Ridley Scott does have a clear vision for Gladiator III and he has not been very discreet about that if I may say.
The visionary director has been hyping his new action epic sequel to give the competition a $60 million fighting chance at the box office this weekend. Scott, who will be 87 this coming week, already starts dreaming of a return to the arena — and not to wait twenty years as this time.
The film Gladiator II concludes with Paul Mescal as Lucius having an army and triumphing over the evil Macrinus (Denzel Washington) as a result of murdering the two Emperors Geta and Caracalla (Joseph Quinn and Fred Hechinger). The ending enables the overtired Lucius to grab power for himself successfully.
That’s what Scott states, the sequel in his opinion will follow that and take the hint from The Godfather Part II where Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) is now the rightful boss of the criminal underworld and has to contemplate whether or not the ends justify the means.
But there’s already an idea, Scott said to the Hollywood Reporter. Which is funny because then I always had this idea that The Godfather ends with Michael not wanting the job. He sits there, and there’s this push-in on Al: Well, he has received his hand kiss. He has given the opposite of what he said to his wife. Lucius, isn’t quite that evil at all. He’s saying ‘Father, Father, what do I do’ That would be where the fact that Paul does not want the job comes in.
To Premiere magazine Scott said that the next [film] will be about a man who doesn’t want to be where he is. He also had time to tell Total Film, “I’ve already got eight pages. I’ve got the beginning of a very good footprint,” he said, before stating, “If there’s a Gladiator 3, I don’t think you’d ever go back into the arena. But I had to return to the ring…”
Of course, any movie called Gladiator somehow has to figure out a way to return its hero to the arena. Despite a promotion to the Emperor position, it wouldn’t stop the first film’s Commodus, Joaquin Phoenix, from entering the arena later.
For his part, Mescal has said he’s extremely willing to take on the role a second time “Oh yeah, massively down,” the actor said to Variety. “Oh come on now stop it! Did you really say that it won’t be [24] years now do you know when it will be?”
He also suggested that interest which first film’s Emperor Marcus Aurelius, performed by Richard Harris, can be considered as interesting point for creation of the film about becoming of Lucius.
To be more precise, even though Scott does not develop the character particularly negatively in the second movie – he portrays the figure rather benignly in the first film – and even though the writings of Aurelius, which emphasize stoic principles, are somewhat in vogue today, Scott appears to be rather cynically oriented toward the figure.
“Every demagogue today must be put into equation with [Aurelius] he said.” “And I think he did feel ashamed of what he had done — that is why he wrote his Meditations.”
A sequel can’t happen too quickly though as the director is eyeing on starting the shooting of Bee Gees biopic sometime in early 2025.
But if recent years have proved anything, it’s that Scott is a very busy man and is certainly capable of moving from one project to another practically in a blink of an eye. For more on this, read the full interview with Scott on the Gladiator II, and his five-decade career in filmmaking, as well as The Hollywood Reporter’s feature story going even deeper into the making of the new film.
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