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Spartacus (1960)
Director: Stanley Kubrick
Country: United States
Length: 184 minutes
Type: Epic, War
'Spartacus' would be the crowning jewel in the filmographies of other directors but not Stanley Kubrick, who more or less disowned it. He lacked his usual "total creative control" having been brought in a week into filming after Anthony Mann was fired. Kubrick had disputes with the Cinematographer Russell Metty, writer Dalton Trumbo, star Kirk Douglas (who also produced), was not allowed to shoot it in the format he liked and didn't have final cut (scenes of violence and a homoerotic sequence were removed). It's a shame because it's arguably the film that made Kubrick's reputation. That the 30-year old Director of modest and controversial black & white movies could take the reins on a colossal and troubled Technirama production, turn it around and make it into the biggest hit Universal had ever had financially and critically is arguably one of the main reasons Kubrick had near carte blanche for the rest of his career. Without 'Spartacus', he probably wouldn't have been allowed to make all the other unusual masterpieces that he did have full control of.
It's not perfect, the 3-hour run time does drag a little in the middle after you've seen it 10 or 20 times. Some of the stylised coloured lighting looks very dated, very 1960s, very 'Star Trek: The Original Series'. The interior sets look a bit phony but there is also a lot of dramatic location filming and some incredibly beautiful and seamless matte paintings to balance it out. It's all heavily romanticised but sticks pretty close to the broad historical facts of the slave uprising (if the contemporaneous sources were accurate). The 6K restoration on the 55th Anniversary blu-ray looks incredible, including the addition of the aforementioned deleted homoerotic scene. Laurence Olivier hadn't recorded his dialogue for it, so Antony Hopkins did a note-perfect impersonation, you'd never tell. Without this important scene, it wasn't clear why Antoninus fled from the home of Crassus, or why Crassus was so obsessed with him.
This re-watch re-doubled my appreciation for Peter Ustinov's fantastic performance as Batiatus. I noticed that there is almost nothing in his script which invites us to sympathise, or to like his character. His words and deeds are equally as bad as the other slave-owning characters but when Ustinov is acting them out they become the words of a lovable rogue. Another actor could have played Batiatus with the same script and made him a villain. To have him, Laurence Olivier and Charles Laughton, three of the all-time greats on screen together is a real treat, not to mention stars Kirk Douglas and Tony Curtis. Laughton's wiley fictional politician Gracchus feels modeled on Cicero and Crassus' lust for power seems intended to echo the then recent dictators of the 20th Century.
The horrible irony of the final gladiatorial duel, where two friends fight with every sinew to kill the other, to save their companion from the worse fate of Crucifixion is dramatic genius from writer Dalton Trumbo. Trumbo had been jailed for refusing to "name names" at the notorious HUAC hearings. It's difficult to not see his iconic "I'm Spartacus!" scene as a celebration of those who had the courage to not betray their friends. Kirk Douglas bravely insisted that the blacklisted Trumbo be given full public credit. Anti-communist groups protested the film but once President Kennedy crossed their picket lines to enjoy 'Spartacus', the Hollywood blacklist was effectively ended.
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Gladiator (2000)
Director: Ridley Scott
Country: United States / United Kingdom
Length: 155 minutes
Type: Epic, Historical, Action
'Gladiator' is one of probably only a handful of movies I watched as many as 5 times in it's original theatrical window (also 'Mad Max: Fury Road' and 'Dredd'). The action, drama, scale, immersive power of the soundmix and the thundering majesty of Hans Zimmer and Lisa Gerrard's score (influenced by Holst and Wagner), all demanded to be seen and heard on the big screen. I think Ridley Scott realised 2000 was the perfect time to bring back the old Hollywood "sword & sandals" epic. A moment in time when CGI had progressed to a point that made the full enormity of his vision possible but also a time when 90% of it still had to be achieved with massive sets, real stunts, crowd scenes and location shooting. At the time I remember there was a huge fuss made about the groundbreaking shot that whirls around the arena, with a 360-degree CGI set extension to the roof. It still holds up 100% twenty years later. A few of the big digital matte paintings of Rome show their age but even those still look pretty great. I watched a Widescreen HDTV open-matte version, rather than my official matted CinemaScope blu-ray, it looks so much bigger and more epic with the expanded field of view.
Between the heart-pounding opening battle in the forest, all the various gladiatorial clashes that escalate across the first half and then the ending duel, it has to said that the pace gets a bit slack. Even in the classic original Theatrical Cut which I re-watched today, not to mention the 3-hour Extended Cut (which I've not seen in a long while). Among all the lavish costumes and sets, the one prop that looks rubbish is Maximus' gladiator helmet. I always hated the anachronistic design but up close in HD, it looks so bad, plasticy and impractical. I wonder if Scott made a last minute change to the design on a whim and the poor prop department had like an hour to weather it down and try to make it look believable. Or perhaps Scott noticed the mask in among some set dressing, never intended to be in closeup and swapped it for the original fine detailed prop? The attempt to complete Oliver Reed's scenes after he died mid-production, with a combination of doubles and early CGI head-swapping isn't totally successful but was preferable to recasting such a powerful performance. Considering Scott choose to cast three legendary, 1960s, elderly drinkers in prominent roles, it's a lucky only one of them died during filming. Richard Harris and David Hemmings would follow Reed to "the big pub in the sky" within a couple of years of 'Gladiator'. I'm glad they were all cast because they're so damn good, not to mention Sir Derek Jacobi, who adds oodles of RSC class. I notice Jacobi's fictional Senator Gracchus shares the same name as Charles Laughton's character from 'Spartacus' and is broadly the same character. A deft populist politician but one who still has some principles he's prepared to die for. Scott's film certainly borrows freely from films like 'Spartacus' and 'Ben-Hur'. 'Gladiator's $300 million profits put Ridley Scott permanently back on the Director A-list after a patchy career filled with as many bombs and misfires, as hits and classics. Although this was hardly his first movie, it made an instant mega-star out of Russell Crowe,while Joaquin Phoenix has had his pick of projects ever since.