Before 2000, the 'Sword and Sandal' epic was considered a dead genre. Ridley Scott’s 'Gladiator' proved the skeptics wrong, grossing $460 million and winning Best Picture. The film famously used CGI to reconstruct the Roman Colosseum and to 'clone' 3,000 extras into a crowd of 30,000. It also used digital technology to complete the scenes of actor Oliver Reed, who died during production. Its success revived the historical blockbuster, leading to films like 'Troy,' '300,' and 'Kingdom of Heaven,' showing that classic historical settings could still captivate modern audiences with the help of digital spectacle.