Gladiator 2's Ridley Scott is still one of Hollywood's hardest-working directors

Ridley Scott is just a few weeks away from his 87th birthday, but nobody thinks he's going to slip quietly into retirement any time soon. This week, Scott debuts Gladiator II — the highly-anticipated sequel to the movie that won Best Picture more than 20 years ago. Next year, his dance card could include two more movies — post-apocalyptic thriller The Dog Stars and a Bee Gees biopic.

Scott has a voracious work ethic that dwarfs just about everybody else in Hollywood right now. He has directed 29 films since making his debut with The Duellists in 1977. That's an average of a movie every 19 months, marking a remarkable consistency over his 40-plus-year career.

This is particularly impressive given the scale of movie in which Scott operates. It's very rare for him to make a single-location, dialogue-fest. He deals in gargantuan spectacle, massive ensemble casts, and cutting-edge technology. These are tough films to make, but Scott keeps going and going. Gladiator II will be the fifth movie he has released since his 80th birthday.

Part of this is due to Scott's efficiency behind the camera, much like his similarly prolific contemporary Clint Eastwood. Scott explained in an interview on the DVD of his 2007 film American Gangster that he likes to work with "a minimum of three cameras" rolling to speed up the filming process.

He said: "If you take a little bit more time to prep on three cameras, or if it's a big stunt, eleven cameras, and – whilst it may take 45 minutes to set up – then when you're ready you say 'action', and you do three takes, two takes and is everybody happy? You say 'yeah, that's it'. So you move on."

Read more: Ridley Scott Stopped Reading Reviews After One Critic's Take 'Killed Me Stone Dead' (People, 3 min read)

Scott's work has accelerated since the death of his brother — fellow filmmaker Tony Scott — in 2012. He dedicated his next movie The Counselor to Tony and has since made films at a remarkable pace. In a profile of Scott by The New Yorker, regular collaborator David Scarpa said Scott was increasingly battling time, saying "his sense of infinite possibility that he had when he was younger is gone".

In the same piece, Scott biographer Paul Sammon explained: “Ridley once told me that he has been dogged by deep depression his whole life ... He says: ‘If I stop, I find myself sinking.’ "

There's no denying his productivity. Scott released a biblical epic (Exodus: Gods and Kings) and a Mars-set sci-fi (The Martian) with less than a year between them. Gladiator II arrives in cinemas almost exactly a year after Scott's last mammoth historical epic Napoleon. The director is already talking about Gladiator III — he simply cannot be stopped.

Read more: Ridley Scott Teases ‘Gladiator III’ Will Be Inspired by ‘The Godfather Part II’ (IndieWire, 3 min read)

In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Scott explained that the momentum of his recent work ethic is a result of the fact he "got good at cutting away all the crap". The filmmaker added: "You can’t have 40 projects in development. That’s a bad idea. I usually have three or four. And I think that’s why I have a great relationship with Fox. I’ve done 13 films for Fox, which may be the highest any director would do for a studio. It’s a bit like opening a restaurant. You better eat there every night."

Scott's work, too, maintains a remarkable standard of quality — the odd Alien: Covenant aberration aside. Napoleon was nominated for three Oscars and, based on the early Gladiator II reactions, he'll be a presence at the Academy Awards in 2025 as well.

So as he draws closer to the end of his ninth decade, there's no sign that Ridley Scott will be hanging up his camera and folding away his director's chair any time soon. When asked by The Hollywood Reporter about the rumours that Juror #2 will be Eastwood's cinematic swansong, Scott replied: "Well, yeah, but he’s f***ing 94. I’m 86 now, so I’ve still got a few to go."

He was even more emphatic when asked about Quentin Tarantino possibly stepping back after his upcoming 10th film. "I don’t f***ing believe that bulls***," said Scott. "Shut up and go make another movie."

Read more: Ridley Scott responds to Barry Keoghan's Gladiator 2 exit (Digital Spy, 2 min read)

It seems we'll all be able to enjoy the work of Ridley Scott for a few more years yet. Next up is The Dog Stars, in which Scott rejoins Gladiator II leading man Paul Mescal. The film is based on a book about a pilot and an ex-Marine who decide to seek something more beyond the abandoned airbase where they shelter from a pandemic-ravaged world. It could be another Ridley Scott masterclass.

Gladiator II is in UK cinemas from 15 November.