First Look at Joaquin Phoenix's Napoleon Released

By Adam Barnhardt

When Joaquin Phoenix isn't winning Oscars for his portrayal of the Joker, the actor chooses to work on slightly smaller films steeped in a wide variety of genres. That includes his lead role in Ridley Scott's upcoming Napoleon, which released its first look Monday afternoon. In the film, Phoenix plays the eponymous character, legendary French conqueror Napoleon Bonaparte.

In the footage, released at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference, Phoenix's character can be seen brooding aboard his ship.

What is Napoleon about?

As you might expect, Napoleon is a period piece from Ridley Scott on the life and times of Napoleon Bonaparte. It's described as an original and personal look at Napoleon's origins and his swift, ruthless climb to emperor, viewed through the prism of his addictive and often volatile relationship with his wife and one true love, Josephine.

The film was written by The Man in the High Castle's David Scarpa, who previously collaborated with Scott on All the Money in the World.

The picture also marks the second collaboration between Phoenix and Scott, who's wrapping up work on Napoleon before getting started on his highly-anticipated sequel to Gladiator, a film Phoenix starred in decades ago.

"First of all, I love doing period films. I love the research. I love to create sort of smells of the period," Scott previously explained to the press. "I think what we did with the first Gladiator…I don't like being critical of other things that have happened before, but I wasn't the biggest fan of Hollywood Roman epics, honestly. They felt artificial and so, when I was asked to consider a script, the script was not very good. But the person who gave it to me said, I want to show you one thing, and he picked up an illustration, this is true, it's called For Those About to Die by Gérôme. He holds it up. It's a picture of this big painting of the Coliseum, and in the corner there is this guy, about to tuna fork this poor bastard," Scott continued. "He's got this thing in his neck, and he's looking up for permission to kill. I went, bloody hell, that's never been done properly before. Never. I said, I'll do it. He said you will? I said yes. Did you want to read the script? I said no, and we went off and hit the ground running around the table, and evolved the new material."

Though a production filmed for AppleTV+, the movie will receive a theatrical release beginning November 22nd.

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