Episode 140: Ridley Scott’s Napoleon

[00:00:00] Benjamin Wright: This is 15 Minute History, a podcast for educators, students, and anyone interested in history, featuring the minds and voices of the University of Texas at Austin.

In the year 2000, Ridley Scott and Joaquin Phoenix teamed up for the movie Gladiator. Phoenix played Emperor Commodus, son of Marcus Aurelius. It was a glorious action movie that was as wildly inaccurate as it was, well, wild. 20 years on, Scott and Phoenix have teamed up for another epic flick, with Phoenix again playing an Emperor, though this time a French rather than a Roman one.

And instead of Russell Crowe giving him trouble and beating him into submission, it’s Vanessa Kirby doling out the punishment as Josephine Bonaparte. The reception for Scott’s Napoleon has been mixed. While it’s enjoyed a good showing at the box office, critics point to its many inaccuracies. Not as many as Gladiator, but enough to prompt Scott to tell them to go get a life.

Today I’m joined by Professor Judith Coffin, the author of Sex, Love and Letters, writing Simone de Beauvoir. She also teaches a class here at UT Austin on the French Revolution, and another on sex and intimacy, themes that intermingle often in Scott’s new movie. In addition to having seen Napoleon, she’s assigned the film to her class.

Today, we discuss the film’s value for scholars, students, and history buffs everywhere. Judith, welcome to 15 Minute History. Thank you. It’s a pleasure. Well, let’s get straight to it. Uh, what was your initial impression of the movie? I assume you saw it last week? I

[00:01:44] Judith Coffin: saw it the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.

I put it on my syllabus. Oh, right. I’d been excited about it, I guess since last spring when a student told me that it was coming out. And I said, Oh, that’s perfect. We get to Napoleon in November. And I put it on my syllabus. I had the whole class go and we discussed it on Monday. So this is an undergraduate class.

This is an undergraduate class on the French Revolution and Napoleon. Great.

[00:02:10] Benjamin Wright: Oh, so yeah, perfect timing. You should talk to Ridley Scott more often.

[00:02:15] Judith Coffin: And I’m not going to be antagonized by Ridley Scott saying, you know, historians weren’t there and so they don’t know. And I also don’t want to be a historian picky, picky, picky.

This was, you know, a movie is a movie and it needs to, it needs to work as a movie. It’s not a

[00:02:30] Benjamin Wright: dissertation. Exactly.

[00:02:31] Judith Coffin: Thank goodness.

[00:02:33] Benjamin Wright: Um, well, um, what was, um, how did your class discussion go on Monday?

[00:02:38] Judith Coffin: Uh, it was good. I think the students were a little disappointed. Um, and, you know, I was, and I was too. There was so much, there’s so much hype, and there’s so much to do with Napoleon, and inevitably you can’t do it in what is, after all, a pretty short movie, um, given the length of, uh, the length of, uh, Most movies.

Right, right.

[00:03:01] Benjamin Wright: Right? Just Out of interest, you know, have you assigned films for classes for, uh, over the course of your career? Is it relatively new that you would assign a film?

[00:03:12] Judith Coffin: I do it all the time in my 20th century classes. It’s hard for the revolutionary period. Because the good films are really long. I would love to show Abel Gance’s 1927 silent film called Napoleon, which is five and a half hours long and only gets you to the Italian campaigns.

Um, but it’s fabulous. It’s completely, uh, it’s completely wonderful. If you find

[00:03:42] Benjamin Wright: assigning films to students, is this sort of ornamental or fundamental to how you teach? Oh, it’s

[00:03:47] Judith Coffin: fundamental. It’s fundamental because you ask them, I mean, I told them, the, the students on, on Monday, I mean, of course we’re concerned with historical accuracy, but we’re more interested in what the message is, in what we learn from looking at the details, um, in all of the things that a film can do that a lecture can’t.

Although I will say, When it comes to the revolution in Napoleon, I think fiction is better than film. Oh,

[00:04:18] Benjamin Wright: sort of as a form of historical fiction? As a form, yes, yes. Right. Interesting.

[00:04:23] Judith Coffin: We also, um, did about 50 pages of Tolstoy the week before we saw the Ridley Scott film. Oh, right.

[00:04:30] Benjamin Wright: Okay. So, obviously, when we review books as academics, we’re told not to review the book we would have liked to have been written.

I’m curious to know some of your students critiques of the film and what you thought was missed out that could have been maybe emphasized

[00:04:46] Judith Coffin: more. Well, there are a lot of important episodes that are missing. To begin with, the Italian campaigns, which really make his reputation. Um, the Haitian Revolution, which shakes the Americas, North and, uh, and South.

Uh, Spain, Which is so important, the failed intervention in Spain, which also has repercussions and creates all the Latin American revolutions. But I don’t see how he could have done all of, I don’t see how you do all of that without it becoming, you know, 10 or 15, uh, 10 or 15 hours long. So, um, one student told me that, She really loved the portrait of Napoleon and her dad really did not because her dad thinks of Napoleon as this legendary figure.

And one of the things that this student liked in the film that I liked as well was it kind of debunks that, right? He’s seen as awkward, blunt, uh, I mean, and, and so one’s missing what makes him such a charismatic figure. But I don’t think that’s a bad thing because in some ways that’s a little, that captures at least an important side of him.

[00:06:02] Benjamin Wright: One thing the movie seems to do well is it’s captured the drama and it’s, I mean, the drama is irresistible in the French revolution, Robespierre and Napoleon. Do you think that sort of ambience of the era came across in the movie? Of the

[00:06:13] Judith Coffin: revolution or of Napoleon? Of a bit of both,

[00:06:16] Benjamin Wright: I suppose.

[00:06:16] Judith Coffin: Well, I don’t, I’m not crazy about the portrait of the revolution.

It’s too fast and you see Robespierre shouting and Marie Antoinette getting guillotined and that doesn’t, and that doesn’t capture the, that doesn’t capture the stakes of the, of the revolution. Um, it may not capture what makes Napoleon tick, what makes him go. Uh, I don’t know. I found that kind of underexplained and that’s too bad because that’s an interesting puzzle about Napoleon.

You know, where does he come from? How does he come out of nowhere? How is he so successful? Um, why doesn’t he stop when he’s conquered half of, uh, half of Europe? Those were all really interesting questions and I’m not sure that the film Dwells on them in the way that I would like

[00:07:05] Benjamin Wright: and there’s sort of certain things that you would have liked to have said to Scott if you’d been brought in as a historical consultant sort of halfway through,

[00:07:14] Judith Coffin: you know, the late historian Natalie Natalie Zeman Davis.

who died just last week and who was a brilliant historian, was the historical script advisor for The Return of Martin Gare, which is by now at least 20 years old. And she describes running around on the, on the stage, um, sort of tugging at the director’s elbow and, and the director just saying, leave me alone, I’m making a movie.

So I mean, the Napoleon Josephine relationship is meant to provide some kind of big clue to who he is and what. makes him go. And I think that relationship, while important, doesn’t explain the military, political, uh, other things. And it’s kind of underdeveloped in the film, that relationship,

[00:08:01] Benjamin Wright: that relationship.

Yeah. I mean, as a, as a historian of sex and gender, as someone who teaches the Napoleonic era, the French Revolutionary era, that sort of juxtaposition in the movie between Napoleon’s sex life and the gender roles, uh, that sort of Josephine Bonaparte found herself extremely limited and confined by. And then the sort of the military, the military battles and campaigns.

Did that intersection sort of interest

[00:08:27] Judith Coffin: you? That’s very interesting. That’s very interesting to me. And I think it’s, I think it’s really hard to tack back and forth between, you know, sort of History with a big H and the kind of intimate history of a relationship and the way the film does it. And Josephine’s an interesting character, she’s a lot more interesting than, uh, than perhaps she comes across.

She had been married, uh, married before. Her husband had been executed. She was in prison with him. That was a Bad relationship with her first husband. It was abusive. She managed to get herself separated from him, which was a good thing and and took a lot of moxie. And then she gets out of then she gets out of prison just as Bonaparte is being thrown in prison.

And she has affairs with various prominent politicians. She really She does the best she can with what she has. I mean, she’s quite beautiful. She’s well connected. Um, and she’s savvy. She’s, she’s, she’s a

[00:09:29] Benjamin Wright: survivor. Yeah, she seems to have that sort of combination of having confinements. That come with her gender but privilege that comes with her wealth exactly and being able to navigate the world with a certain amount of success because of that Yeah,

[00:09:43] Judith Coffin: although she’s also an outsider.

I mean she comes from She’s born in Martinique. I think she’s she’s married to her first husband when she’s 15 15 leaves Martinique to come to France to be married to him that doesn’t, uh, that doesn’t work very well. She goes back to Martinique and then comes back to France. So she’s a little bit of an outsider as well.

And I think there would be something, there would be something dramatic to do with that in a, in a film, but that’s in the, but that’s in the books. The

[00:10:12] Benjamin Wright: way she was portrayed, there was something of Anne Boleyn. about her. Do you think that’s a fair comparison? Is there a comparison there that can be made? I don’t know.

[00:10:20] Judith Coffin: I don’t think, no, because, no, because Henry is so ruthless and, and he just, you know, kind of uses up these women and, and throws them away. And, and, and Napoleon really Well, at first he’s infatuated with Josephine. He’s also infatuated with himself being infatuated with Napoleon in this kind of 18th century romantic way.

in love. I’m in love with being in love. I’m romantic. I’m passionate. And, uh, and all of that. And I think, I do think he is. Uh, he becomes genuinely attached to her as a, as a friend, um, and treats her quite well. I mean, you know, Anne Boleyn didn’t get set up at Mal Maison, um, in the outskirts of Paris with, uh, with a whole, um.

you know, with her, her own chateau. Uh, so, so I don’t, but yeah, I mean, Josephine just doesn’t have that much room to maneuver. And I think it’s quite poignant when she says I, when she doesn’t want to be left by him now that she’s become an Empress, right now that she’s got security, the kind that she hasn’t ever had before.

Of course, she doesn’t want to give it up. Um, you know, I, I, what, one of the things I like in the film is that. Vanessa Kirby manages to convey that she’s not, you know, deeply in love with this man. He writes her a letter every single day, even when he’s on his, uh, on his military, uh, campaigns. And as a couple of historians have pointed out, um, those letters have a lot of erotic stuff in them.

It’s interesting.

[00:11:59] Benjamin Wright: I mean, I wonder, we’ve tried to get in Napoleon’s head a little bit, I suppose. he would have been aware at some point those letters would fall into the hands of historians and perhaps there’s a sort of performative aspect to writing them. Or do you think people weren’t aware of that, that what they would write would end up in the history books down the line?

[00:12:17] Judith Coffin: Isn’t that an interesting question? You know, because I write about Um, 20th century, uh, 20th century letters and letters are always performative. And again, I think he’s infatuated with himself being in love with her and he’s writing, you know, he wrote novels. So I think he’s performing that for himself and performing the man in love for her.

And I don’t think that he’s thinking about archives in the 19th or the 20th, uh, or the 20th century. Thank you

[00:12:49] Benjamin Wright: Right. That’s

[00:12:50] Judith Coffin: fair enough. He’s not the most self conscious person, right? He fully inhabits who he is. He doesn’t kind of back up and say, Whoa, I’m going too far in either amorously or militarily.

[00:13:07] Benjamin Wright: One of the things I’ve always thought, Judith, is that it’s hard for movies to get the melody of history, right? Particularly 20 years of melody. Yeah. But they do some, they, they, they have a shot at getting the ambience right. Do you think this movie? gives us something to think about when it comes to social and cultural change in the Napoleonic

[00:13:25] Judith Coffin: era.

No, but I don’t want to, I don’t want to criticize the, the movie for that. What, what you get here is, is a big historical panorama. I mean, I guess what I hope people would come away with is a curiosity about it, because this film raises all of these questions. Why does he do it? How does he get from, you know, from Toulon to being, uh, to overthrowing the government?

So, So I think if it makes people curious, and if they then want to read, it’s more than done its job.

[00:13:55] Benjamin Wright: Do you think there are things that, sort of, there are myths or errors repeated in the movie? Do we need to worry about the sort of great man angle of it? Or are there things that you think Thought watching it be like that’s totally not correct.

[00:14:08] Judith Coffin: Well, let me start with the things that thing that is totally correct the the scene of the 18th Brumaire where he overthrows the Where he overthrows the directory is great and it did happen in just that kind of chaotic, almost slapstick kind of way. That’s super well done. I always want to learn something about military history from these, uh, these films.

I’m not sure that I did, but I liked seeing the squares in action. Um,

[00:14:39] Benjamin Wright: It was, uh, the thought I got me with it was just what a lottery it was being on that front line. You either, people went down either side of you and If, if you kept going, you kept marching forward.

[00:14:51] Judith Coffin: Yes. I mean, and that’s kind of a convention of war movies, isn’t it?

I mean, that’s what you always say. I mean, you do get a sense, I suppose you get a sense of, of what it’s like to be in the, uh, to be in the infantry. You get a sense of how crowded these battlefields are and how chaotic it is. I mean, I think that, I think that’s really important, just how chaotic. those, uh, those, um, 18th century and early 19th century battlefields, battlefields are and, and how hard it is to maneuver and how good Napoleon is, is, is at, um, using, moving his, moving his men around, uh, like a chessboard.

I thought, I thought that was very good. Yeah.

[00:15:29] Benjamin Wright: And the sheer number of people in these battles as well, I mean, compared to, um, 18th century Conflicts. Do we enter sort of the period of modern warfare with Napoleon?

[00:15:40] Judith Coffin: Yes. One of the, one of the best books about the period is by David Bell. It’s called, um, the first total war, which is about not just about the military fighting, but about a culture of war that’s created.

by the revolution, and that Napoleon is the best practitioner of. I think, I think that’s, I think that’s very important. And that doesn’t come through in the scenes on the, scenes on the revolution. Just, you know, the, the, the wars, Napoleon didn’t start these wars. The revolution started these wars. Well, the king declared these wars in, in 1792.

So Napoleon inherits them. And then he. continues them long after he makes them very much his own, exactly.

[00:16:28] Benjamin Wright: Well, I think I’d just like to finish by asking Judith, how is Napoleon important today? Why should we still study him? Well,

[00:16:35] Judith Coffin: as one historian once said, the French Revolution is over. So we don’t have to debate it as if You know, we have, uh, as, as if its stakes are, are high, but, and I think the film does this, uh, does this well.

The cost of war comes across, um, the mission creep of war comes across the way it keeps going and why we become infatuated with these strong rulers. I mean, I think that’s very helpful to think about what it was that people at the time, but more important, after Napoleon, why they were so, why, why he became such a legendary figure, uh, and our relationship to that legendary figure.

And I think the movie is good at debunking that a little bit, not portraying him as the great romantic hero, not. The man of destiny that, that he fashioned himself as. To go back to this, uh, to the student and, and her father. Her father really wanted a tragic figure that he could identify with. Um, and the student who’d been listening to me for a couple of weeks.

said, no, you know, maybe we aren’t supposed to identify with him. Maybe we should, uh, maybe we should pull back from that either as a, as a triumphant figure or as a tragic figure.

[00:17:59] Benjamin Wright: There’s something, there’s something profoundly middle aged about Joaquin Phoenix’s portrayal of him. Yes. I think. Men of, men of my age probably struggle with a little

[00:18:09] Judith Coffin: bit.

It’s true. Um, and lots of people have, have said, Oh no, you shouldn’t. Uh, where’s the young Napoleon? Where’s the Robespierre on, on horseback? The, the revolutionary.

[00:18:22] Benjamin Wright: Well, will you be assigning the movie next year if you teach this

[00:18:25] Judith Coffin: course? Well, that’s a good question. I guess so, yes, because I think it’s fun to connect with things that people are talking about that you can go on Twitter and read endless threads about what’s accurate or inaccurate about this, uh, about this battle scene.

And because it’s the only one I know, uh, that’s not You know, four or five hours long.

[00:18:50] Benjamin Wright: Oh, well, thank you so much for joining us. This is fascinating. Thank

[00:18:53] Judith Coffin: you. This is fun.

[00:18:56] Benjamin Wright: 15 Minute History is produced at the University of Texas at Austin in partnership with Not Even Past and Hemispheres in the College of Liberal Arts.

It is recorded at the Lates Development Studio. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, follow us on social media, and visit our website for more information and resources. See y’all next week.