Season 1 • Episode 6
LatestThe miniseries charts Napoleon Bonaparte’s career from his return after the Egyptian campaign to his downfall and exile on Elba, portraying his political maneuvering, military ambition, and complex relationships with key figures such as Talleyrand, Fouché, Murat, Tsar Alexander, Joséphine de Beauharnais, and Countess Marie Walewska.
Acting
Andrzej Seweryn's Tsar Alexander steals scenes without trying.
Direction
Six different visions, somehow cohesive — Zanussi's episodes hit hardest.
Production
Pre-CGI battles that actually built things and blew them up.
Jean-François Stévenin
Napoléon Bonaparte
Jan Nowicki
Murat/Barras
Bruno Madinier
Lucien Bonaparte
Jean-Claude Durand
Talleyrand
Andrzej Seweryn
Tsar Alexandre
Jacques Frantz
Murat
Jerzy Kryszak
Fouche
Krzysztof Zanussi
Narrator/Commentator
James Faulkner
Maitland
Béatrice Agenin
Joséphine de Beauharnais
Christoph Waltz
Karl Emmanuel
François Perrot
Talleyrand
Philippe Bouclet
Caulaincourt
Krzysztof Luft
Frederic Guillaume de Prusse
Monika Świtaj
Louise de Prusse
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
This was a rare Polish-French-German-Italian co-production during the final years of Soviet bloc collapse, with each director bringing distinct national sensibilities to Napoleon's story.
Jean-François Stévenin's Napoleon deliberately avoided the 'great man' hagiography of earlier films, instead channeling the anxious uncertainty of a post-1989 Europe re-examining its imperial foundations.
FR
PL
