Oh sure. We Scandinavians finally get our hunky star-powered vehicle, and the Romans have to remind us they were in the game first.
Just kidding. Well, sort of. It turns out that Warner Bros thinks that the way to replace Harry Potter and balance out DC Comics might be to hit the history books. According to Deadline, they’ve set Jonathan Liebesman to direct a Julius Caesar battleopic, hoping it will serve as a tentpole for a Caesar series.
It’s being penned by Chris Boal, who is becoming Hollywood’s history man of the hour. He’s also the writer behind the Skarsgard Viking picture.
The Boal-Liebesman film will be “a Patton-like approach” which will follow Caesar to the governorship of Hispania — an assignment no one else wants — where he builds the 10th Legion that will march on Rome.
It would be cool to get a “hard” Caesar film, as Hollywood has tended to focus on the creaky, aristocratic version who bedded Cleopatra. (Even Rome, which was nearly perfect, was more interested in his decline.) The strapping young soldier and canny politician hasn’t gotten much play. I would actually like to see his early career get its cinematic due.
But not before the Vikings.