# Napoleon (2002)

> A four-part French miniseries chronicling Napoleon Bonaparte's climb from ambitious young general to master of Europe and his eventual fall into exile.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/2566

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 4
- Episode runtime: 90 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: drama, history, war
- Created by: Max Gallo, Yves Simoneau
- Network: France 2
- Cast: Christian Clavier, Isabella Rossellini, Gérard Depardieu, John Malkovich, Anouk Aimée, Heino Ferch, Sebastian Koch, Ennio Fantastichini
- TMDB rating: 7.3/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0253839/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: measured
- Intensity: moderate
- Complexity: layered
- Violence: moderate
- Tone: epic, melancholic, stately, dramatic

## What critics say

Audiences rate this four-part historical biopic positively, valuing its sweeping scale and portrayal of Napoleon's rise and fall.

## Synopsis

Napoléon (2002) is a French national-television historical biopic miniseries created by Max Gallo and Yves Simoneau for France 2. Christian Clavier plays the ambitious Napoleon Bonaparte, an unpaid general whose courage and devotion to his country carry him from the battlefields of Italy and Egypt to the most powerful position in Europe. Isabella Rossellini plays his wife Joséphine de Beauharnais, whose bond with him is tested as his ambitions grow, while Gérard Depardieu's Joseph Fouché and John Malkovich's Charles de Talleyrand circle him as schemers in the corridors of power. The engine of the story is ambition itself: a man wanting more territory, more loyalty and more glory, and the cost of getting it. Told across four ninety-minute episodes, it moves through campaigns, court intrigue and diplomacy, building toward a dramatic reversal and an exile. The atmosphere is epic and stately, with a grand, sweeping scale and a melancholic undertow. Fans of Elizabeth R, I, Claudius and Band of Brothers will find resonance in its portrait of a towering historical figure and the price of power.

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