EXCLUSIVE:Ridley ScottunveilsNapoleontoday at a lavish world premiere in the 2,500-seat Salle Pleyel concert hall in Paris.
Hes got 90 minutes of footage, fully edited, and needs that much more.
Like the time we spoke forThe Martian.
Joaquin Phoenix in ‘Napoleon’Sony Pictures/Apple Original Films
He wanted to go to space, and that led toAlien.
Scott is also quite honest about the slings and arrows accumulated along the way.
RIDLEY SCOTT: Couple weeks.
Thank God its over.
We shot about 90 minutes, at least thats finished.
Its really getting the sets cleaned up; theyre already built.
I got another 90 minutes to go.
DEADLINE:Presumably you couldnt talk with your actors during the strike.
How did you protect against the possibility your gladiators have porked up over the last half-year?
SCOTT: None of my guys do that.Paul Mescalis really very fit and stays that way.
I havent seen the other ones yet, so I hope theyre not porked up.
DEADLINE:I have heardDenzel Washingtonhas been working out hard.
You had him in a badass turn inAmerican Gangster….
SCOTT: That is his thing.
I think its his manner, and obviously hes actually in a bad mood.
I think its just the way he is.
He tends to be abrupt.
You got to get used to that.
But nevertheless, hes quite charming
DEADLINE:You dont seem comfortable at sitting around.
What did you do the last half year?
SCOTT: I prepped the film afterGladiator.
I have a script finished to the extent that weve already pitched to studios and Ive already recced it.
I used time out to find out where Im going to do it.
DEADLINE:Youve told me2001: A Space Odysseywas a big influence on your filmAlien.
Kubrick finished that movie and spent two years trying to make a Napoleon movie.
He eventually dropped it forA Clockwork Orange.
How did you pull it off when he could not?
SCOTT: Mine has nothing to do with Stanley.
Ive always admired the French way of life.
It was called St. Tropez, about 20 years before Bridget Bardot.
So Ive never forgotten the French summers.
I got deeper and deeper into the French history and their national awareness of who and what they are.
My first film was about Napoleon Bonaparte, even though he wasnt in it.
It won a prize at Cannes, and from that was the kickstart to my career.
That always stayed with me.
I was in a place called a beautiful area, in France, the Dordogne.
In that time, I thought, let me do the greatest Frenchmen in history called Napoleon Bonaparte.
DEADLINE:Your Napoleon,Joaquin Phoenix, was quoted likening Napoleon to Hitler and Stalin.
Napoleon spilled a lot of blood on the battlefield, but there isnt a record of genocide.
Do you agree with his assessment?
I started with Charlemagne, and Alexander the Great, and Marcus Aurelius.
If you dont think there was mass killing, youre naive.
So any great leader is going to be involved in killing.
There are 400 books on Napoleon.
People say, which book do you read?
I said, are you kidding?
I as a child looked at pictures.
When you look at [Jacques-Louis] David, some of the paintings done of Napoleon at the time.
So the 400 books are reports on report, on report.
When probably only the original made sense, maybe written 15 years after Napoleons death.
So by the time you get to the 399th book, youve got quite a lot of inaccuracy.
DEADLINE:Joaquin played your villain inGladiator, and then he went on to win an Oscar playing Joker.
What made you see him as your Napoleon?
SCOTT: Im going to correct you.
I saw him as the most sympathetic character of all, inGladiator.
He was a product of neglect, total neglect of a father that he adored.
Then finally in the film, the father would say, Im going to neglect you even further.
You will not be the prince of Rome.
And then the father realizes in his old age that he needs some form of absolute.
So he does something fatal.
He kneels before the boy asking for forgiveness.
That was fatal because the boy has never seen his father ask for that kind of close discussion.
So he suffocates him.
So from that moment on, I thought Joaquin was the most sympathetic person during the movie.
Marcus Aurelius could not have taken Europe through a benevolence.
Its going to be war and steel, and many deaths and devastation.
None of what happened was benevolent, right?
But I think with age Marcus Aurelius felt his own fragility.
Commodus was the neglected son, the product of complete neglect.
And then to be told, you cant follow me, and here is who will take my place?
That is more than a slap in the head.
And in those days, particularly when succession was so righteous and expected… Dont forget, Maximus is the person who didnt want it.
He wanted to go home.
I cant do that.
Because my home, my wife, our kid.
Tell me about your home.
So then he start telling him about it, and what hes actually talking about is heaven.
Thats where he wants to be.
And so it all worked backwards and some of it wasnt planned.
Marcus says, it sounds like a place worth fighting for.
And then Marcus is that day assassinated by his son.
DEADLINE:With that indelible image of the hand of Maximus, gently touching the field of wheat.
How did you come upon that?
SCOTT:Honestly, no.
I shot that hand it was the last shot of principal photography.
Russell didnt come to Italy, it was his double.
The guy was standing there in this field, smoking.
I go, get out of the field, are you joking?
It was mid-summer, dry.
He says, Oh, sorry man.
He walked out [off the field], and did that thing with the hand.
I said, Stop right there.
SCOTT: We followed the hand, no kidding.
It became the catalyst for immortality, or heaven if you like, right there.
It was discovered the last day, spontaneously.
I consider spontaneity to be essential to what I do, youve always got to be watching.
Thats not on paper.
And so suddenly that becomes the editing room and then the theme happens.
The theme is magic, and the hand is magic.
Russell didnt come to Italy, thats his double.
He said, youll never use that.
I said, I will.
When he saw the scene, he groaned.
I said, too late, Its shot.
I got it, mate.
It was, put out that cigarette and get the Steadicam.
And dont walk on the wheat.
DEADLINE:Your movies often get sequels, some youve directed and some not.
What here interested you enough to directGladiator 2?
SCOTT: Well, economically, it makes sense.
That always begins there.
But these cycles keeps going on and on and on, they repeat globally for the last 20 years.
It started to spell itself out as an obvious thing to do, and thats how it evolved.
The hardest thing is getting the footprint right with the writer.
There was a very obvious way to go, which was whos the survivor?
Whatever happened to him?
It became about that, and thats Paul Mescal.
Its 20 years on.
That was harder than casting Russell as Maximus, that was more obvious.
DEADLINE:Once you see Russell play that cop inL.A.
Confidential, you could see he had the charisma and authority to play Maximus.
What about Paul Mescal?
SCOTT:Im always looking for someone, something new and fresh.
I mean, fresh is terribly important.
I watched this show calledNormal People.
Its unusual for me, but I saw one and thought, thats interesting.
These actors are really good I watched the whole goddamn show and thought, damn.
And I just said, you want to do it?
He said, yeah.
He was about to doStreetcar Named Desirein London.
DEADLINE:What about Denzel?
They wouldnt drink water, they drank wine.
When they traveled, who would supply wagons and horses and tack?
His hobby is like a racing stable except its gladiators.
Hes got a stable of 30 or 40 gladiators.
He likes to actually see them fight and it evolves that thats where he came from.
He was captured in North Africa, and evolved into a free man because he was a good gladiator.
But he hides that because also hes now realizing the potential of his actual power.
SCOTT: Im thinking, who can Napoleon be?
Joaquin looks like Napoleon.
I didnt say that to him, I didnt want to make him feel too important.
I was blown away by his outrageous performance as Joker.
I didnt like the way the film condoned violence, celebrated violence.
I didnt like that.
Napoleon, Im also thinking commercial.
How long did all this take?
SCOTT: I shot it in 62 days.
So youre scheduling a scene for the day, and Ill be finished at 11 oclock.
DEADLINE:The biggest challenge to working that quickly?
SCOTT: Every department has to keep up with the speed that I work.
I got that early on.
He said, I love two takes.
That hand in hand with using many cameras.
You have to know what you are going to do next, and know the geometry of the scene.
If you dont, itll be 3 oclock before your first shot.
Thats not a good idea.
In your deal with Apple, you will put out a long version ofNapoleon.
Most directors will do it once, at usually longer length.
Something else comes in to that equation, which I put under the heading of the bum ache factor.
Three and a half or four hours?
It has to be awfully good for you to tolerate three and a half hours.
Inevitably the large part of the audience are not going to go for that.
And that will get around.
So youll pay the price, when your movie peters out more quickly.
it’s possible for you to sit there for two hours and 23 minutes.
Your first assemblage is 4 hours, 15 minutes.
Can I get stuff out of that easy?
So that took that whole story sideways, and ate up 17 minutes of the movie.
But to me, it just made the movie more meaty.
And I removed it to get the story flying, and I regret it.
But now I watch it and I think, wow, thats good.
DEADLINE:Theatrical release, big budget, and then your long cut on Apple TV+.
Is this how streaming logically fits into moviemaking for artists like yourself?
Its a visual book, and people watch this visual book every night.
I do need the cinema, and theres been a move back to that.
Then it’s possible for you to always stream later.
Its a perfect double whammy for the business, for their business.
Its better than isolating your movie only to streaming.
That never made sense.
The box office was shaken withTop GunandAvatar.
Theres no way that gross could ever have ever been equalized on the push button thing.
They claim they dont know.
Of course they know.
Every time anyone press a button.
They also know when you switch off.
He got the return.
DEADLINE:He projected Robert Oppenheimer as a real Prometheus.
But it could have ended the world too.
And who is going to be stupid enough to press the button?
DEADLINE:The evolution of Napoleon is fascinating.
Starts out this ruffian with superior war skills who becomes savior to France.
But when his obsession with conquering Russia to find peace fails, the French make him a pariah.
Why didnt Napoleon succeed there?
SCOTT: He misjudged.
Hitler should have crossed the channel when he was there, and bizarrely he didnt.
Ive heard that Hitler didnt cross the channel because he was very much guided by a spiritual entity.
A person who was fundamentally stupid, said, dont cross water in September.
Napoleon went for Russia bizarrely way too late in the year and it deteriorated into a disaster.
But he stayed there too long, and in that extra six weeks, midsummer just disappears.
And he misjudged it terribly.
But taking Russia was personal, an ego trip.
I can do anything.
He knew what the Russian winter could do, but he didnt want to face it.
Now that becomes the danger for somebody like that.
He can attain anything, just by his will.
To him, it was the ultimate act of courage and ferocity.
They were constantly hit by Russians and Cossacks who could live off the land.
Theyd eat a wolf, theyd eat each other.
He took out 600,000 men.
I think they returned with 40,000.
That is a massive, massive loss.
That Russian trip was a fucking disaster.
So he had to be taken away and sent away.
Its kind of like America, right now.
DEADLINE:What do you mean?
I dont want to go deeper into that then that, but he thinks hes invincible.
Hopefully, hes not.
DEADLINE:Josephine was his obsession, he craved her as much as taking ground in Europe.
Then he more or less exiles her because she cant provide an heir for him?
Once she was gone, it was like hed lost his North star.
Would he have escalated his campaign in Russia if she was still in his life?
She was his Maximus in heaven end, but he went too far and failed.
For Josephine, there was safety and some power, being at Napoleons side.
Did she love him?
SCOTT: I think she was always becoming an influence on him, I think.
Did she love him initially?
I dont think so.
She thinks shes going to be cast out and shes not.
She walks away with an estate, two million francs, and Ill visit you went I can.
She could not see other men.
SCOTT: you’ve got the option to feel it.
If she could smooth out this mans ruffian ways, she could be back in high society.
How long could that last?
It could lasted for as long as she was entertaining, put it that way.
Was she good in the bedroom?
Would he have ever experienced anything like that?
She was a very smart woman.
I think she was particularly beautiful, but very imposing, physically imposing and powerful.
Is that next to fondness?
Is that next to the possibility of love?
Are you going to give me a child?
DEADLINE:Sulfur and arsenic?
SCOTT: Oh yeah.
The abortion kit would be sulfur and arsenic.
There was no real contraception.
So women then would adopt methods invented by doctors as to abort.
Can you imagine how scary that was?
Will this continued push into AI make that unnecessary.
Many look at AI as a threat though.
How do you see it?
SCOTT: Youre talking about artificial intelligence as opposed to digital.
On artificial intelligence, I hit on two very important AI characters inAlien.
There was Ash; having a robot on the ship in the form of a human being was genius.
Suddenly there was the shock of that, on top of the alien shock.
Itll decipher that in four minutes and then be ready to beat your ass.
But what a computer hasnt got is emotion.
And will that be the difference?
InBlade Runner, we had a computer, Roy Batty [played by Rutger Hauer] that had emotion.
Thats why he was angry; he was only given four years.
Thats where were going right now.
So Stanley was 40 years ahead of his game.
Mine were emulations of that, and not original.
We wouldnt have thought about that if it hadnt been for Stanley, I dont think.
Is AI something to be feared?
Thats a f*cking time … no, its a hydrogen bomb.
The world would close down if I switch it off, and we are all completely f*cked.
Were back to candles and matches.
Do you have candles and matches at home?
I live in France, so I do.
DEADLINE: Sounds like youve thought this through.
SCOTT: You know Im a dramatist, so I cant help myself.
Its not necessarily really happy.2001wasnt a happy ending.
I talked to Stanley twice.
First time, Id just doneAlien, and the office says, Stanley Kubrick is calling.
I said, holy f*ck.
He says, hi there.
Listen, I just watched your movie.
I need to ask you a question and Ill get straight to it.
How do you get that thing coming out of his goddamn chest?
He said, it scared the sh*t out of me.
That was the first exchange.
He said, I got you.
Next time, Id just finishedBlade Runner.
And the film is essentially a film noir.
He walks out, youre going to walk away with his love, and on the floor.
And theres this origami unicorn.
He picks it up and nods.
This is a confirmation that he may be a replicant.
He goes into the elevator and boom, finished.
They f*cking hated it.
They say, you cant do this.
Weve got to preview it again with a happy ending.
I said, why a happy ending?
They said, driving into mountains or something.
I go, what are you talking about?
Why would you live in a city if there was a mountain range just around the corner?
You go live in the fucking mountains.
They say, we need a preview with a happy ending.
You must have six weeks of helicopter footage in those mountains.
Can you let me borrow?
So Ive got 70 hours of footage the next day, and that footage went into the movie.
That was Stanley, that was his material.
DEADLINE: You mentioned the gladiators hand through the wheat field.
Did he believe in evil?
you might only imagine how Kubricks brain worked.
SCOTT: Kings book had a much darker and gloomy hotel.
The Boiler Room is a monster in the book.
All boiler rooms are scary as sh*t. Stanley chose deliberately to go very bright, very modern.
And I thought, why?
So immediately, it didnt work for me.
It made it an uphill battle on what was a very scary book.
He didnt really want to get into the shining, where Scatman Crothers says, you shine boy.
He didnt really use that enough.
He worked with Stanley four or five times.
DEADLINE:Ever figure out whyAlienso haunted Kubrick?
Id always admired Stanley, from when I was a designer.
I was a designer and after Royal College I got a job drawing storyboards.
I remember sneaking out at 2 oclock one Friday afternoon because2001was on just down the road, in 70mm.
The theater was empty.
But also it felt real because hed been working with some guys who had been associated with NASA.
The sets were spectacular.
I just thought that was incredibly perverse, marvelous idea.
So we jumped in later withAlien, and Ash became the humanized version of the box.
Wed almost worn out the creature, this marvelous beast that H.R.
You dont want to overuse that.
Its a bit like being prudent, and dont show the shark too often.
Its actually what were going to do today.
First guy on Mars is going to be worth a fortune, right?
DEADLINE:Had Kubrick seen his HAL in your Ash character?
SCOTT:Only when I told him.
You get two filmmakers together, they just open up and theres nothing pretentious in there whatsoever.
That continued when I had theBlade Runnerissue and they wanted a happy ending, and Stanley gave meThe Shiningfootage.
DEADLINE:They didnt ask you back for theAliensequel, which James Cameron directed.
Its very different, more of a roller-coaster ride.
As I learned somebody else was doing this, I actually had been trying to develop something.
Its hard to make him as frightening again, now familiar ground.
So he said, Im going in a more action, army kind of way.
I said, okay.
And thats the first time I actually thought, welcome to Hollywood.
DEADLINE:What was it like to learn about a sequel to your movie when your replacement calls you?
SCOTT: Jim and I talk often.
Were not exactly friends, but we do talk and hes a great guy.
DEADLINE:How did you feel after you hung up that time?
SCOTT: I was pissed.
I wouldnt tell that to Jim, but I think I was hurt.
I knew Id done something very special, a one-off really.
Which I thought I really got something pretty special, and then the previews were a disaster.
Somebody said, lets dig out the old print and run it for fun.
And they called Warners.
It was a cutting copy with partly Jerry Goldsmith on it, and partly my great musician on it.
So that got rediscovered.
It came right out like a cannon shot, and went everywhere.
And of course I know it.
I knew it then that it was a very special form of science fiction.
Now its copied again and again.
DEADLINE:But at the time Cameron called you, thats enough to rattle the confidence of anyone.
How did you get yours back?
What I decided to do was something that ironically Disney hadnt done at that point.
And of course, they do it now again and again, 25 years later.
Tim Curry playing the demon … it was a success for me, just great.
DEADLINE:Now youre not so easily wounded, but you just did a lengthy profile in theNew Yorker.
I saw the movie, and wasnt sure what the complaints were, beyond historical nitpicking.
Does the digital micromanagement trouble you?
SCOTT: Youve got three questions.
Its all internalized entertainment.
Theres this idolization of the superheroes, which really is just a comic strip extension.
And from that, its very difficult to write a comic-strip story and carry it out successfully on film.
That said, Im not a superhero fan, even though I used to love the comic strips.
DEADLINE:Every been offered one you were tempted to say yes to?
SCOTT: Yeah, been offered, but just said, no, thank you.
Ive done two or three superhero films.
I think Sigourney Weavers a superhero inAliens.
I thinkRussell Crowes a superhero inGladiator.
And Harrison Ford is the super anti-hero inBlade Runner.
The difference is, the f*cking stories are better.
Was the corpse a Pharaoh?
SCOTT: He wouldnt be Tutankhamun, maybe a less important Pharaoh.
I saw this wonderful two paintings.
One was of a man sitting on a horse staring at the Sphinx, and it was Napoleon.
They took it over pretty easily.
I think the Egyptians threw in the towel immediately.
I dont think theres even any conflict.
And so they were able to, lets say, enjoy themselves in Egypt at that particular point.
I thought, I just had to do it, it was such a beautiful counterpoint of two universes.
He wouldve to be important to being embalmed and actually buried in the casket like that.
And the Pharaoh suddenly slipped to one side and gave Joaquin a hell of a shock.
But I let it run.
I said, no, it was an accident.
It scared the sh*t out of him.
I said, no, no, no, I didnt do that.
SCOTT: Well, I couldnt quite work out whether it was an insult or a compliment.
But Ive got a lot of admiration for him, my goodness.
Youve got 50 years in the Senate and now the oddest tough circumstances.
DEADLINE:Still with thatNew Yorkerpiece.
You trotted out Pauline Kaels review to show the writer.
You got a very flattering profile.
SCOTT: Of course.
So Ive always thought of that as a nice warning bell.
MakingBlade Runnerin every possible shape and form was tough, the hardest experience Ive ever had in my life.
But because Im being so experienced in advertising, I gave as good as I got.
The guy read it and said, yes, she had this reputation of being pretty tough.
I said, tough.
She scalped me!.
And he said, yeah, okay, okay, okay.
What do you miss most?
Well, Ill go deeper and way back.
I was at a very good college, which didnt have a film school.
Royal College of Art was excellent, and I eased over to graphic design.
This would mean photography and doing.
I liked that idea of getting into that in the universe because the world is very attractive.
But my feeling was instead, I need to make a movie.
And I was so embarrassed about saying Id like to be a director.
It sounds so ridiculous.
I never admitted it.
I kind of want to make a movie.
And he said, well, you cant borrow it unless youve got a script.
I said, alright.
Went it back to him and he went, well, okay.
Bring it back undamaged and keep it clean.
Ive got dads car.
Were going to go to Harley for, Im going to shoot this movie.
And he went, oh no.
I said, yes, get out of bed.
So I give him money, hed go get the food.
But he was in the movie and we finished the film.
I edited it willy-nilly with great difficulty.
And its now in the archive of the British Film Institute.
But whats interesting is it really worked in 16 mm.
But the interesting was that Tony and I were creating a lifetime together without realizing it.
DEADLINE:How long did it take for that to change him?
SCOTT: Well, I made the cuts.
Hes six years younger than me.
Hes at this private school, and I said, come and have a look.
And he was stunned.
We had a story.
He was the person on screen.
He just followed me right through where my career took me.
He went to Leeds, our school, then he went to Royal College.
By then, theres a film school, and Tony made the best two student films Ive ever seen.
So that was it.
I miss him, and you are right.
We were very close.
Every climb a mountain with him again after that one?
SCOTT: Youre f*cking kidding?
But he would then move on to the Dolomites and then he would do El Capitan twice.
My outlet became tennis and he couldnt stand it.
I thrashed him at tennis and he couldnt take that.
He wouldnt play tennis.
I would never go on the El Capitan.
I said to him, youre f*cking joking.
Its a 4,000-foot vertical face.
DEADLINE:Your most recent films you made in close proximity,House of GucciandThe Last Duel.
Two fine ambitious movies released as the business was recovering from the pandemic.
Neither was a big hit.
SCOTT: Thats it.
I thought Id done something very special.
I knowBlade Runneris very special.
So many big ideas in there that now people feed off it constantly for other movies.
I was very happy with it.
Im not a person with a big head, conceited.
Im not like that.
I knew it was tricky, but I knew it was special, very special.
And she destroyed me, in four pages.
You could not ignore it, and so I was down for a while.
