screaming like a banshee because Russell Crowe is filming at Eilean Donan Castle which is on my family’s ancient ancient ancestral land. it’s like we’re married
watched gladiator for the first time today (26 years late I’m aware) and I finally fully understand what you’re on about that is the sexiest anyone has ever looked ever I think
he's my entire personality and I'm so glad you have discovered the KSHLYUATF6WDGVQlfh;waiusgdlhjbqwldwejFHQls that is Maximus Decimus Meridius <3
Author’s Note: In honor of Russell Crowe's birthday (happy birthday, baby :D), I'm posting one of my Maximus fics. It's one that I wrote awhile back as part of the AU I created for Stalking Tiger, and it's a favorite of mine. Major thanks always to @streets-in-paradise, who always encourages my writing so kindly, and for all of you who are still around even though I never get to post here anymore! Russell and Maximus are always #1 in this girl's heart, even when I'm not screeching it from the rooftops of Tumblr. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy, and as always thanks for making this blog a wonderful place where I get to share my love for Maximus :D
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“What is this?” the Spaniard asks you, carefully turning your wrist over.
He’s on his knees at your feet while you are perched on the edge of his bed. He had begun with the simple process of kissing his way down your body, which is his usual way, but his eye has been caught by a strange mark on the inside of your wrist.
You feel the unwelcome sensation of embarrassment and discomfort coming over you. He’s cradling your wrist in his strong hands, delicately tracing the raised red mark there, but you vainly try to tug your hand away from him.
“It is nothing,” you tell him with a feigned smile. “An irritation of the skin, nothing more.”
He raises his eyes to yours, concern and puzzlement clouding his gaze. His blue eyes are so sincere, so beguiling, that your heart skips a beat. You have no desire to lie to him, but you do not want him to know the truth either.
You still remember the night you got that mark. The red-hot branding iron, the cruel hands holding you down, the scent of burned flesh in your nostrils. A shiver runs up your spine at the memory.
He notices your shiver, gently presses his fingers around your arm to keep you from pulling it away. You relent immediately, your gaze falling to look at your slender wrist cradled between his large hands.
He carefully turns your wrist over again, one fingertip tracing the raised marks with all the tenderness he shows you every night.
“I have never seen it before,” he remarks quietly, still focused on your mark.
You shrug slightly, feigning casualness. “It has only become inflamed the last few days,” you reply truthfully. “The heat always irritates it.”
He lifts his eyes to yours, studying your face for any tells of concealment, and he must not believe what he sees there. His brow furrows, and he looks down to study your mark even more closely.
You are content to sit quietly with him, his thick forearms resting against your knees, his body heat beginning to spread to your chilled bones. Seeing him on his knees before you is still unfamiliar, but you enjoy the peaceful surrender he offers you so freely.
A moment later, he raises his head again, and you can see the sorrow, the pain in his beautiful blue eyes this time. He knows the truth.
“This is a brand,” he whispers. He rubs his thumb over your inflamed skin, soothing it immediately.
All you can do is nod and drop your gaze, unwilling to look at the pain in his eyes. More than anything, you despise him seeing any vestiges of the life you are forced to live beyond his cell walls. He has to bear enough suffering without remembering that you are forced into a different man’s bed every night, that you are mere chattel property to your slave master.
He still studies your face with intensity, fingers stroking your wrist absently. “Who did this?” he breathes, his voice deep and hushed in the scant inches between your faces.
You press your lips together and shake your head dismissively. “It is nothing,” you try to say, but he shakes his head sharply.
“Is this some nobleman’s seal?” he demands, thunder glowering on his brows. “Did someone try to mark you as his private property?”
You shake your head again, feeling the sharp bite of tears behind your eyelids. “No,” you promise him, your voice breaking. “It was not a client.”
Realization dawns in his eyes a moment later. “Antoninus,” he mutters with a curse, and the rage and hatred in his gaze is almost enough to make you pity your cruel master.
His grip on your wrist tightens just barely, and you lift your other hand to press against his for support. You meet his gaze more firmly now, scooting a bit closer to him on the edge of the bed.
“Do not trouble yourself about it, my love,” you say softly, stroking his knuckles with your fingertips. “It happened long ago. It is not worth your anger.”
He just presses his lips together, rubs his thumb absently over your inflamed skin. “Your pain is always worth my anger,” he replies, his voice low and dangerous.
You are ready to forget this conversation, anxious to feel his body against yours and lose yourself in the depths of his lips. He was igniting heat in your body just a moment before, but now your skin grows cold in the small cell, goosebumps and shivers traveling over your skin.
But he is not finished. He gazes at your branding mark, transfixed and horrified. “It is not enough that he must sell your body and take away your freedom,” he mutters angrily. “He must also leave scars on you. Brand you like a piece of livestock.”
You manage a wry laugh to cover the choking emotion in your throat. “It serves its purpose,” you tell him. “Anyone who sees it knows who I belong to. And if I ever try to run away, this brand will make it easier for him to hunt me down.”
His jaw twitches, the tight muscles in his face betraying his anger at seeing yet another way that Antoninus has abused you.
Then he does something that utterly steals your breath. Still kneeling before you, looking up at you from between your knees, the Spaniard takes your wrist in his strong hands, cradles it close to his mouth, and presses the gentlest of kisses against the thin skin of your inner wrist.
Heat burns in your body at the soft touch, the gentle movement of his lips against your sensitive skin. His fingertips hold you in place but stroke your skin with intentional tenderness, and he lets his lips linger on your wrist for a moment.
Memory of the pain from the night you were branded flashes into your brain. How you screamed and cried at the terrible pain, how it ached for weeks afterward. How it still burns like fire every time you remember it.
And the shame. The shame of knowing that the ugly mark on your wrist is permanent, tying you to the horrid man who owns you.
But what matter they now, the burns on your body and soul? Your sweet love is on his knees before you, his lips brushing the veins of your inner wrist with the softness of a feather. Your heart warms, and affection washes over you for the way this man has taken all the terrible things in your past and turned them to sweetness.
“I would kill him for all he has done to you,” he murmurs against your skin. “I cannot stand the thought of you bearing his mark on your skin for the rest of your life. I cannot bear the thought that he does whatever he wishes with you, forces you to earn him money against your will.”
You close your eyes and melt into the pleasurable sensation of his kisses to your inflamed branding mark. “Just as I cannot bear the thought of your master forcing you into the arena every day.”
“No.” He lays his cheek against your delicate inner wrist, his face warm against the rapidly-pulsing blood in your arm. “It is not the same.”
“Yes, it is,” you insist, tucking your fingers under his chin to make him look up at you.
Blue eyes, framed by dark eyelashes. The moonlight streams through his tiny window, catching his eyes and dancing in the gaze that tells you I love you, I would die for you, I would give anything to keep you safe.
“No,” he repeats, tilting his head slightly so that his cheek nuzzles your hand on his face. “My master uses me for my natural fighting skills, my strength. I have a chance to win the crowd and gain popularity and favor with the people. I can earn my way out of this place.” His eyes darken and soften at the same time. “You have no such opportunity.”
You squeeze your eyes shut for a moment, then lean forward to rest your forehead against his. He reacts immediately, one hand reaching up to grip the back of your neck with such tenderness, such sorrowful fondness.
“I do not face swords and lances and chariots,” you argue with nothing but softness in your voice. “I do not fight wild beasts and assassins. I do not try to survive in an arena filled with people who scream for blood.”
Your lover sighs, his warm breath fanning across your face. Being so close to him is the only peace you ever know, and all you want to do is gather him close in your arms, breathe into his neck and feel him do the same thing in return.
“They could have my blood,” he whispers, tilting his chin up so he can delicately kiss your cheek. “I would die if it meant you could be free.”
“No,” you whisper immediately, wrapping your arms around his neck quickly to pull him close. He does not hesitate, but shifts forward on his knees to wrap his arms around your waist.
“No,” you whisper again, relishing the way his broad chest rises and falls with his breath against your stomach. “Do not even say such things.”
“I would,” he says simply.
You bury your face in his neck, press a gentle kiss there as one hand slides up to thread through his hair at the back of his neck in the place he likes.
“I do not want freedom,” you murmur into his throat, “if you are not there to share it with me.”
A gentle tremor runs through his body, and his fingertips tighten on your back. He feels tense, as though full to the brim with emotions he longs to untether. Even when you stroke his neck and plant a kiss to the top of his head, he does not relax.
“I would do anything to win your freedom,” he asserts, tilting his head so he can kiss your exposed collarbone. “My life means nothing so long as I can use it to keep you safe somehow.”
You know what he is thinking of — the law that says a gladiator must win the favor of the Emperor in order to be granted mercy. If the Spaniard does this, he can free himself and you. He has spoken of it often, and of the lengths to which he is willing to go to bargain for your freedom.
Tears flood your eyes at the thought. You know he would die for you in a heartbeat — less than a heartbeat — and the thought is so unbearable that you squeeze him even tighter, an embrace he returns enthusiastically.
“A life of freedom would be empty without you,” you murmur, tears choking your words.
His response is immediate. In one swift motion, your love pushes himself up and onto the bed beside you. With his arms firm around your waist, he pulls you down across his lap, pinned against his body.
Every nerve in your body thrums in response. You love nothing more than when he takes control, pulls you into a more comfortable position. His arms anchor you in place, cradling you tenderly while his lips find their usual place on the curve of your neck.
“We will not be parted,” he promises you, his voice deep and husky so close to your ear. “When we get our freedom, we will start our new life together.”
Tears flow freely down your cheeks now, and you wrap your arms tighter around his neck. The warmth of his body floods through yours, a deep pleasure that often stays with you long after you leave him at night.
“Yes,” you murmur through the tears. “Nothing will ever part us again.”
Your lover loosens his hold on you slightly, holding you apart from his body so he can look down into your eyes. His gaze is tender, soft, utterly admiring.
He smiles down at you, lifting one hand to swipe away the tears running in rivulets down your cheeks. “Tell me what you dream of,” he whispers, “when you think of our life together.”
Something about this moment — his adoring gaze, the intimate posturing, the way he kissed your brand mark so gently — stirs your emotions even further. You choke back a sob, one that he soothes with a comforting hand down your back.
He pulls you close again, nuzzling your neck gently in the silent moment. His beard scratches your skin in the most pleasant way, while your fingers trace the defined muscles of his arms, shoulders, and chest.
“We would live by the sea,” you whisper, finding your voice amid the sob in your throat. He pulls you a little tighter, nestles his face in the curve of your shoulder. “A small house in the cliffs. We would have a garden, raise livestock. We would walk by the sea every night.”
It’s a daydream you have indulged in so many times. Part of your heart tells you that it could never be true, but lying here in his arms, enveloped by his comforting scent and strong grip, any dream seems possible.
His lips find your pulse point, gently teasing your sensitive skin. “And so we shall,” he murmurs, lips brushing your skin in a way that makes you tremble. The shivers only make him draw you closer, so close you can feel every line of his body against yours.
“We would do just as we pleased,” you continue, caught up in the dream. “We would tend our crops and build up our land. We would never want for anything, and we would never fear anything.”
He grunts his agreement, dipping his head lower to explore your chest. With delicate fingers, he uses one hand to pull your shift open the rest of the way, and his lips make contact with one of the swells of your chest, right in a spot that makes you writhe in his arms.
You could fly, you could sing, you could ascend to the heavens when he touches you this way.
You’re burning for him, every inch of you needing him to close the last bit of distance between your bodies and give you what you know you are both craving. You can feel his own desire, the fervent intensity of his kisses on your chest.
Emotion catches in your throat again. What cruel fate conspired to give you this man, this perfect beloved man in your arms, only to constantly threaten you with the knowledge that he could be ripped away from you at any moment?
With his lips coaxing sighs and moans from you, his strong hands holding you fast, you pray that this moment might never end, that you might live forever in this bed, in his arms.
You can’t suppress a soft moan when his tongue does something particularly wicked. “And I would be your wife,” you gasp, “every day of the rest of my life. I would be content all my days if only to call you my husband.”
“Yes,” he growls, emotion jerking into his own voice. You’re clinging to him fiercely now, gripping his bare shoulders with all the intensity you can muster. His mouth travels lower, down your ribs, then to the softer flesh of your belly. He’s still cradling you close, shifting your position every time he kisses further down.
You press one hand to the back of his neck, encouraging him and anchoring yourself. “And I would bear your child,” you whisper, melting in pleasure at his gentle but inquisitive lips. “I would be so proud to be the mother of your children.”
Another thought you have indulged many times. The pride of bearing his children, of having all the world know that he has claimed you. The joy of raising children alongside him, seeing him be a father.
At this, the Spaniard nearly comes undone, and his grip on your waist surges with his heartbeat, thundering in his chest where he is pressed against your hips. He has nearly fallen onto his side now, both of you stretched out on his bed while he explores the full length of your body.
“I have imagined it so many times,” he confesses, his mouth open and hot against your waist. One of his hands moves to hold your hips in place, the other gripping your free hand where it clenches the blanket beside you. “Sharing a home, sharing my life with you. Making you my wife, making you the mother of my children.”
He seems to sense that you need him to be gentle tonight, and he is. A moment later, he has pushed himself up to realign with your body, supporting himself on one elbow while you get into the proper position beneath him.
He makes love to you slowly, gently, passionately, his hand gripping yours and his mouth resting on the curve of your neck. With every thrust, he whispers your name, tells you he loves you, and promises the life you will one day share.
And, oh, how you rise to meet him. How you effortlessly find his rhythm, plant your hand on his bare chest, and make love to him to the cadence of his steady heartbeat.
There is something about this particular position that drives him mad. He loves having you beneath him, having his body fully against yours, cradling you in his arms while you cling to him. He loves the sound of your labored breath, and the gentle strokes of your hands, and the way he can lean close and kiss you anywhere he pleases.
He’s nuzzling your neck, his tongue hot against the hollow of your throat, when you come undone for him. Without having to think, you grip his broad shoulders, wrap your legs tight around him. The soft moans he coaxes from you crescendo, sounds that he craves and glories in.
With those signs of your satisfaction — your sighs, your trembling, the way you cling to him so desperately — he pulls your body tight against his, reaching his own pleasure a few moments later.
Tears spill down your cheeks again, all in the simple joy of holding your love so close, feeling his body pulse with the pleasure only you bring him.
His sweet voice is sighing in your ear, gasping for breath while he comes down from his high. His broad hand strokes your side, gives your chest a gentle squeeze, rests on your hipbone as if anchoring himself.
Your hands trace patterns on his back, tenderly whispering to him while your tongue finds its words again. These moments are so intensely precious — immediately after you’ve taken your pleasure from each other, all either of you wants to do is cradle the other in your arms, stroke sensitive skin, and breathe in rhythm.
“I long to be yours,” you murmur breathlessly in his ear, dipping your head to kiss his neck, covered in a thin sheen of sweat. “I want to belong to you.”
The sound he makes comes from deep in his chest, rumbling against your breastbone. You know he is still recovering from his climax, and he rests his head in the curve of your neck, trying to catch his breath.
“I want you to mark me,” you whisper, suddenly longing for something that will tie you to him, replace the ugly brand seared into your wrist — the wrist that he kissed so tenderly earlier, the wrist that is now pressed against his dark hair.
He exhales a laugh, his breath fanning over your collarbone. “And how would you have me do that, my love?” he rasps.
His deep voice, always a bit different after he’s made love to you, stokes the fire in your stomach. He has shifted onto his side beside you, still holding you against his body with his face in your neck.
You smile in return, ducking your head shyly. You’ve never asked him for anything like this before, but you long for it in an inexpressible way.
“Choose a place on my body to mark,” you reply quietly, “anywhere you like. Give me something to replace my brand, even if it is not permanent.”
His body is still trembling, his hands shaking where they stroke up and down your back. His sweet touch is always gentler while he recovers from lovemaking.
“Will you not be punished for having a man’s mark on your body?” he inquires.
“Not if it is yours,” you tell him honestly. “What man would challenge the Spaniard for the right to mark me?”
When you lift your head slightly to meet his gaze, a mixture of emotions have clouded his eyes. You can see the sadness there, the longing to abolish any other man’s right to touch you again. You also see his earnest pride that you would ask for this, his pride that you long to be his, that you want his mark on your body for all to see.
His hands tighten on your waist, and the eager gleam in his eye tells you that he is willing to grant your request.
He helps you sit up on the bed, your body still trembling as much as his. While he sits up and leans back against the wall, you sit cross-legged between his legs, your back against his chest and his strong arm wrapped tight around your waist.
Somehow, the intimacy of this moment eclipses even your lovemaking. The trust, the closeness, the sheer physicality of letting him hold you, your bare body against his, makes you ache for him all over again.
He marks you on the neck, at the juncture of your shoulder, just a few inches from your spine. His lips are gentle but unyielding while he works your skin. You reach one hand to interlace with his where it presses firmly against your belly, squeezing his fingers for strength.
“Am I hurting you?” he asks cautiously, lips brushing your shoulder in the most delicious way.
You shudder, partly from his warm hand on your abdomen and partly from the sheer pleasure of having him mark you this way. “Not at all,” you promise him, and he continues.
Several blissful moments pass that way, with you melting in his strong arms, resting your head back against his broad shoulder. When he is satisfied with the dark mark he leaves on your skin, he presses a feather-light kiss to it.
“Now you are mine,” he whispers, his kisses trailing down your shoulder. “In a way that only you and I will know.”
That thought brings a smile to your lips while you rest in his arms. You have his mark, and no one can take it from you.
“I have always been yours,” you murmur, tilting your head back to kiss the underside of his jaw. He shivers at the contact. “From the moment I met you, I have been yours, body and soul.”
He wraps both arms more fully around you, and you can feel the deep breath he draws. “One day, I will make you my wife,” he swears, conviction ringing in his soft voice. “I will fight every day until I can claim you as mine.”
“Know that I already am.” You lift your hands to rest on his forearms, gripping the thick muscles there. His wrists flex and relax beneath your hands; he knows how you love holding him there.
“I know,” he agrees, dipping his head again to kiss your shoulder blade. “But one day I will claim you so that everyone will know who you belong to. You will never be in another man’s bed as long as I live.”
You squeeze his forearms, a mixture of joy and sorrow coursing through you. He lowers his head now, resting his forehead in the curve of your neck, weary and spent from the vigorous lovemaking.
You are exhausted, too, and eager to fall asleep in his arms for the next half-hour. But there is still one thing left for you to do.
“Now,” you declare, playfully nudging his chest with your shoulder, “it is my turn.”
He lifts his head, nuzzling your cheek with his face. You can feel his smile. “You intend to leave your mark on my body as well as my heart?”
Your own heart leaps at his sweet words, and you laugh with delight. “Not as you marked me,” you amend. “But I do want to give you something of mine.”
Carefully, you extricate yourself from his embrace, turning to face him. He’s still leaning back against the wall, and he rests his palms on your thighs where they lay across his now.
His gaze follows your hands, which you lift to fiddle with something in your hair. His eyes occasionally glance downward, sweeping in appreciation over your figure. While you work with both hands in your hair, he playfully traces his fingertips down your bare body.
The sensation coaxes a laugh and a gasp from you, and you teasingly swat his hand away so you can finish. His grin warms your heart in a way you could never put into words.
A moment later, you free your hands, your hair now tumbling free around your shoulders. He lifts his right hand reflexively to comb through your cascading hair, in the way he loves to do.
“This,” you tell him, “is for you.”
He lifts an eyebrow, his grin still softening his eyes and lighting up his face in the way you adore. “Your hair ribbon?” he asks curiously, mischief alighting in his eyes. “It is kind of you, my love, but I do not think my hair is long enough to be tied back.”
You laugh with him, easily and cheerily. Gentler, freer moments like these are what you live for.
“Hold out your hand,” you request with a smile, and he does so immediately, dropping the hand that has been buried in your long hair.
His wrist and forearm are thick, and your hair ribbon only wraps around it twice before you have to tuck it into a knot. He watches you with such admiration, such affection, as you tie your ribbon around his arm.
“There,” you murmur, tracing your fingers over the interlacing pattern. “Now you can bear me with you in the arena.”
Again, his eyes cloud with a mixture of shadow and light. He grips the back of your neck tenderly, leans you forward so that your forehead touches his.
“I bear you with me everywhere I go,” he whispers, “because you are ever in my heart.”
At that, you close the distance, entwining your arms around his neck while his lock around your bare waist. Once he has you securely pressed to his chest, he lays you down beside him, nestling you in his arms so you can both rest.
“I love you,” you whisper, your head tucked under his chin and your arm wrapped around his torso. “My life is yours, only yours, for the rest of my days.”
The Spaniard tenderly kisses your forehead, pulls you closer with an arm around your waist. His warmth pervades your skin, and his scent floods your senses. His heartbeat pounds steadily in his chest, where your other hand rests.
“And I am yours, my beloved,” he whispers, “until I seek you in the afterlife, and then for all eternity.”
The brand on your arm might as well have vanished, for now you bear the mark of your beloved on your skin, and he carries a symbol of your love on his own body. Though you are slaves with no way to truly belong to each other, the marking somehow makes your vows feel more permanent, more obvious to the outside world.
But at this moment, the outside world is utterly forgotten. Your love is in your arms, breathing steadily against you, and that is the sweetest pleasure on the face of the earth.
I've only recently started going through Crowe's filmography (Gladiator, 3:10, The Quick and The Dead) but are there any particular works you would recommend? I mean this as a fellow simp lmao
Oh my goodness where to even begin??? (also hi and welcome to the Russell fan club :D)
The three you've already seen are awesome places to start! If you're looking to see some of his most famous and popular movies, I'd start with Master and Commander, Cinderella Man, A Beautiful Mind, L.A. Confidential, American Gangster, and The Insider. Also Man of Steel but he's only in it for like 10 minutes.
If you're looking for some of his awesome but underrated movies, try The Water Diviner, Mystery Alaska, Proof of Life, Robin Hood, The Next Three Days, A Good Year, State of Play, Proof, and The Nice Guys.
If you're looking for some really niche movies of questionable quality because you just want to simp over Russell (my personal favorite genre of film), I'd recommend The Silver Brumby, Virtuosity, Rough Magic, Heaven's Burning, No Way Back, and Hammers Over the Anvil.
A few others I have not seen but have heard about are Breaking Up, The Sum of Us, Romper Stomper, Body of Lies, Tenderness, Les Miserables, Noah, Fathers and Daughters, and most of his newer movies (I haven't gotten around to those yet unfortunately).
I hope this helps! He's got so many fantastic movies and honestly is simp-worthy in every single one. I hope you find some you really enjoy! Welcome to the Russell ranks <3
Russell Crowe. Russell Crowe’s eyes. Russell Crowe’s hands. Russell Crowe’s voice. Russell Crowe’s shoulders. Fierce Russell Crowe. Soft domestic Russell Crowe. Shouting Russell Crowe. Horseback riding Russell Crowe. Fighting off eight guys at once Russell Crowe. Doing the thing where he licks his lips and glances up through his mile-long eyelashes Russell Crowe. Just Russell Crowe all day every day every night
over-psychoanalyzing blorbos is healthy and needed enrichment for the girlies in order to avoid over-psychoanalyzing themselves. like giving a dog a chew toy in order to redirect chewing on its hind legs
If you could make your Blorbo real (bring them to the real world) and have them live with you, would you do it?
Yes
No
Voting ended onOct 4, 2025
Every poll on this blog is about fictional characters only. This request was sent to us and we made a poll in response to it. Send any Blorbo-related question you want to our inbox and we’ll make a poll on which people can vote with their own Blorbos in minds
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