You and I have a tendency towards corpulence. Corpulence makes a man reasonable, pleasant and phlegmatic. Have you noticed the nastiest of tyrants are invariably thin?

Rating: 8/10 (14 September 2012)

This Stanley Kubrick classic appears to have it all. The set decoration, cinematography and costuming are all superior. In fact Oscars were given for each of these along with one for Peter Ustinov as Batiatus. Also excellent was the editing, score, and, of course, the direction by Kubrick.
The cast was superlative. Kirk Douglas (Lust for Life, The Bad and the Beautiful, Champion) as Spartacus really gave us an outstanding performance as the man who took on Rome. Not until Gibson gave us William Wallace do we see a similar champion of the people fighting for freedom.
We cannot neglect mentioning Sir Laurence Olivier as Crassius, Jean Simmons as Varinia, and Woody Strode (The Quick and the Dead) as Draba.
The restored version of this film goes 3 and a half hours. I guess sitting through Grindhouse wasn't so bad after all. If a film is good, then the time flies by.