History repeats itself in Ridley Scott’s new tale of retribution, ‘Gladiator II’

Paul Mescal stars in “Gladiator II,” a sequel to Russell Crowe’s 2000 hit historical action film.

“Rome,” Laurence Olivier’s Crassus declared in Stanley Kubrick’s “Spartacus,” “is an eternal thought in the mind of God.”

Lately, it has been on mortal minds as well.

Last year, a Swedish influencer on TikTok urged women to ask the men in their lives how often they thought about the ancient empire. The casual poll became a viral worldwide meme, with the surprising answers ranging from “three or four times a month” to “at least once a day.”

This year, the toga party’s only grown.

Francis Ford Coppola’s “Megalopolis” envisioned a futuristic Rome/Manhattan hybrid, full of palace plots and bread-and-circus entertainments. Tinto Brass’ much-reviled 1979 “Caligula” got a restoration and a re-release (although not much renewed respect).

Connie Nielsen in “Gladiator II.”

And reaching theaters on Nov. 22 is “Gladiator II,” Ridley Scott’s nearly 25-years-late sequel to his sword-and-sandal epic about revenge and redemption in the Colosseum.

Whether or not you thought much about the Roman Empire before, Hollywood obviously hopes it will be on your mind at least through the next few weeks at the box office.

Frankly, that may be a struggle. Scott has always been a superb image-maker, and his new film is full of startling visuals — ferocious sea battles, a charging rhino, vast cityscapes. But the picture it draws the most clearly is one of the changing big-studio film — what that art form has lost over the last few decades, and what it has replaced it with.

Like most scripts, the one for the original “Gladiator” had several people’s fingerprints on it, but the smartest changes came from John Logan, a Tony-winning playwright. He pared and polished the screenplay down to a point as sharp as the tip of a spear: Our hero seeks revenge on the villain who has slaughtered his family.

Add to it Russell Crowe, in one of his iconic, dangerous, wounded-bear roles — slow to provoke, impossible to call off — and you had a modern classic.

The script for “Gladiator II” is by David Scarpa, who last collaborated with Scott on the sometimes dazzling, sometimes delirious “Napoleon.” And it offers a similar mix of spectacular set pieces and confused characterizations. Set some two decades after the first film (which replays, in flashback images, under the credits), it is the story of Crowe’s character’s grown son, who had been sent into African exile at age 12, after his father’s death.

And years later, when a Roman invasion leaves his wife dead, and him sold into slavery, it is back to the Colosseum, to look for retribution.

The story hits the same plot points as the original, yet without their ready plausibility or emotional logic. The first hero had his innocent family ravaged, tortured and killed; the second lost his wife — a skilled soldier — in battle. His grief may be no less, but it is harder to empathize with his blind lust for vengeance. (Just as it’s difficult to accept that a fearful mother would hide her young son on a different continent — and then essentially forget about him.)

The loss of Crowe is also a blow. Obviously, there was no way to bring him back for the lead (although there was a faltering, far-fetched sequel idea years ago, to have his character return as some sort of immortal warrior). But as much of an impression as Paul Mescal has made in art films like “Aftersun” and “All of Us Strangers,” he doesn’t have the charisma necessary for an outsized role like this. He can’t instantly draw us in and make us care.

Co-star Pedro Pascal fares better, as the initial focus of Mescal’s (misplaced) anger; he has the truly gritty gravitas of a weary soldier. But the most interesting characters in dramas are people who want something and, for most of the film, Pascal’s general is essentially someone who doesn’t want anything, unless it’s not to be a general anymore. He is a poor target for Mescal’s vengeance — an object of hatred who doesn’t hate back. Only too late in the film does he take a more active role.

Denzel Washington in “Gladiator II.”

The one true delight in the movie is Denzel Washington, playing the sort of behind-the-scenes conniver that actors like Herbert Lom and Peter Ustinov used to portray in pictures like these. Declaiming his lines as if he were back in “Macbeth,” swirling his robes and chuckling mirthlessly, Washington steals every scene he’s in, even if it’s mostly petty theft.

But if “Gladiator II” is proof that this is an era in which studio films value spectacle over drama, that approach also throws its shortcomings into starker relief.

Scott can still stage thrilling action scenes (the battles in “Napoleon” were the only parts of that film fully beyond reproach). But modern cinema’s over-reliance on CGI’s exaggerated effects gives this sequel an unreal feel the original didn’t have.

The wide shots of a sprawling Rome look like a video game, not a real city; the ferocious baboons unleashed in the Colosseum look like sci-fi movie monsters.

And while the film’s look is disturbingly modern, its sentiments are distressingly old. No one needs an excruciatingly politically correct look at the Roman Empire, but that culture was far more tolerant of gay life than America is today. Do we really need a story in which nearly every villain is either gay or bisexual? Where effeminacy equals evil? The simpering Roman predator trope goes back at least as far as Charles Laughton’s Nero in 1932’s “The Sign of the Cross,” but mincing monsters aren’t the exception here, they’re the rule. (It is notable that Coppola repeats the stereotype in “Megalopolis,” which features Shia LaBeouf in drag.)

It is worth wondering, perhaps, why those characters have made a comeback. Or, better yet, why the Roman Empire seems to have invaded our thoughts recently. Is it because, at our most pessimistic, we see signs of its decline — a great nation losing its way and purpose, distracting its population with vulgar entertainments — in our current situation? That we see descendants of its vain, selfish and ultimately destructive emperors in our own gold-plated billionaire class? That some of us are beginning to hear the barbarians at the gate?

You don’t need to be a soothsayer to answer that one.

For local showtimes and more, visit gladiator.movie.