NAPOLEON 2023 // Trailer Review

So I have always been particularly fascinated by Empress Josephine (you might have been able to tell from one of my dear Hollywood posts see here) and I find her relationship with Napoleon to be a fascinatingly complex one (see here). The thing is I’m not necessarily a huge fan of Napoleon per se but I do find find him very interesting (and some of the personal anecdotes about him are HILARIOUS). When I watched the trailer, I decided I want to do a bit of a trailer reaction/review and give my thoughts. I will absolutely see the film – I see almost any historical film regardless of how infuriatingly historically accurate it is!! Also I’ve been expecting a big budget Napoleon film for a looooong time.

I am fairly certain Napoleon wasn’t in Paris when Marie Antoinette was executed, so he certainly wouldn’t have witnessed it. Also this execution isn’t historically accurate – her hair for example would have been cut and she wore white. Also there’s a defiance to this Marie Antoinette that there wasn’t necessarily in the real one; she’d been absolutely devastated by her husband’s execution and in the days afterwards, barely spoke and rarely ate. She became quite thin and pale and her hair went white from stress. When she was taken to the scaffold she actually apologised to the executioner after stepping on his foot. I get that they’re trying to show the utter chaos of Revolutionary France but if that’s the case where the hell is Robespierre?

This is supposed to be Paul François Jean Nicolas de Barras a Revolutionary politician who ended up becoming the leader of the Directory (the governing five-member committee that ruled France between 1795 and 1799); for starters he’s older than Napoleon by 14 years (he was born 1755, Napoleon was born 1769) so the fact Napoleon looks older here doesn’t take sense. Another tid-bit that they’ve missed is that Barras was knowing for being a snappy dresser – I’m not getting fashion icon from this look.

I’m going to state the obvious. Joaquin Phoenix is far too old to play Napoleon. I said this when the casting was announced and I had Joaquin Phoenix fans come @ me on Twitter. Let me just say I appreciate Joaquin Phoenix’ acting abilities and he would make a great Napoleon towards the end of his life (Phoenix is 48 whilst Napoleon died at 51) BUT when Napoleon begins his rise, he’s this awkward kid in his 20’s who doesn’t appear to have much gravitas and everyone kind of ignores him. Phoenix just doesn’t fit the bill, however I recognise the difficulty in covering a period that spans decades and keeping the same actor. I get it. It doesn’t work but I get it.

This is accurate; in his first major assignment in Paris in October 1795 he was tasked with dealing with the royalists that had declared a rebellion against the National Convention; Barras remembered him from the Siege of Toulon and gave him command of the forces that were defending the Convention at the Tuilleries. He ordered Joachim Murat (who I hope to God is in the film) to seize large cannons; Murat did and they used them to hit back at the rebels. This was on the 5th October 1795 (13 Vendémiaire An IV in the French Republican Calendar). Around 1,400 royalists died and 19th century historian Thomas Carlyle later wrote that Napoleon cleared the streets “with a whiff of grapeshot”.

A revolutionary party!!!! The Directory was a period of major partying; there was a real sense of thank fuck we survived. I appreciate the difference in costuming – there’s one guy that’s still wearing a powdered wig whilst other’s are letting their hair down literally. Also Napoleon standing awkwardly whilst everyone’s living it up is quite accurate.

Sighhhhhh. I love Vanessa Kirby and I do think she has the right look for Josephine and she’s a good age for how old Josephine was when they met (Vanessa Kirby is 35 whilst Josephine was 33). Solid casting….however. She’s 13 years younger than Joaquin Phoenix. Josephine was actually 6 years older. Their age gap was not only considered a bit scandalous but it also played a major role in their dynamic. She was far more experienced than him (in just about everything); she’d survived the tumult of the Revolution, she was a mother, a widow, her husband had been executed, she’d been imprisoned, she’d supposedly been the lover of a number of important revolutionary politicians and at this point she was considered one of the most prominent women in Paris (she was a member of the Merveilleuses who along with the Incroyables aka their male counterparts, were the leading members of an aristocratic subculture that emerged in Paris post the Reign of Terror; they were the leading figures of Parisian society and influenced the fashion, politics and art of the period). Like this woman had seen some things and lived a whole life pre-Napoleon whereas he was a young twenty something soldier with very little experience. And by experience I do mean sexual experience. Josephine had been around a little bit and it was a known fact in Paris (literally we have contemporary evidence) that she was EXCELLENT in bed. Napoleon’s sexual history on the other hand was to put it politely lacking. She was a real sexual awakening for him and that very much played into his obsession with her; it was also one of the reasons why no woman ever really lived up to her. If you want to portray Josephine and Napoleon right, the age gap is VITAL. They did likely meet at a party though – so this isn’t a historically inaccurate first meeting. I’ve seen some people being like wtf is with her hair? Well she was imprisoned and almost executed so she probably had her cut in prison awaiting her demise – also after the Reign of Terror during the early Directory era, lots of women cut their hair to imitate the women that had been imprisoned. Josephine and a number of those women including Thérésa Cabarrus, Madame Tallien (who is in the film but doesn’t appear in the trailer) became the style icons of the period. The choker around her throat for example – the fact she’s wearing one means this party is supposed to be one of the infamous “Bals des victimes” a series of balls that were allegedly held after the Reign of Terror; in order to be allowed into the ball, you had to be a close relative of someone who had been executed during the Terror. The women would apparently wear white dresses that either a) reflected the Greco-Roman style favoured by the Merveilleuses or b) were reminiscent of the white gowns worn by the likes of Marie Antoinette during their execution whilst they would also wear red ribbons around their necks as a way of paying tribute to those who had lost their lives to the guillotine – the red represented blood and the thin choker was the whole guillotine slice thing. There’s some debate over whether these balls even existed; David Bell concludeed that “the bals des victimes… never took place — they were an invention of early nineteenth-century Romantic authors”. For the purposes of this trailer, IF they were real then this is aspect is 100% accurate.

The voice over at this moment is Napoleon saying “I led the siege at Toulon”. Ummmmm no you didn’t. Napoleon was very much at the siege of Toulon and did play an important role; Barras remembered his heroics and summoned him to Paris afterwards to deal with the rebels. He wasn’t however in charge, he was too junior an officer at this point although considering how absolutely whipped Napoleon was from the minute he met Josephine its not outside the realm of possibility that he’s bragging to impress her (she however was probably Barras’ mistress at this point so she’d likely have known to the truth) . I do appreciate the visuals of this battle and I am looking forward to seeing them re-create some of the main battles of the Revolutionary/Napoleonic war period.

So we’re getting the Egyptian campaign. If we’re getting the Egyptian campaign, I want to see his brothers (who are in the film) being absolute shits trying to ruin Napoleon and Josephine’s marriage which is what they basically did throughout the entirety of the campaign. Also Josephine’s son was in Egypt with Napoleon as was Jean Lambert Tallien so I hope we see them; Napoleon and her children actually grew very close so I’m looking forward to seeing some step-father/step-children bonding. The Egyptian campaign and all the marital shenanigans that took place was vital to the dynamic of the latter part of their marriage. I’d like to point out there’s no solid proof that she had an affair with Hippolyte Charles in this period (other than the fact the man gave her a puppy but that is not convincing evidence; also Hippolyte Charles was potentially gay); considering some of the things Ridley Scott has said about Josephine in press for this film, we are probably going to get a “Josephine was an unfaithful wife who drove her husband to tyranny” portrayal; I do hope there’s some nuance though, I mean in this period she was also writing to Barras shit like “I desire nothing more than to see Bonaparte again” which to me, call me crazy, doesn’t sound like a woman who is ambivalent on her husband and is sleeping with every Tom, Dick and Harry in Paris.

The voice over is him saying “I’m destined for greatness” so they’re certainly getting his megalomania and staggering self confidence correct. I think this is meant to be representing some of the famous cavalry charges of the era; it looks amazing but Napoleon didn’t lead cavalry charges, that was usually the aforementioned Murat (who was a marshal aka the highest rank in the military below Commander in Chief). I really hope we get to see as many of the marshals portrayed as possible (they were a group of absolutely maniacal idiots who were chaos personified) – Berthier is almost a guarantee (he was Napoleon’s chief of staff, was in charge of the administrative side of the army and was absolutely vital to Napoleon’s success. His mistress later wife was also besties with Josephine and there’s letters between him and Josephine where he’s evidently acting as mediator telling Josephine that Napoleon worships her and keeping her in the know about all the goings on on campaign so he’s pretty key to both Napoleon’s political and personal life – he also point blank refused to manufacture evidence that Josephine was cheating) whilst out of the other marshals I’d LOVE to see Lannes (one of Napoleon’s best-friends), Murat (his brother in law) , Massena (usually ranked as one of Napoleon’s best generals), Bernadotte (an early rival of his who married Desiree Clary; Napoleon had actually been engaged to Desiree who was his brother Joseph’s sister in law, until he met Josephine, became completely obsessed and brutally dumped the very heartbroken Desiree who never forgave Josephine – he dumped her by ignoring her letters for ages and then abruptly announcing he’d fallen in love with and married someone else), Ney (one of Napoleon’s most loyal generals who Napoleon named “the bravest of the brave” – he married the best-friend of Napoleon’s step-daughter Hortense and after Napoleon’s fall from grace he was actually executed for his loyalty to Napoleon), Bessieres (another absolute ride or die for Napoleon) and Davout (who was arguably the best general of them all and whose very happy 2nd marriage allegedly came about due to Josephine and Napoleon’s matchmaking); I know Davout has been cast but I don’t know about the others.

Showing the military’s love for him is good; it was key to his rise to power and became a vital part of how he maintained that power.

Talleyrand!!! You can’t tell the story of Europe post the Revolution without this dude. I have to say the costumes look good – the red velvet that Napoleon’s wearing looks to be a pretty good replica of the uniform Napoleon adopted as First Consul (see here) and Talleyrand’s looks expensive without looking too gaudy. He’s also age appropriate for the time (Talleyrand was born in 1754).

This appears to be the coup against the Directory in 1799 that brings Napoleon into power. One thing I’d really like to see about the coup is Josephine’s involvement. There’s not a ton of contemporary reports on how involved she was but General Segur who admittedly wasn’t part of the coup but in the years afterwards knew those that were, wrote that “Josephine was in on the secret. Nothing was concealed from her. In every conference at which she was present her discretion, gentleness, grace and the ready ingenuity of her delicate and cool intelligence were of great service. She justified Bonaparte’s confidence in her”. The two most important members of the Directory were Barras and Gohier – she had been lovers with Barras and was friends with Gohier and his wife; we believe in the run up to the coup her job was to make sure they a) didn’t find out and b) keep them distracted. She was a major political player and if the film is going to truly show his rise through the lens of their relationship (which was how Ridley Scott’s described the film) then they absolutely need to acknowledge that.

Ah the coronation. This is a very important moment so it’s no surprise they’re showing it. Most monarchs are obviously crowned by a member of the clergy and Napoleon demanded to be crowned by the Pope – at the last minute he took the crown from the Pope’s hands and crowned himself. It says a lot abut Napoleon’s character so they couldn’t really cut it out. I’m interested to see if they include the pre-coronation Josephine/Pope situation – basically just before the coronation Josephine told the Pope that their marriage had been a civil ceremony and that there had been no religious ceremony (they had been married in 1796 when religious services were still banned). The Pope was aghast at the idea of crowning an Empress that was not married to her husband in the eyes of God so he demanded Napoleon and Josephine re-marry and basically threatened not to crown Napoleon was not impressed. This was literally right before the coronation.

Costumes look fab – the whole set up looks very accurate included the dignitaries, the clergy, the marshals and the procession.

Josephine looks perfect although a bit too young (Josephine at this point would have been 40); the costume looks good especially the ruff which was inspired by the styles of Marie de Medici. A really phenomenal amount of thinking went into the planning of the coronation in regards to what periods of French history to highlight and draw inspiration from and what traditions from the Ancien Regime should be kept. Josephine’s gown was a big part of that. I enjoy the women behind her – considering how much of his life they’re covering I doubt they’ll be able to focus on the family dynamics but I would like to see how deeply unhappy his sisters were at having to carry Josephine’s train and how pissed they were she was even crowned whilst they were not given the title of Princess. Josephine played an unusually large role in the coronation so I think that needs to be highlighted; usually in coronations where the monarch and consort are crowned in the same ceremony, the monarch is anointed, invested with regalia, crowned and enthroned first, before the consort who is then anointed, invested with regalia, crowned and enthroned second (usually in a simplified manner). Napoleon and Josephine were unique in the history of coronations in that they were anointed, invested with regalia, crowned and enthroned together, like a proper partnership.

Another battle although I’m not 100% sure which one this is supposed to be. There’s a British flag after this so that tbh doesn’t massively narrow it down. My guess would be Austerlitz.

The famous infantry square. This was used by Napoleon in a number of battles; my instinct is to guess this is supposed to be Waterloo which is the most famous battle where this particular formation was used but I can’t see any British flags so it might not be Waterloo. There’s only so many battles you can show so they’re going to have to narrow it down – we’re likely to see Waterloo and having seen the pyramids earlier on we’re likely to see the Battle of the Pyramids. I’m 99% are we’re going to see Austerlitz which was known as the Battle of the Three Emperors and was one of his greatest victories; Marengo, Trafalgar, Jena-Auerstadt and Borodino are probably the most likely battles to make an appearance.

This I’m 99% sure is Moscow so I’m guessing this is in the latter half of the film. I’m guessing Russia because a) Napoleon didn’t traditionaly go to big European cities and set them on fire, b) the rounded architecture in the background is very Orthodox and therefore probably Russian and c) Moscow burning is a pretty big moment in the Napoloenic era. It is interesting to me they’re trying to fit everything from the Siege of Toulon to Moscow burning in the same film; a series would have been much better in terms of spacing everything out and including all the nitty gritty details of Napoleon’s frankly bat shit insane life.

This a complete guess on my part but I’m thinking this could possibly be the meeting between Napoleon and Tsar Alexander of Russia – the figure in the foreground might be Napoleon but I think he looks too tall to be Napoleon and there’s someone riding towards him wearing the same hat – this could be Napoleon. Or alternatively I’ve over-thought this completely and this is merely a random moment in an army camp.

My first thought is that this is the Duke of Wellington however Rupert Everett famously played the Prince of Wales (albeit a younger version in The Madness of King George) so I suppose it’s possible he could be reprising his role. It’s definitely someone from Britain though – you can tell by the star on his jacket – you can make out a Union Jack. My bet is on Wellington (the official casting for the film hasn’t specified Everett’s role annoyingly).

Napoleon was obsessed with Josephine and some of their letters were very sexual; they evidently had a very active sex life and so them getting down to business under a dining table, is not absurd. There’s another scene in the trailer where they’re in their bedroom; he’s wearing his consul uniform and she looks younger in both that scene and this one so I’m guessing these scenes are from the happier-earlier phase of their marriage (before power and empire and meglomania and a need for an heir ruined everything) in which case yes they would have been 100% all over each other.

I love this so much; if you really want to get the Napoleon and Josephine relationship right, you need all to get all the myriad of complexities. One of these complexities was that they were a true partnership; especially at the beginning, and a big part of his PR campaign revolved around Josephine. You see Josephine was a pretty unique, dynamic figure. She represented so many things to so many people and had been a prominent member of society through everything; from the Revolution to the Directory to the Consulship to the Empire. She was a constant and thus I think a unifying figure. As Eleanor P Delorme notes “Josephine’s presence among the people is well documented as a stabilising, reassuring authority during times of public stress”. The aristocracy trusted her, the political elite respected her and the French people ADORED her. As Napoleon himself said, “I win the battles, Josephine wins the hearts”.

So I’m torn on this because on the other hand she’s a 100% correct; he was kind of no-one when they met; she was the one with the connections and the relationships – she was the one that was tied to some of the most powerful people in the country, had a seemingly never ending supply of charisma and she was already an immensely popular figure amongst the public. She was invaluable to him. Literally the the greatest asset. On the other hand, would she have ever actually told him this? At the beginning o f their marriage probably not (I’m not sure his ego could have taken it) but towards the end when things were very messy and very complex and quite unhealthy then yes probably. Also I love that the only reference of his height in the trailer comes from her – firstly he wasn’t as small as people make out. He was about 5’7 which although considered small for a man today, was bang on average in 1700-1800’s Europe. If it was something he was insecure about however then the dig coming from her is quite rich in terms of their dynamic – she knows his weaknesses, she knows his insecurities and isn’t afraid to use them agains him. They know each other so deeply but that also means they really know how to hurt each other. It’s an example of the idea that the people who you love you most are also the people capable of hurting you most.

I see marshals!!! I love his marshals as I’ve made abundantly clear. They were massive personalities and some of the stories about them are so funny. I would kill to see some of the complicated and interesting dynamics between them. I will take as many scenes with the marshals as I can.

This is Russia by the looks of it so towards the end and really where everything falls apart.

This is obviously incredibly striking visually but I also like it because it looks like the films really going to recognise how brutal the Revolutionary-Napoleonic wars were; it was basically two decades of near constant warfare between 1793 and 1815. The death toll was horrific and its one of the deadliest periods in European history. A film about Napoleon should acknowledge that fact.

See he looks SO good as older Napoleon. It’s younger Napoleon that he doesn’t fit.

I’d also like to comment on some of the commentary that I’ve seen about the posters tagline; in particular the line “he came from nothing”. I’ve even seen a comparison between him and Queen Victoria which is odd; no he technically did not come from nothing but compared to her he kind of did. Napoleon was descended from Tuscan and Genoese nobility (and there were a number of early members of the Buonaparte family that worked for and were loyal to the Medici’s – I think he’s descended from them), and his father was the Corsican envoy at the court of Louis XVI (his uncle was also a cardinal) so he did come carrying from a family of some distinction BUT they didn’t have significant wealth and he had absolutely no claim to the throne whatsoever. I mean the brothers of the last king were still swanning around Europe with actual claims to the throne. Everyone in Europe was a bit like wtf who this odd man that’s somehow taken over France? To be honest he kind of did come from nowhere in the sense of him being a low ranking soldier at the early end of the revolution who had absolutely no importance (literally when he arrived in Paris, no-one knew bar a few people like Barras knew him) but running the country at the end as Consul for Life, not to mention crowning himself an emperor a number of years later, feared by pretty much the entirety of Europe. Not Napoleon’s biggest fan but that is an extraordinary rise by anyone’s standards.

So there it is! My review of the trailer for Napoleon (2023). I’ll be back with another post soon!

Alexandra