Celt, he emerges into the ring and kills 5 fearsome gladiators, while starting the match unarmed. The Celt is transported to Pompeii and on the way meets a nobleman’s daughter when he is tasked with putting her injured horse out of its misery. He displays his fighting skills among the rest of the gladiators when they attempt to kill him while he is eating a meal. The Celt refuses to reveal his name and is told he will be fighting the best gladiator in Pompeii. In the meanwhile, a Roman senator has come to express interest in investing in the city while also attempting to gather the nobleman’s daughter in marriage. The Celt realizes that the Roman senator was the one who killed his entire village and all his family. At a party celebrating investment in Pompeii’s future, the celt and the nobleman’s daughter run away on a horse after it gets startled by an earthquake. They are caught and the Celt is punished with 15 lashes but is also sanctioned to a new role in the gladiator festivities where he is supposed to die. However, he rises to the occasion and wins, breaking the Roman flag in half in the process. The senator is infuriated and orders the Celt killed but the volcano erupts which causes an earthquake and the colosseum falls apart, allowing the Celt to escape. The Senator also imprisons Cassia, the nobleman’s daughter, and kills her parents. The Celt frees her as fiery ash from the volcano rains down on the city. The city starts to flood from a tsunami and much of the city begins to fall into disarray. The senator recaptures Cassia and escapes on a chariot as the Celt gives chase on a horse. The Celt defeats the Senator in combat and locks him to a chariot to be consumed by the explosion. The Celt and Cassia ride away but the horse throws them off and they kiss before being engulfed in flames and memorialized in ash.

I felt that Pompeii, although cheesy, provided a great historical look at the city of Pompeii, the corruption of Roman Senators, and what it may have been like to experience being consumed by an exploding volcano. Pompeii uses a historical Roman conquest to fuel a love and revenge story, keeping the viewer on their toes while simultaneously giving a semi-historical representation. Perhaps it is the lack of knowledge from personal testimony that allows a director’s imagination to run wild on what the city was like that fateful day.

Over spring break, I chose to watch the movie Pompeii because I have always been a fan of disaster movies. This movie mainly takes place in 79 AD and is based on the eruption of Mount Vesuvius that destroyed the city of Pompeii. The film opens showing a tribe of Celtic horsemen being slaughtered by an army of Romans led by general Corvus in northern Britannia. A young boy, Milo, is the only survivor of the massacre and is eventually captured by slave traders. The next scene features a grown up Milo and it is evident that he has been trained in gladiator fighting. Known as the Celt, Milo performs well and is taken with other slaves to Pompeii. On the journey, a horse falls and injures itself while carrying Princess Cassia. Milo ends the horse’s suffering and it is obvious that Milo and Cassia are drawn to each other. Once he arrives in Pompeii, Milo is taken to the dungeons and befriends fellow gladiator, Atticus, who needs only one more victory in order to earn his freedom. The gladiators are then taken to a party, in which Corvus is in attendance. It is clear that Corvus wishes to marry Cassia.

At the party, Milo and Cassia are caught on a horse ride together and Corvus only spares Milo’s life at the request of Cassia, although he still receives fifteen lashes as punishment. The following day, the gladiators are chained and forced to fight dozens of Roman soldiers in the arena. Atticus and Milo survive, however, Cassia is forced to agree to marry Corvus during the battle. Shortly after, Mount Vesuvius begins to erupt, spewing ash and fire everywhere. In the chaos that ensues Milo finds Cassia and a tsunami forms, further devastating the city. Atticus finally reunites with Milo, while Cassia is captured by Corvus. In the midst of the eruption, Milo and Atticus fight a group of Roman soldiers as Corvus attempts to flee with Cassia. Milo saves Cassia from Corvus and the two try to escape to the hills. However, it soon becomes clear that they cannot outrun the destruction and Milo and Cassia die in each other’s arms as they are enveloped in fiery ash.

In this movie, it is evident that love cannot transcend such disasters, as none of the characters manage to escape the destruction of Mount Vesuvius. Pompeii lacked an original plot and there was minimal character development. Although I started this movie with low expectations, somehow I was still disappointed with this disaster film. Of all of the disaster movies I have seen, this one was probably the worst. The three natural disasters that ravaged Pompeii and intense fight scenes did little to improve this cheesy romance and the film’s subpar acting. I would not recommend this movie to anyone, unless they are prepared to sit through two hours of an unsatisfactory and overplayed story of two unlikely, yet lovestruck characters.

Pompeii starts in  Britannia, where Tribune Corvus killed all of the Celts. This does not seem accurate that Tributes could lead armies in the empire. A Celtic boy, later called The Celt, is enslaved as a gladiator. He is sent to Pompeii to fight. He meets the rich citizen love interest and ends a horse’s pain. Her roman house looks very similar to the one presented in class with a central courtyard with a fountain. The Celt wins a brawl. While sparring, the champion gladiator Atticus saves the Celt from being killed by the previous guy he brawled with. Severus, the love interest’s father, and a corrupt senator are doing a business deal. The Senator got mad about Severarus describing Emperor Titus as the new emperor. This is a reference to Roman’s dislike of new things. The love interest’s name is Cassia, and the Senator wants to marry her against her wishes. Vesuvius causes more and more earthquakes. The quaked scared Cassia’s horse, and The Celt calmed it down. Cassia wants to help the Celt escape, but he refuses to save her. The Celt finds out that Senator Corvus killed his family. As punishment for escaping, The Celt gets whipped, and Corvus plans for the Celt to die in the arena the next day. The Celt introduces himself to Atticus as Milo. The next day the proclaimers in the arena had masks on with the mouth to project sound. The arena reenacts the Celtic massacre. Corvus threatens Cassia’s father into agreeing to have Cassia marry him. After winning the battle, the crowd wants Atticus and Milo to live. This references to the court system where the people can save people. Milo fights the champion of Rome that helped kill his family. Vesuvius erupts, and the Arena breaks apart. Corvus kills Cassia’s dad. In the chaos, Milo and Atticus find Cassia and go to the arena for horses to escape. Corvus takes Cassia, and Milo follows him. Atticus fights the champion of Rome. Atticus dies and kills the champion of Rome. Milo kills Corvus by leaving him for the volcano. Milo and Cassia ride out of Pompeii. They kiss and then die.  Overall, this movie was less accurate in portraying Rome. It was more dramatized but still had accurate parts. It did a good job showing the reach of Rome of having similar gladiator pits in Britainia as Pompeii, and still, it being Rome across those distances. The movie does acknowledge that people of different social classes did not interact, however in real life, I doubt a gladiator and woman of a noble would form a relationship. They did show people being entertained by gladiators. The set design looked very realistic, specifically the roman house. It also accurately portrayed Pompeii since it was very destructive and few escaped. The movie also accurately portrayed the corruption that must have been prevalent in the senate and those in power. It also shows that Rome was brutal in putting down rebellions. 

The dying emperor’s son is Commodus, who wants to become emperor himself. Maximus wants to go home to his family, but the emperor plans to make Maximus, a respected general, emperor after he dies. The old emperor wants to bring Rome back to its true self. This is very Roman, where you need to go back to how things always were supposed to be like with the republic and two of the high officials like the two kings. Commodus is scared of Maximus’ possibility of being very political with an army behind him. Commodus kills his father, removes Maximus, and then kills Maximus’ family. Maximus escapes and goes home and sees his wife and son dead; he is captured and made a gladiator. Senator Gracchus tries to help Rome with its problems. This could reference the Grachi who wanted to help the people 200 years ago. Throughout this movie, characters mention that the senate is the people and the citizens are a mob. This is an interesting shift of SPQR where the Senate was not the people. Maximus is a great gladiator and is sent to Rome. In the colosseum, there is a reenactment of the battle of Carthage. The gladiators are Carthage and win due to Maximus’ strategy and command. In this way, Maximus was like Hannibal in directing incredible strategies to kill Romans. Maximus confronts the emperor and reveals himself. Commodus wants to kill him, but the people save them by chanting live. This is similar to when Romans can appeal their punishment to the people and possibly not be executed. Maximus wins against an undefeated champion and defies Commodus by sparing him. Maximus randomly comes across an old army friend. Maximus gets his friend to muster the Roman army and march on Rome after his ousting. This is very similar to Sulla, who marched on Rome with the loyal military when ousted from power. The escape attempt almost works, but Maximus is captured and is stabbed by Commodus to make it harder for him to fight.  Commodus and Maximus duel and Maximus kills  Commodus. This is a much better death than the usual punishment for patricide of being put in a sack with a dog, snake, rooster, and a monkey and thrown into a river. The movie ends with Maximus dying, having accomplished his revenge. This movie included many references to Roman history that we had learned about. Maximus was a hero because he had virtus and proved his worth on the battlefield, like the Horatti trial. Maximus was returning Rome to what it should be, a real Roman does, by giving the senate power again and removing the usurper. It also shows off the reason for the Roman fears of secrete meetings because, throughout the movie, there are secret plots to kill and change society. It seemed to accurately portray Rome through the values, sets, clothes, events, and people vying for power through various ways.

In Director Ridley Scott’s blockbuster movie, Gladiator, he chronicles fabled and fictional Roman General Maximus’s journey as a gladiator while also displaying many prominent aspects of the Roman government, social structure, and culture. After Maximus conquers the last of the rebellious Germanic tribes, he is greeted with great admiration by the Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Impressed by his general and in an aging state, Marcus Aurelius appoints Maximus as his successor over his own son, Commodus. Shown to be entitled and incompetent, Commodus is infuriated with this decision by his father, committing patricide in his rage and sending Marcus Aurelius to be executed. Marcus Aurelius heroically escapes his captors and heads to save his family in Spain but he is too late, finding them murdered by Praetorians. Maximus passes out and is enslaved by Proximo, a former gladiator who now buys and sells the fighters. Maximus soon emerges as his best fighter, winning over the local area’s fans and cementing himself as the man to beat. Proximo decides to bring his gladiator caravan to Rome, where they will have the opportunity to earn their freedom, as he did when he was granted it by Marcus Aurelius Their first competition is a reenactment of one of the battles of Carthage. They’re supposed to play the role of the losers, but end up destroying their competition under Maximus’s leadership. Commodus, who is at the games, is very impressed and goes down to meet the mysterious gladiator and then learns it is Maximus who he thought was dead. He can’t kill Maximus because he is a favorite of the crowd, so he sets him up for more and more challenging battles, hoping he will be killed. Maximus has pledged his revenge and works with Cicero and Commodus’s sister to round up a group to overthrow the evil emperor but this plot is thwarted by Commodus. Many of Maximus’s friends are killed or taken away, such as Proximo, Cicero, and Gracchus, and Maximus himself is recaptured while trying to escape. Commodus confronts Maximus and challenges him to a duel, but not before stabbing him so the odds are in his favor. Maximus eventually kills Commodus but also dies himself and the credits roll.

While the film mixes fact with fiction, it provides an interesting take on real events that occurred in the Roman empire. The viewer learns about culture and sport, as well as treachery in Roman bureaucracy while also following along with an animated storyline. The film leaves the viewer satisfied that justice has prevailed, while also leaving them wanting to learn more about Ancient Rome.