Napoléon (1927)

Best movie ever!

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

I've never felt compelled to write a review on here before, but have just enjoyed the fairly recently released four part, 5+ hour version of this film painstakingly restored by Kevin Brownlow and wanted to highlight what a revelation this was. As mentioned in a review by Quibble more than 10 years ago, this film has now had 90 years of pain to get where it is now, with different substandard restorations.I would urge any serious film fan to give this a look, even if they are not keen on silent movies, as I've never seen anything quite like this. From a technical point of view, it is full of features and processes that were years if not decades ahead of their time (handheld camera-work, multiple exposures, split screen, POV camera shots, widescreen etc.). It is the definition of a masterpiece from the director Abel Gance, and the central performance by Albert Dieudonne as Napoleon is captivating and powerful. The musical score by Carl Davis drives the story beautifully. I hope to one day get the chance to see this performed live as other reviewers have. Fantastic film- making.

Whilst the on-going scandal rages on about the rights of ownership of this supposed Masterpiece and without a proper DVD release available, there seems to be few options.Firstly, I'd never seen either the film, nor extracts from it, even. It is often cited as the best film made at that point (1927) and is truly Napoleonic in scale and ambition, using cutting edge film techniques that only a few Russian directors employed - and a bit later at that.There's an imported (Korean/Chinese) DVD that apparently is heavily compressed in order to fit 3.5 hours all onto one disc and so, subsequently, quality is rubbish. Or so reviewers have said - in fact the legalities and the quality (or lack of) is all they seem to carp on about.Having not being able to find even a Korean DVD, I found a secondhand NTSC video on a well-known auction site, which comes in two cassettes, each being just under 2 hrs and housed in an outer case. My old JVC VHS recorder, long disconnected, just so happens to play the U.S format NTSC videos as well as VHS, and so, I thought my bidding, whilst a gamble, might be worth it, if my machine could play it.It does. The picture quality is OK, never exactly sharp in detail but with good contrast and not as muddy as many Silent era film DVDs. You just see slight magenta and green bands where the tinting of the film is sepia, but that is well controlled and easily gotten used to. The stereo realisation of Caarmine Coppolla's new score sounds surprisingly good and full-bodied, for a video.So, this 'solution' may not be favourable or even possible for many but my £15 winning bid was worthwhile, in a roundabout way! And, of course, I get to see the Masterpiece in about the best from currently available. Better that than not at all, surely?

I thought I had entered a review, but I can not find it. . This movie came to Sacramento, California, as a premier in 1983 prior to my transferring to Germany. I do not know if it came with the new sound track, as I seem to recall that the piano down front was played, maybe only for the before the movie begins. I had difficulty with the costuming, as I was of the opinion that Josephine liked filmy dresses, so I thought the costuming was more 1890 than it should have been. But after watching the actors and actresses for a bit, the viewers get caught up into the beleiveability of each actor. One could only wonder what colorization would do for it. The final battle scenes were awe inspiring. The three screens tended to give a three dimensional effect, and let the audience be almost in the middle of the battle. As I recall in the write-up, the camera man tied his camera to a rope and spun it over his head, while on a horse to film those scenes. I do not understand why this film is not available to the public. I am unable to find a copy. Arne Sampe, Paul, Idaho,

Even though Abel Gance have made lots of innovating and masterful movies and I have the biggest respect for him and his movies, I'm not one of his biggest fans, mostly because his movies are extremely long but they are also really heavy to watch. "Napoléon" is however a great exception and is a very entertaining movie to watch, since there is always a lot happening and of course the actual story of Napoléon Bonaparte is an absolutely compelling and historically interesting one.The Napoléon Bonaparte has always captured the imagination of lots of people over the world, also that of film makers. Throughout the movie making history lots of version of the Napoléon story have been made, with also some well acclaimed actors in the lead roles. Still non of them really matches up to this extremely well constructed and shot movie.The movie begins at Napoléon's youth and end with his Italian Campaign. It showed how he gained all of its power, his most famous battles and actions till that point. But it most importantly shows Napoléon as a human, rather than a historical character, with family, friends. love and emotions. It therefor works also effective as a good biopic.The movie is filled with some early and multiple split-screen effects and other interesting and unusual movie making effects. Abel Gance much have really had fun experimenting with all those movie technique present in this movie. Of course the movie also features all of the usual ingredients such as the typical fast paced and cut together Gance style of editing. Further more the movie also features lost of moving camera-shots to enhance some of the sequences and its effect and to put us right into the action during some of the sequences. Even the snowball fight in the beginning of the movie with all the kids is spectacular to watch because of these movie-making techniques and approach. Visaully the movie is also great. They picked some nice scenery for the backdrops of this movie. And of course also all of the grand looking sets and consumes are fine looking and seem to be true to the era.If you can blame the movie for one thing is that it perhaps too much romanticizes elements and events and the actual character of Napoléon. They portray the character as a great national hero. But this is just the sort of stuff people wanted to see in movies. It would take lots of decades before actual 'true' and also criticizing biographic movies would be made. Also of course the movie is French, so who can really blame them for romanticizing their most famous and important citizen. This is a pretty nationalistic movie but it's not really that bad all, although Napoléon sailing with a French flag as a sail is perhaps a bit too over-the-top, unless this really occurred, which I highly doubt. The movie also only concentrates on the glory days of Napoléon, so no failed invasion of Russia or Waterloo in this one. And no exile and death on Saint-Helena. But after watching already this film for 4 hours, you don't really want to see all of those things anymore. Gance originally intended this movie to be the first part of a total of six movies concentrating on the life of Napoléon Bonaparte. Unfortunately he never raised the money to make the other movies. It's the reason why this movie still leaves a sort of an incomplete feeling.Still no other Napoléon movies is a real match to this movie.9/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/