Napoleon (1927) - The Greatest Film Ever Made? | Cecily Carver

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Napoleon (1927), the monumental silent film directed by Abel Gance is frequently (and correctly) described as one of the most astonishing, awe-inspiring achievements in the history of cinema.

Joined by small-handed essayist and fiction writer (and the sole inventor of Google Maps) Cecily Carver, Milo and Jack discuss why this five-and-a-half-hour epic about Napoleon Bonaparte (a Corsican man) remains insanely electrifying a century later. What makes Napoleon feel less like a historical drama and more like an operatic explosion of cinematic ecstasy? Is it fascist propaganda? Is it a prototype of the modern blockbuster? Is it the final, triumphant eruption of silent cinema before the apocalypse of sound, which murdered the medium forever?

Topics include:

Napoleon as “Great Man” and metaphysical force

The French Revolution (what was all that about?)

Abel Gance’s radical visual experimentation (polyvision, superimposition, handheld camerawork)

Silent film acting and the magic of the human face

The Coppola vs. Carl Davis scores and how music transforms silent cinema

The Josephine interlude and romantic melodrama

Unfinished art, and the beauty/tragedy of abandoned masterpieces

Whether Napoleon belongs to the stolid 19th century, or the avant-garde 1920s, and how it anticipates directors like James Cameron

We also plonk Napoleon within the broader arc of late silent film, alongside the theatrical inheritance of opera and vaudeville.

For viewers interested in film history, aesthetics, political myth, and the philosophy of art, this discussion treats Napoleon (the film) as a heavenly spectacle, and as a majestic historical object.

If you care about silent cinema, epic filmmaking, the French Revolution, or the enduring allure of charismatic power on screen, this conversation is for you.