An ambitious epic, but rather ponderous, and unsubtle.

Rating: 5/10 (9 April 2011)

Spartacus is one film I felt compelled to watch. It had been frequently mentioned as a classic, and therefore I was pleased to finally catch up with it this year. I was disappointed with it however, on the surface, it has an interesting story, and interesting characters. The acting is good, if a little over done as might be expected in a Hollywood epic. It starts of well enough, with Kirk Douglas playing Spartacus who is a slave being trained to be a gladiator. The scenes in the gladiator school, are tough, and have a brutal efficiency to them. Then the story begins to escalate and I think struggles to maintain a focused narrative. Spartacus leads a slave revolt, which causes all sorts of plotting in Rome amongst the panicking generals and senators. Lawrence Olivier plays the most ruthless of the antagonists who sets out to destroy Spartacus, and in doing so wants to lay his claim to be the emperor. He is opposed by the machinations of Charles Laughton's higher minded senator. The acting is solid but subdued on the whole. Peter Ustinov as the Roman who runs the gladiator training camp, is doing Peter Ustinov's forte, i.e. doing a clever slyly witty turn. The film is rather worthy and its attempt to see Spartacus as a Christ like figure, is obvious. It amuses rather than jars seeing Hollywood's po-faced interjection of the religious symbolism in the film. Where the film disappoints is surprisingly its cinematography. Kubrick doesn't bring much visual flourish to the film which is unexpected. Only the major battle scene shows Kubrick at his best, with its cold and clinically powerful visuals. The film lacks the drive to sustain three hours though, even with the many sub plots. The film is never dull but it is only sporadically exciting, and you sort of drift along with it. There are some major faults with the film,one is the illogic of Spartacus in allowing himself to be attacked by three Roman armies. He did have the opportunity to attack one roman army at a time at his discretion. Poor generalship on Spartacus's part certainly, but not helpful to the films credibility. The last scene shows Spartacus being crucified, yet he has not a mark on him. Kirk Douglas suffers manfully but the lack of injuries is ridiculous, and really kills the power of the ending. It is a film I am glad to have finally seen, but it left me unmoved. It's a film that tries hard to be an intelligent epic, but it is strangely unconvincing, despite the good overall acting. It is by no means a failure, but somehow it lacks a necessary deep and emotional connection to any of the characters. The scene that does work best is the 'I'm Spartacus scene' it is a classic, yet not enough to make me like this film. I respect the ambition of the film, but once the film was over, I felt underwhelmed. It's one film ticked of my must watch list, but not one I would need to watch again.