Gladiator

Gladiator (2000) is an American-British historical epic directed by Ridley Scott and starring Russell Crowe as Maximus Decimus Meridius, a betrayed Roman general forced into slavery and gladiatorial combat under Emperor Commodus (Joaquin Phoenix) Winning five Academy Awards at the 73rd Oscars—including Best Picture, Best Actor (Crowe), Costume Design (Janty Yates), Sound, and Visual Effects—it revitalized the historical sword-and-sandals epic Genre Revival: As the first major Hollywood sword-and-sandals epic since the mid-1960s, Gladiator's $451.7M worldwide gross and Best Picture win sparked a 2000s wave of ancient-history epics Oscar Re-Release Bounce: Following its 25 March 2001 Best Picture victory, Gladiator's domestic weekend gross surged +1,601% on 30 March 2001 ($456,732 across 577 theaters) Box Office & Budget: Produced on a $103,000,000 budget, Gladiator earned $187,683,805 domestic ($416,342,431 inflation-adjusted) and $263,999,794 international for $451,683,599 worldwide (4.4× budget multiple), plus $38,289,339 in estimated domestic DVD/Blu-ray sales Opening & Legs: Opened #1 on 5 May 2000 with $34,819,017 across 2,938 theaters (peaking at 3,188 theaters), achieving 5.39× domestic legs