Now I understand why Stanley Kubrick always backed away and disowned this quite financially successful picture "classic" of his.
After a week or two of shooting, star/producer Kirk Douglas fired Anthony Mann and called up his PATHS OF GLORY director Kubrick to finish the rest of his would-be non-Jesus Roman Empire epic, SPARTACUS.
Okay, what works? Well, Sir Laurence Olivier is money, so is Charles Laughton, Peter Ustinov.....hell, all the sequences shot in Rome rule, with the Senate political intrigue and all. Though check out the restored scene at a bathhouse finally put back in the 1991 restoration, where certainly two men talk whatever they like both "oysters" and "snails". At least it would be the more recognizable Romans that I know of!
But unfortunately, while that shit is hot, the rest of the movie isn't. If anything, Douglas(no offense, but even Kubrick would probably agree that Doulgas called the shots behind his back) delivers a very conventional hero picture of such historical epics of the time period. Yes, poor Spartacus gets his ass beaten like cookie dough, but what other indication is there that he could actually become a "charismatic" leader of a slave revolt? I mean besides the fact that he's the star.
Worse yet, I love how for such a movie about a whole other world from the 1960s, how these slaves have a clear understanding of "freedom" that we do today. Really, you think these slaves would know any better about such things in a whole world where slavery isn't only part of the status quo, but also considered an essential of society?
"I'm not an animal!"
Ya whatever.
"I'm Spartacus! I'm Spartacus! "I'm Spartacus!"
Oh? Well, whoever points out the real Spartacus gets free of any punishment. Any of you assholes want to support him now? I figured as much!
