The highly anticipated Gladiator sequel will indeed be rated R.
Ridley Scott is returning to Ancient Rome this holiday season with the big screen debut of Gladiator II. The highly anticipated sequel to the Best Picture-winning Gladiator, Scott’s new film aims to be every bit as epic, intense, and violent as its predecessor. After seeing the trailer, no one should be surprised to learn that Gladiator II is going to be Rated R, just as the first movie was nearly 25 years ago.
This week, the MPAA confirmed that Gladiator II would be getting an R-rating when it hits theaters at the end of the year. The film is being given that rating for “strong bloody violence.”Â
Gladiator II connects in a deep way to the original, as it follows an older version of Lucius, the son of Lucilla who was featured in the first movie. Paul Mescal plays the lead in the film, taking the reins from Russell Crowe, who won an Oscar for his portrayal of Maximus back in 2000.
In addition to Mescal, Gladiator II stars Pedro Pascal, Joseph Quinn, Connie Nielsen, Denzel Washington, May Calamawy, Fred Hechinger, Lior Raz, Derek Jacobi, Peter Mensah, and Matt Lucas. Scott directed the film from a script by David Scarpa.
“I love doing period films. I love the research. I love to create sort of smells of the period,” Scott, who returns to direct Gladiator 2, explained in 2021. “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 GĂ©rĂ´me. 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. 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.”
