Gladiator II’s warning to America
Film Review: by Marc LiVecche, from Juicy Ecumenism.
“A republic, if you can keep it.”
So went Benjamin Franklin’s reply when asked about the kind of government the Constitutional Convention had just birthed. More than simply declarative, Franklin’s answer was a warning: Republics require a lot of maintenance. It’s been nearly 25 years since Maximus Decimus Meridius died in Gladiator to make Rome a republic again. Gladiator II makes it clear he failed, if through no fault of his own. Real history concurs. At no point following Julius Caesar’s crossing of the Rubicon would Rome ever truly be a republic again. There’s a warning for America implicit in that as well.
Republicanism looked good on Rome. Her military, architectural, and institutional brilliance facilitated expansion across the Mediterranean, building a wonderous infrastructure of roads, bridges, aqueducts, and ports that facilitated trade and enriched her. She was a thing to behold. Admittedly, Rome, after the Republic succumbed to itself, also wore Empire well. While the compelled peace of Pax Romana meant subjugation for conquered peoples, it was, more than any available alternative, capable of bringing stability and creating and preserving interconnected webs of culture, civilization, art, and tradition (and don’t forget “the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the freshwater system, and public health”) that helped even those beneath the Roman yoke to prosper. Gladiator makes clear Rome, despite her imperfections, could earn a good man’s devotion. Recall Maximus, after subduing Germanic tribesmen at Vindobona, defending the Roman vision: “I’ve seen much of the rest of the world, it is brutal and cruel and dark. Rome is the light.”
By Gladiator II, this luminescence is in jeopardy. Following his own victorious opening battle, Gen. Marcus Acacius declares over the conquered enemy: “I claim this city for the glory of Rome.”
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