"Gladiator II" won’t hit theaters until Nov. 22, but with every view of the trailer, we’re reminded why we want to rewatch director Ridley Scott’s original 2000 epic. The winner of five Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor, stars Russell Crowe as revered Roman General Maximus, whose refusal to support ruthless new emperor Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) should mean death — only Maximus secretly survives his ordered execution.
"Gladiator" is streaming on Prime Video
Enslaved as a nameless gladiator, he gets the chance to avenge his murdered wife and son when the games return to Rome. While Maximus wins over the Coliseum crowd with the blood on his sword and his command of his de facto men in arms, the battles are so visceral that some viewers may need to momentarily mute the Oscar-winning sound. But no one will be able to look away from the spectacle Scott creates with chains, chariots, and tigers. Once you regain your breath from the brutal but beautiful conclusion, here are seven more movies like "Gladiator" to entertain you.
'Ben-Hur'
William Wyler’s sweeping 1959 adaptation of Lew Wallace’s novel is tied for the most Oscar wins ever (11). In the Best Picture winner, proud Jewish prince Judah Ben-Hur (Charlton Heston) refuses to side with his childhood friend turned Roman tribune Messala (Stephen Boyd) — who eventually condemns Judah to row in the galleys and imprisons his mother and sister. After four years and an unlikely adult adoption by the Roman consul who turned him into a triumphant charioteer, Judah returns to Jerusalem to find his loved ones and exact revenge on Messala.
Cue the nine-minute chariot race that remains riveting 65 years later and a miracle ending that makes this one of our 7 best Easter movies, too.
'Braveheart'
“They may take our lives, but they'll never take our freedom!” Mel Gibson’s Oscar-winning tale of real Scottish hero William Wallace is one of the most stirring films of all time, even if it plays incredibly loose with history. In the movie, Wallace (Gibson) starts a rebellion against England’s King Edward I after his wife (Catherine McCormack’s Murron, who we get to know and mourn) is executed for defending herself. Just as Maximus had an ally in Commodus’s sister, Wallace receives helpful information — and sexual tension — from Longshanks’ daughter-in-law Princess Isabelle (Sophie Marceau). Unlike Maximus, when Wallace’s end comes, he can only mortally wound his enemy with a word: “Freedom!”
Wallace’s gut-wrenching fate is considered one of the more accurate scenes in the film. It’s excruciating to watch, impossible to forget, and a testament to how one change of expression on a face can offer the audience the slightest bit of comfort.
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'Spartacus'
It’s easy to see how Stanley Kubrick’s 1960 masterpiece influenced Ridley Scott. A slave named Spartacus (Kirk Douglas) is purchased to train as a gladiator. Soon, he’s a threat to an unhinged Roman power (Laurence Olivier’s Crassus) because of the loyalty he inspires from the men fighting beside him in — and later out of — the ring (“I’m Spartacus! I’m Spartacus! I’m Spartacus!”). Add in some delicious scheming from Crassus, slave trader Batiatus (Oscar-winning scene-stealer Peter Ustinov), and Crassus’s rival senator Gracchus (Charles Laughton), and, of course, large-scale carnage.
Still, what echoes most in "Gladiator" is the way Kubrick and Oscar-winning cinematographer Russell Metty make the expansive story painfully intimate. Just wait until Spartacus and Antoninus (Tony Curtis) are ordered to fight to the death. Steel yourself for the final moments, when the hero is granted a chance to see his beloved (Jean Simmons) and their child again in a different bittersweet way.
'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon'
“Awe-inspiring” is an overused adjective, but it’s 100 percent accurate to describe the gravity-defying fight scenes in Ang Lee’s 2000 Best Picture winner. Set in fantastical imperial China, the action tips off when the 400-year-old Green Destiny sword formerly wielded by warrior Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun-Fat) is stolen. Like trusted private security expert Yu Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh), Mu Bai’s unspoken love, we quickly realize the skilled masked thief is Jen (Zhang Ziyi), a governor’s daughter who longs for freedom and adventure rather than her impending arranged marriage. We gett to see those two women fly from rooftop to rooftop and wow with fast-paced fight choreography by "The Matrix’s" Yuen Woo-ping for the first time.
The feminist story is filled with romance and revenge as young Jen’s past and master come to light. Everyone has an idea of how she should spend her future. The decision builds to a final act that fans still debate the meaning of; tissues encouraged.
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'The Last of the Mohicans'
A ballet of vengeance and violence performed to a score as majestic as the frontier landscapes, Michael Mann’s 1992 adaptation of James Fenimore Cooper’s French and Indian War-set novel is a heart-pounding stunner. While British Redcoats escort their colonel’s daughters, Cora (Madeleine Stowe) and Alice (Jodhi May), to join him at Fort William Henry, their Huron guide Magua (Wes Studi) reveals he’s actually sided with the French to exact his own payback. Enter Hawkeye (Daniel Day-Lewis, at his absolute hottest) and his adopted Mohican father Chingachgook (Russell Means) and brother Uncas (Eric Schweig). They’ll have to stage more than one rescue before the film is through.
Like "Gladiator" the movie has lines we still quote today (“Stay alive, no matter occurs! I will find you!”), Oscar-winning sound, and a haunting climax. The cliffs and valley are the Coliseum. We are the weeping masses.
'Black Panther'
Ryan Coogler’s culture-shifting 2018 Best Picture nominee also has a power struggle at its core, it’s just over who should rule the nation of Wakanda: T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman), the titular hero and son of the slain king, or Killmonger (Michael B. Jordan), T'Challa’s long-lost cousin and former Navy SEAL who wants to realize his late father’s vision. On the throne, Killmonger would expose Wakanda’s covert technological prowess to the world — and use its hidden resource, Vibranium, to power weapons that could be used to fight oppression globally (and fall into the wrong hands).
You’ll feel like T’Challa is a gladiator when he faces challengers while temporarily stripped of his suit and superhuman strength. You’ll be fully immersed in Wakanda (the film’s costume design and art direction won Oscars, as did its score). You’ll note that the women — Lupita Nyong’o’s spy Nakia, Letitia Wright’s STEM princess Shuri, and Danai Gurira’s warrior Okoye — do more than sit on the sidelines.
"Black Panther" has a moving ending, but the real tearjerker, of course, is its 2022 sequel, "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever." It honors the late Boseman and earned Angela Bassett (as T’Challa’s mother, Queen Ramonda) the first acting Oscar nomination for a Marvel role.
Watch both films on Disney Plus
'Mad Max: Fury Road'
Did the wild disregard for human life shared by Commodus and the cheering Coliseum crowd give you an adrenaline rush? Then the inventive blood thirst in George Miller’s 2015 reboot of his seminal post-apocalyptic franchise will floor you. The plot is equally “good vs. evil:” War rig driver Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) stages an escape from water-hoarding Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne)’s Citadel with his five remaining wives in tow. The women are headed to “the Green Place,” where Furiosa was born, and end up reluctantly joining forces with lone wolf survivor Max (Tom Hardy). He’s a captive himself, strapped to the front of War Boy Nux’s (Nicholas Hoult) ride for a solid 13 minutes.
The movie, a nearly non-stop chase, won six Oscars (film editing, production design, costume design, sound editing, sound mixing, and makeup and hairstyling). Just when you think the practical high-octane stunts can’t get more outrageous, here come the Pole Cats — men swinging on humungous rods, bopping from one vehicle to another at speed. Max’s name is in the title, but Furiosa is the one who delivers the emotional punch in this never-say-die chapter. So much so that she earned a true origin story in 2024’s "Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga" starring Anya Taylor-Joy.
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