We live in a society devoid of heroes. Or, perhaps stated more accurately, we live in a society that is afraid of and dislikes heroes—those who call us to be better and who remind us that we could be more than we otherwise are. So, the many so-called heroes in modern society turn out to be empty shells—empty because they have no real sacrifice to make, such as the heroes of the Marvel universe, or because their moral characters are hopelessly compromised, as in a George R.R. Martin story. For that reason, the heroes on offer quickly vanish into the malaise of boredom that afflicts modern culture. True heroism requires sacrifice, and sacrifice requires love. Our culture is afraid of love, if only because love abolishes boredom, the ruling vice of our age.

Nevertheless, there are a few films made prior to our culture’s complete rejection of ethical heroism in which the link between sacrifice and love is still preserved. Such films include The Lord of the Rings (2001–2003) trilogy and Braveheart (1995), and serve as a check on modern apathy. It is doubtful that such films could be made today, for they present a vision of heroic masculinity that is dependent upon sacrifice, a masculinity that is now utterly rejected and feared. For this reason, the movie Gladiator (2000) remains centrally important, for in it the question of masculinity appears most clearly.

The movie Gladiator is about masculinity. At first glance, it might appear as just another title in an overcrowded genre of action films with a central male protagonist. On second glance, however, an important distinction emerges, one that helps account for the enduring power of Gladiator. We might be enthralled by a Terminator. We can be animated by a Rambo. We may find ourselves intrigued by a James Bond or a Bourne spinoff, or tantalized by a Mission Impossible film. We might be overwhelmed by the violent masculinity depicted in The Expendables series. But we love Maximus, the hero of Gladiator, and it is worth asking why this is so.

We love Maximus first because his men love him. The film shows us this affection simply but quite movingly. In the beginning of the film, the soldiers under Maximus’ command kneel on the muddy battlefield of Germania as their beloved general walks before them, the salute of “General” echoing down the ranks. In the middle of the film, Maximus’ fellow gladiators—many of whom initially despised him—now walk before and behind him as bodyguards, while the rest of the prisoners chant his name. And at the end of the movie, his body is borne with honor from the Colosseum by senators and gladiators alike. We love Maximus because Marcus Aurelius loves him, and because Juba loves him, and because even the people of Rome come to love him.

We also love Maximus because he loves his wife and son. In one of the most touching scenes in the movie, the emperor Marcus Aurelius asks Maximus to tell him of his home. Maximus, visibly moved with emotion, replies:

“My house is in the hills above Trujillo. A very simple place. Pinkstones that warm in the sun. A kitchen garden that smells of herbs in the day, jasmine in the evening. Through the gate is a giant poplar. Figs, apples, pears. The soil, Marcus, black—black like my wife’s hair. Grapes on the south slopes, olives on the north. Wild ponies play near my house. They tease my son. He wants to be one of them.”

And, after the brutal murder of his wife and son, Maximus prays to them, awaiting the day he will see them again. His friend Juba sees him praying and asks:

Juba: Can they hear you?
Maximus: Oh yes.
Juba: What do you say to them?
Maximus: To my son, I tell him I will see him again soon. To keep his heels down while riding his horse. To my wife . . . that is not your business.

We especially love Maximus, however, because he is a virtuous warrior. He is a man of “strength and honor,” one who has cultivated within himself the four cardinal virtues: prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance, to which the film makes explicit reference. In this way, Maximus is a sort of embodiment of ancient Stoic thought as expressed, for example, in the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius. In that book, the emperor had enjoined himself:

“Every hour make up thy mind sturdily as a Roman and a man to do what thou hast in hand with scrupulous and unaffected dignity and love of thy kind and independence and justice; and to give thyself rest from all other impressions.

The Meditations call on its reader to cultivate virtue; to resist evil in all its temptations; to live in gratitude; to gain self-mastery over the passions; and to live modestly, simply, and with one’s last hour ever in mind—all ancient wisdom later taken up in Christian thought. The drama and power of Gladiator is that it asks if such a life of virtue is truly worthwhile. This is achieved in the film by the contrasting figures of Maximus and Commodus, the son of the emperor. Commodus rejects a life formed by the cardinal virtues, instead telling his father (whom he is about to murder) that his virtue is ambition. Commodus is driven by power, and he indeed succeeds in achieving the highest power of the ancient world when he becomes emperor. However, though he is supremely powerful as emperor, Commodus is a weak man. He is cowardly, dominated by his passions, and consumed by envy of Maximus, whom he tries again and again to destroy. Commodus hates Maximus. He hates him because he sees that Maximus is loved. He is envious and bitterly resentful because he wants to have the trappings of authentic virtue, but without the slow and at times painful process of character formation, and the self-effacement that such moral formation requires. He wants all the honor, but without moral strength. He wants all the veneration, but without sacrifice.

In contrasting these two characters, the central question of the film emerges. Is a life of virtue worthwhile, even if, in this world, such a life will end in defeat? The contrasting moral characters of Maximus and Commodus press this question, made especially acute by Maximus’ utter fearlessness in the face of evil and death. But it is perhaps the film’s soundtrack, done by the incomparable Hans Zimmer, where we most clearly hear this question and its poignant answer.

The film’s score is forever famous. The final theme soars, carried aloft by a hauntingly beautiful feminine voice in a strange tongue, and represents the very highest aspirations of the ancient world for moral uprightness and masculine integrity, aspirations that the film has just shown us in Maximus’ moral character. The theme shows the nobility and high calling of virtue, made all the more wonderful because it is embodied in a man of great personal and political authority—a rare thing indeed. For this reason, Gladiator is a film about masculinity. Though possessed of great power, it is impossible to love Commodus. His lack of virtue renders his character pathetic in contrast to the strength and honor of Maximus.

But the score is wonderful because it is also sad. Maximus is killed, and the film’s score is elegiac and haunting, even as it soars. Perhaps we are left with the answer that living virtuously in this life sometimes means being overcome by the seemingly stronger forces of ambition and power, but that nonetheless a life of virtue is worthwhile, since only the brave man can smile back at all-smiling death, and only the just man knows that “what we do in life echoes in eternity.”

Source: Word On Fire here