To me, this is the best Russell Crowe film, and I think the movie was deserving of nominations. Of course, liberties were taken with history, fairly big liberties with Commodus. Commodus was off his rocker, but participating on the public stage in the games? Nope.
"More required reading for would-be beatniks. Every punk rocker moving to New York in the ‘70s had this book around; it became the Bible for the east village aesthetic and free-flowing “cut-ups.” Its dystopian views fit perfectly into the punk rock esthetic of nihilism."