Director Paul W.S. Anderson
Starring Kit Harington, Emily Browning, Kiefer Sutherland & Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje
Rated M
Score 2.5/6

A slave-turned-gladiator finds himself in a race against time to save his true love, who has been betrothed to a corrupt Roman Senator. As Mount Vesuvius erupts, he must fight to save his beloved as Pompeii crumbles around him.

While watching this in the back of my mind I immediately started to make comparisons with Ridley Scott’s 2000 release Gladiator. I quickly pushed those thoughts out of my mind because it was unfair to make these comparisons considering that Scott had far more grander city to work with and the fact that Paul W.S Anderson is nowhere near Scott’s level.
I ended up comforting myself with the fact that Anderson had done action movies before and he would probably know what to do. I’m not so sure that he was the right director for the job, especially when Mount Vesuvius erupted. With the eruption he erred on the side of historical and scientific accuracy which was great but I really would have liked to have seen push the boundaries a little and deliver a sense of “OH MY GODS IT’S THE END OF THE WORLD” to the audience.
I was impressed by Kiefer Sutherland and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje. Sutherland was amazing as the movie’s villain because slimy quality to Senator Corvus that made my skin crawl and to be honest I just loved Adewale’s voice.