Caligula

Maybe it helps to be familiar with the history, Art, and literature of the Ancient Rome because "Caligula" is surprisingly truthful adaptation of the chapter about Caligula in "The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars by C. Suetonius Tranquillus, the Roman Historian. If you read the chapter dedicated to Nero, you'll be even more shocked because Nero was always fascinated by his uncle Caligula (he was a son of Caligula's sister Agrippina who later became a wife of Claudius who adopted Nero and made him the heir for the title and the power of Roman Emperor). Anyway, Nero made Caligula his role model and managed to surpass his uncle's' notorious fame.

The movie is notoriously famous for the plentiful scenes of real sex, including incest, necrophilia, rape, and orgies. The movie also includes quite nasty and gruesome scenes of torture, executions, murders, and humiliations but all of the events have been documented in the historical documents that still exist.

I don't think of the movie as a masterpiece or even a good movie for all of its 2.5 hours. It actually reminds the life of real Caligula. In his childhood and youth, he was adored by Roman people and especially by the army and he was a promising young man. When he grew up as a heir to the cruel and suspicious Tiberius, he had to hide his feelings and go through many humiliations in order to survive. Shrewd Tiberius said about his adopted grandson that "never humankind knew the better slave and the worse ruler than Caligula" and that he was rearing "a viper for the Roman people and a Phaethon for the world."

When the young man finally received an access to the absolute power it had absolutely corrupted him. It is also known that soon after becoming head of Roman Empire, Caligula suffered an illness and as the result of it, he became incredibly nasty, cruel, and suspicious man who had indulged in the worst acts of debauchery, cruelty, and sadism. The movie follows this pattern. I still think that it is an interesting movie with very good actors. Not every day you can see porn with Helen Mirren, Peter O'Toole, Sir John Gielgud, and of course, Mr. Clockwork Orange himself, Malcolm McDowell.

This is the sort of film that I would have enjoyed stumbling upon as a 15 year old switching through late night BBC 2 and channel 4 at 3am in the morning.

I think I watched the 'Uncut version' of this film. I found it somewhat hard to follow or to understand every motive or decision other that the overlying top most story.

It was just wild decisions of mad man in my opinion. However, now reading details about the film, there would have been cuts and edits here and there that broke up the flow.

It did provoke some thoughts about what it might have been like to live in those times. How life had little value and could be taken away for very minor issues.

It also highlighted how certain types of entertainment media still existed, it just wasn't in the mainstream. As humans, we haven't progressed as much as we would like to think.

I have access to the Ultimate Cut version and watched about 5 mins of it so far. This version has 20 mins more in the run time, missing scenes and some rearranged, different angles and different audio/script.

In those 5 mins, I was able to get a better understanding of the story compared to the uncut version. It even briefly explained initial history of the making of the film. What I will do is probably revisit it in a month.

It was interesting to see Dame Helen Mirren in her physical prime. I've only ever seen her acting over the age of 45.

The film is gory in a low tech way. I don't think I know anyone that I could recommend this to.

I watched this movie the first time the night-before last.. and watched it again last night and again tonight.

This movie is far from pornography... only a few scenes are hardcore, and only a couple of these are even barely erotic. It does not exactly function as an historical epic, either.

The film quality and lighting would make it appear to date from the 1960s.

The script is mediocre. More drama could be added, however we do have to bear in mind that the Romans followed the school of Stoicism.

The acting (including Malcolm McDowell's) is nothing outstanding, with the exception of Peter O'Toole's Tiberius Caesar. He displays tragedy and lunacy, evoking reactions of disgust, sympathy, pity, and compassion. I found myself much more intrigued by his character and wishing the movie was about his decline from wisdom to near-madness, rather than Caligula. It also caused me to desire to learn more and research the actual life of Tiberius.

The film neither condemns, nor condones. That is probably how it should be.

Where this film succeeds monumentally is the costuming and unabridged realism. This is the first film I've seen to have a character wearing a toga like the one Caligula's sister (a design many Roman women actually wore) wears in the opening scene. The depiction of slaves and the acts of love and brutality are well-done. It is not erotic, it is not horrifying. With the hardcore scenes excised (the version i saw was the complete version), I believe this movie should be shown in every high school World History class. For centuries, Western culture has censored and toned-down representations of its Pagan past. The filmmakers must be applauded for attempting to make an honest epic.

I've become very hard to please when it comes to movies. The last movie I actually liked to a strong degree was Amadeus, which I saw two years ago. Despite its flaws, with its sheer amount of action and atmosphere, I believe this movie deserves a 10.

The rise and fall of one of the most famous, and infamous Caesars of all, Caligula.

I had only ever seen the edited version, recently I was made to watch the whole, uncut version, it was so long, it seemed to be on for almost three hours.

If I'm honest, the uncut version seemed to make more sense, it flowed a lot better. The original better shows the level of depravity of the man, and the behaviour he condoned and encouraged.

I can't say it's a great film, but it's definitely worth watching, at times it's just too gratuitous, and too self indulgent. It's worth watching to get a version of Caligula, I was left feeling a little confused, as to whether it's an accurate form of the man, or just the director's desire to make a porn film.

McDowell is excellent, he's wild eyed, manic, and clearly very comfortable playing such a part, I think some of the acting elsewhere is very dodgy.

That scene with the bride and groom on their wedding night is overly grim, it's too much.

Amazing sets, and some of the production values are very decadent.

It doesn't surprise me that this was a massive flop, I'm not sure audiences were ready for it.

It's interesting, it held my attention, would I watch it again soon? Not on your Nelly!

Worth seeing, 7/10.

Excuse the title of this review however the bottom line is, it has to be seen to be believed. The purely supreme cast is more than likely the only thing keeping the film from being well and truly buried in a basement. Historical revelations indicate that the content of this film probably does in fact (to a degree) reflect the lunacy rampant at the time and yes that means....meaningless executions, wild paranoia, incest and of course the gratuitous sex which could probably leave some soft porn movies looking very average (provided you get the right version). No its not a true classic but it dabbles with taboo, and dares go where other films draw the line. Its one i'll watch again and one you'd have to see merely to say you saw it. 6/10 scorpio