Spartacus - The Complete TV Miniseries

Rating:
Summary: Frustrating...
Review: I eagerly awaited this film. Spartacus is such an interesting personality from the ancient world that he definitely needs another look. And what do we get? A basic remake of the 1960 version with a few new additions.

There were some things I did like. I thought Goran Visnjic did a pretty good job of portraying Spartacus. Most of the rest of the cast also did a commendable job. It was filmed very well and I thought they portrayed most of the rebellion accurately. The movie was fairly entertaining as well. However...

Angus Macfayden is completely miscast. I really don't understand how he was cast as Crassus. Just completely unconvincing. I felt he overacted the entire movie, like he was trying too hard. It's really a shame too, because I thought he did an incredible job in Braveheart, where his lines seemed to come almost naturally. Not so in this movie.

For the life of me I cannot understand why they used Fast's novel AGAIN. Folks, this is not history. Fast is a historian-for-hire who makes up fantasized tales in order to sell more books. There are so many flaws with this book that I cannot even begin to name them all. Avoid it like the plague, and don't say you weren't warned!

The historical inconsistencies of this film are almost sickening. I understand that we have very limited sources on Spartacus (the only real source we have is Plutarch), but this doesn't mean you can just add things in there because you feel like it. I'm not a huge stickler for complete accuracy (I enjoyed Braveheart and Gladiator as much as the next guy), but this movie really goes too far. The character of Antonius Agrippa probably never existed, and if he did, it was certainly not in the form that this film portrays him. The ending of the movie made me want to cringe. Sorry to break it to you all, but there is no happy ending. Spartacus dies, his followers die, he never had a child and he was in fact probably never married. Yes, it's unfortunate, and we all wanted him to win, but that's reality folks. Why does Hollywood need to insult our intelligence by adding these contrived, happy endings? Complete and utter nonsense.

Marxist historians love Spartacus, and it's evident throughout this movie. Spartacus never wanted to conquer Rome and establish his own state. He wanted to get out of Italy, go back home to Thrace, and stay away from the Romans who enslaved him. That's all there was to it.

Rating:
Summary: Luka as Spartacus
Review: I have been a fan of Goran Visnjic since he started on the show E.R. which also happens to be one of my favorite television shows. When I heard he was to play Spartacus there was no doubt in my mind I would watch it. Seeing him topless for most of the movie was a very big plus. I also liked the fighting scenes. Some were a little graphic but they were very exciting to watch.
I had the pleasure of watching this special on the HIstory Channel again last night and fell even more in love with it. This is definitely on my Christmas List. I would advise any fan of "Luka" to rent, buy, do whatever it takes to see this.

Rating:
Summary: Its time for Mitra to shine
Review: I programmed this television mini-series to record on my TiVo thinking that I was recording the classic Stanley Kurbrick sandal-and-sword epic. Imagine my surprise then when I pressed the play button and found myself looking at Goran Visnjic instead of Kirk Douglas. Was I disappointed? For about three seconds, for my eye was instantly captured by adorable and incredibly beautiful Rhona Mitra who plays the slave girl who will eventually become Spartacus' wife and mother of his child. How did I not become entranced with her in her other movies such as `Sweet Home Alabama.'
Covering much the same territory as the Kubrick movie, this sprawling miniseries (four hours with ads on the History Channel) does an admirable job in retracing the historical story of the gladiator turned military commander. The man who managed to outwit Roman general after Roman general until his final confrontation in what is now southern Italy. What I found most interesting in this show (which was such compulsive viewing that I literally had to tear myself away from the television set) was the political interplay and maneuvering in Rome and believe this is where this production comes closest to eclipsing its illustrious predecessor.
Mitra is simply amazing and Visnjic displays a great deal of charisma in the title role. I have never seen the television show ER but I would venture to guess that both actors have a bright future on the big screen based on their performances here.
Both dramatic in its `quiet moments' and rousing in its battle scenes you can do much-much worse and for I am grateful for my fortunate error in that I discovered an entertaining mini-series and a new movie actress crush in Mitra (to join Keira Knightley and Kate Beckinsale).

Rating:
Summary: Exceptional mini-series
Review: The big difference between "Spartacus" the TV movie and "Spartacus" Stanley Kubrick's epic from 1960 are tennis shoes. Why tennis shoes? It's rumored that if you look carefully at Kubrick's film some of the extras are wearing tennis shoes as they fight the Romans. While this version lacks tennis shoes, its brisk pacing makes it just as fast on its feet and Kubrick's film. "Spartacus" based on Howard Fast's epic novel gets a second epic retelling in this terrific television adaptation. While it lacks some of the visual splendor of the 1960 version starring Kirk Douglas, it makes up for this scale through the use of CGI visuals to represent the City of Rome and strong performances from the late Alan Bates, Goran Visnjic as Spartacus and Rhona Miltra as his love. Visnjic and Mitra both provide convincing performances as the two leads. Both are also closer in age to what I had envisioned the characters to be. When I originally saw Kubrick's original film, I thought both Kirk Douglas and Gene Simmons were a bit too old to play their parts. Visnjic plays Spartacus as an ordinary man uncomfortable with the burden of leadership but willing to step into the fray since there was nobody else that could truly lead them. There's been some criticism that this isn't historically accurate. Well folks, that's why its called fiction. It's based on a fictional account written by the late novelist Howard Fast and much closer to Fast's novel.

Although it's 20 minutes shorter than Kubrick's film, the modern pacing and convincing period detail of the production manage to convey much of the same qualities that made the original flawed film a classic. Director Robert Dornhelm's ("Anne Frank-The Whole Story", "RFK", "Echo Park" and "Rudy-The Rudy Giuliani Story") confident direction. Pulitzer Prize Winner Robert Schenkkan's ("The Quiet American") script stays true to Fast's novel but also introduces character moments that contemporary audience's can relate to without betraying the setting of the film. Interestingly Schenkkan's script focuses much more on the politics of anicent Rome than Kubrick's film. Usually that'll undo a film with as much action as "Spartacus" but that's not the case here.

The anamorphic widescreen transfer looks terrific with sharp colors, little in the way of digital blemishes and a crystal clear picture. The DVD has also been enhanced for 16x9 television sets which means that it'll fill the screen of your widescreen TV sets. Since it was shot in 1.78:1 with a more rectangular image (vs. the square image of 1.33:1 full screen films), this transfer should not only look exceptionally good on HDTV's but also there should be little to no picture lost as a result. The 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround Sound mix is particularly rich with a lot of attention paid to detailed background sounds and a nice spread across the surround channels.

The only extras included on this dual sided (and dual layered at least on side one) disc are scenes that were deleted for the TV premiere. Since these have been integrated back into the main body of the film, technically speaking they aren't extras. My only real complaint is that, as usual, Universal doesn't provide anything in the way of extras (deleted scenes excepted) or a commentary track. I'd love to hear why the director and writer chose to emphasize some elements vs. others when compared to the original classic theatrical film.

A terrific adaptation of Fast's novel, "Spartacus" manages to reach an audience the way that the classic 1960's film might not. The swift pacing and more contemporary performances make this film a worthwhile investment for viewers who haven't seen the original. While it doesn't have quite the epic sweep of Kubrick's film, it does contain a number of marvelous performances and the sharp writing & direction make it a thoughtful film. The entertaining performances from Alan Bates and Ian McNiece more than make up for any lack of star power from the two leads (although both are quite good in their roles and more believable than Douglas and Simmons in the original film).


Rating:
Summary: Why remake "Spartacus" and still not get the history right?
Review: The rationale for turning Stanley Kubrick's 1960 film "Spartacus" into a two-part television mini-series was that this time the production would be more faithful to Howard Fast's novel. Given that the Spartacus revolt is a part of Roman history it would make more sense to try and be more faithful to that actual history than a fictional novel, but that is going to have to wait for another day and it just might take a while for Hollywood to want to revisit this story. The chief attraction of Fast's novel, in contrast to the historical record, would seem to be the happy ending that is provided by virtue of Spartacus having a child who survives his death and is raised free.

What we believe we know about the real Spartacus is that he was born free in Thrace and may have served as an auxiliary in the Roman army in Macedonia. However, he deserted, lived as an outlaw, was captured, sold into slavery, and ended up being trained at the gladiatorial school of Batiatus in Capua. In 73 B.C.E. Spartacus escaped with 70-80 other gladiators and camped on Vesuvius, where they were joined by other slaves who ran away from their masters and began plundering and pillaging the region. Spartacus wanted to escape Italy by crossing the Alpus, but the slaves from Gaul and Germany wanted to stay in southern Italy and continuing the plundering and pillaging. That first year Spartacus and his men defeated a force of 3,000 raw recruits led by Cladius Glaber and then two forces of legionary cohorts. In 72 B.C.E. Spartacus had an army of approximately 70,000 slaves and the Roman Senate sent two consuls, Publicola and Lentulus, with two legions each against the rebels. Publicola defeated the Gauls and Germans, and Crixus was killed. At Picenum in central Italy, Spartacus then defeated first Lentulus and then Publicola, having 300 prisoners from the battles fight in pairs to the death. The slave army then moved north and defeated the proconsul of Cisalpine Gual at Mutina. With the Alps open as a way out of Italy, the Gauls and Germans refused to go, and Spartacus returned to southern Italy intended to try and cross to Sicily.

At the height of the revolt Spartacus had about 120,000 followers and the Senate sent Marcus Licinius Crassus with six new legions in addition to the four consular legions to defeat Spartacus in 71 B.C.E. Exactly how Spartacus died is not known, although it is believed he died in the battle near the headwaters of the Siler River. Six thousand of the slaves that were taken prisoner by Crassus were crucified along the Appian Way from Capua, where the gladiators had been trained, to Rome. Another five thousand slaves escaped and fled north, but they were captured by Pompey's army and the following year Pompey and Crassus were elected consuls.

Enough of the history lesson. The point is that the slave revolt was not as unified or as simplistic as it appears in either version of "Spartacus." Following the lead of Fast's novel, it is not the conflict between Spartacus (Goran Visnjic) and Crixus (Paul Kynman) that is at the center of the drama but the collision course between Spartacus and Crassus (Angus Macfadyen), who are such mirror opposites. You have the former slave who is uncomfortable with being declared the leader of the slave revolt and the rich Roman who is just begging to be put in command of troops. Then there is Varinia (Rhona Mitra), the wife of Spartacus, created by Fast from a reference in Plutarch to Spartacus having a wife who was a former slave.

I wondered about the casting of this version of "Spartacus" in terms of the ages of the actors playing the historic figures. Overall, they are slightly younger. The year the slave revolt was crushed Spartacus was 38 (Visnjic is 32), Marcus Licinius Crassus was 45 (Macfadyen is 41, but looks much younger), and Pompey the Great was 36 (George Calil is 31). Although Pompey actually enjoyed a triumph when he was 24, he was the exception and not the rule. Yet in this production it is like the junior executives are fighting over who gets to run the firm. No wonder a giant slave army is running around the Italian countryside for a couple of years and no wonder after watching this remake you will be more impressed with the performance of Kirk Douglas in the original.

Visnjic's Spartacus comes across as bored rather than brooding. Before a big battle his idea of strategy and tactics is to hope that maybe they will get a break and be able to win. I can appreciate the idea that it is better to die free than to live as a slave, but you should try to avoid rushing off to die. Macfadyen's Crassus is rather petulant. He wants to rise to power in Rome but is thwarted by the machination of Agrippa (Alan Bates), and he sees Spartacus as the key to every thing he wants. That explains why he postures like he really believes he can defeat the gladiator in one-on-one combat on the field of battles, and why he is fixated on Varinia. This guy cannot be in charge of himself, so how can he run the Roman Republic? Bates and Mitra turn in the two best performances in "Spartacus," which makes their supporting characters the two most interesting ones. Spartacus has been an idealized champion of the masses because he stood up to the Romans at a time when they were carving out their empire, but the idea that he was a sensitive guy who accepted gender equality is just a bit too much. Hopefully, the next time the story of Spartacus is filmed they will just go with getting the history right instead of being concerned with political correctness.