Rating: 
Summary: Rent it, don't buy it.
Review: The five stars are for the programme itself - I completely endorse the positive comments other writers have made concerning the series and the actors - but I would give only one star for the technical quality. I also have the recently released Australian DVDs and they are no better. As with all BBC programmes there has been no effort to digitally clean up the image, and as for the sound! It simply isn't good enough. These are expensive DVDs and to produce such rubbish is just customer contempt on the part of the manufacturers. My advise: rent it and enjoy, but save your money until someone produces a DVD of quality worthy of the series and the actors therein.
Rating: 
Summary: A masterpiece of entertainment, but DVD is faulty
Review: This is truly one of the best "mini-series" dramas ever made, and I easily rate the show itself FIVE STARS. There's a lot of reviews of this show by others, most of which describing the brilliant writing and acting. Some people mentioned the picture quality isn't that great, considering this is a DVD release, but the original show was shot on video. It's cheap looking, anyone will admit that. The whole production is studio-bound, and there's not a trace of music throughout. It's basically a stage production played by stage actors - and all of that adds to the charm. It's the writing, it's the writing, it's the WRITING! You'll be hooked.But the DVD has a serious problem with the audio. It's horrible! And I know it's not the show itself, since I've seen this both on PBS and video, and never did I have trouble hearing anything while watching it then. But the DVD version is muffled, and you'll have to turn the volume up ALL the way to hear the more quiet moments. A lot of the time I couldn't hear a thing being said. I was so frustrated that I hooked up a stereo to the TV, hoping that would help. But I even had to turn the stereo up ALL the way, and even then the more "whispery" moments are nearly impossible to hear. And considering how much scheming and secret plotting go on in the show, there's plenty of hushed whispering going on through the Roman palaces. The DVD's only "extra feature" is an hour long documentary about the abandoned 30's production of "I, Claudius," which was to be a massively expensive and lavish movie. Sure, it's mildly interesting, but I was disappointed that the only "behind the scenes" material was about this lost movie, and NONE about the "I, Claudius" I just got done watching. No info, no extras, no "behind the scenes" stuff, no commentary, no interviews. Nothing. Grrr. But if you can deal with the bad audio (and I'm not the only one complaining about the bad sound - other reviewers have mentioned the same), it's worth the money. But it's not a cheap buy. It's a lot of money to invest, and when you spend that much money on DVD's, you expect top quality. But beware - this is NOT the best quality that could be had. When I watch this again, I'll probably watch the VHS version. Sure, the visual quality might not be as good, but it never was in the first place. But at least I'll be able to hear what the actors are saying!
Rating:
Summary: No One Could Write Fiction Like This And It's All True
Review: Absolutely the best example of characterization and story telling to be found anywhere. You can make fun of the English for a great number of things, but they have the entire planet cornered on acting! This mini series is perfectly cast and if you give it a chance to get going, it will HOOK you from start to end. This is surprisingly one of the sexiest shows I have ever seen, too. Not really for young kids or young teens. Brian Blessed is perfect as Augustus, an emperor for whom the job seems too big and exhausting sometimes, but this is because of his scheming wife who will do ANY thing to get her sons the big position held by her husband. Patrick Stewart also gave an incredibly strong and unforgettable performance as a military man looking to sleep his way into royalty and power. He pays by being dismembered and publicly displayed. I'm sorry he's become Americanized with such schlock as the Star Trek stuff. The series has some unforgettable moments such as when young Claudius is standing with a group of kids and an eagle drops a wolf pup into his hands (wolves, the symbol of the Roman Empire.) It could have been the strong kids, but it's little, slow, stammering Claudius. Then, Caligula (John Hurt) in one of the funniest scenes anywhere shows up in frightful, ungodly drag as some sort of goddess and dances around poor Claudius who knows if he laughs, he'll be instantly dead. When Claudius becomes emperor, the love of his life wife, unknowing to him, takes on the biggest wh*re in Rome to see who can lay the most men in a day. And she beats the wh*re. The wife is then forced to commit suicide by knife, but can't and is forcibly decapitated as she begs for her life.
Tiberious becomes a sexual deviant and forces a woman to do perverted acts in exchange so that her very young daughter doesn't have to. The woman disembowls herself in front of everyone at a dinner because she feels so violated and dirty.
Augustus'beloved can-never-do-anything-wrong daughter beds most of the Roman senate and all her dad's friends and he banishes her to an island forever. Everyone is sleeping with everyone and it's a little tough to keep up, but verrrrrrry entertaining. If you're looking for great acting and story-telling, give this one a go!! 10 stars, actually, this is the ultimate Classic!
Rating:
Summary: Televisions Finest Hour(s)
Review: I've recently become interested in historical fiction and after hearing such wonderful things about "I, Claudius" I decided to purchase it from Amazon and see if it was indeed as great as everyone says. I am pleased to report that this is probably the best DVD investment I have ever made (and being a DVD junkie I've made plenty). "I, Claudius" is without doubt one of the greatest things television has ever given us. This story has everything: great characters, intrigue, murder, lust, sex, passion, politics, humor, etc (and thats just in the first couple of episodes). Sure its production values are a bit stagey but who needs elaborate sets or special effects when you have such a rich ensemble of charcters and drama. Seldom have I been so absolutely riveted by what was going on my televison screen. And what a great cast: Derek Jacobi, Sian Philips, John Hurt, Patrick Stewart, and Brian Blessed are just a few of the actors who provide outstanding performances in this production. I was very sad when the whole thing came to an end; I had become so caught up in this saga and its people I just wanted it to go on forever. I've talked this show up so much with my friends I now have a waiting list of folks who want to borrow it and watch it for themselves. Anyway, if you haven't seen "I, Claudius" I can't reccomend it highly enough. Beg, borrow or buy this DVD set. You won't be dissapointed. Now, I'm off to get Robert Graves' novels upon which the whole thing is based. Oh, and BTW, don't touch the figs!
Rating:
Summary: if this doesn't get you interested in history, nothing will
Review: this is a wonderful series, even if you don't know a thing about roman history. the characters are all vividly drawn, the drama is intriguing, you come away wanting to read the book to find out more about these people and their times. that's the biggest compliment for any film based on a book. the only drawback is the production value which is poor, early 80's BBC quality. and the fact that much of the material is speculative - there's simply no confirmation of many of the events.
Rating:
Summary: The very finest vintage champange.
Review: The BBC's mid 1970's 13 part adaptation of Robert Graves novels "I Claudius" and "Claudius, the God" has always been considered to be one of the finest pieces of television ever made (The Bollinger of the Beeb if you like.) and in many ways puts most big budget films to shame. I first saw this when I was about 8 or 9 years old (my parents allowed me to stay up and watch it) and I remember being transfixed by it. Up until then history as it was taught at school was all about cavemen with rocks or pitch battles between army's, quite boring really, but these characters who were ready kill, steal or do what ever was necessary to get and hold on to power really fascinated me. I bought this DVD a couple of months ago, just to have more than anything else, but once I started watching it, the magic started all over again. With the perception of an adult I can see just what a masterpiece this series actually is. Covering the greater part of reign of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, of the most fascinating periods in history, I Claudius begins 7 years after Octavian's defeat of Marc Anthony and Cleopatra at the battle of Actuim and ends with the accession of Nero. The individual performances from Derek Jacobi as Claudius, stammering his way through life with only the occasional hint of the man beneath, Sian Phillips, as the scheming almost lady Macbeth like Livia and John Hurt's Caligula are all acting master classes. Hurt in particular is in amazing form, many actors have tried to portray the unpredictability and sheer manic insanity of Caligula, but none have come with in spiting distance of Hurt or for that matter any of the three above. This overt display of genius seems to lift the rest of the cast along with them, Patrick Stewart, Brian Blessed, George Baker, Isobel Dean, James Faulkner, Barbara Young, Fiona Walker and Margaret Tyzack, all superb actors and actresses in their own right, give the performances of their careers here. Although the picture looks slightly crude (not surprising considering that it was shot on video rather than film), the soundtrack is almost nonexistent and the sets look Spartan by the standards set by modern cinema (compare the palaces in here with those in Gladiator to see what I mean), yet despite these shortcomings, the viewer very quickly looks beyond that as he or she is carried away by the truly engrossing story and magnificent performances of all concerned, approach this more as a stage play than a movie and you'll get the idea. Ok so, authorised history is sacrificed in favour of a good story, although Robert Graves himself always claimed it was accurate based on a manuscript he discovered in the aftermath of World War 1, what we have here are the back stairs whispers and not the facts as set down in the history books. But isn't the servants gossip is always much more juicy and often far more revealing than the press release?
Rating:
Summary: An Amazing Drama Worth Experiencing Many Times
Review: Here we have a family saga full of intrigue, love, hate, violence, lust, ambition, and insanity. The drama is heightened because it the family includes Roman Emperors, beginning with Augustus through Nero. The wonderful dramatic mechanism is the narration of the story by Claudius (played so wonderfully by Derek Jacobi) who is thought to be a fool and yet ends up, briefly, the Emperor. He is writing his own history of the family and empire from just before he is born until his wife betrays him in favor of her son, Nero. Along the way we get the amazing and evil Livia (Sian Phillips), the crazed Caligula (played so bravely by John Hurt). This is a big story, based in outline in fact, but is most of all a great story told memorably. It is told in 13 episodes as it was aired over the BBC. It is from the mid-1970s and has some of that period's style and production values, but that really doesn't make it dated because the story and the acting are so powerful. This five disk collection also includes a documentary of a 1937 version that was going to be done for the big screen and would have starred, among others, Merle Oberon, and Charles Laughton. It documents what it was intended to be and why it failed. This series is an amazing experience and its all-star cast almost uniformly went on to great heights. It is really something that needs to be experienced and you will likely want to view it many times.
Rating:
Summary: A Wonderful Historical Fiction Mini-series.
Review: This production of the original BBC mini-series is fantastic! I own this and highly, highly, and even more highly, recommend it!!! First of all, the history in this adaptation to the novel by Robert Graves, is impeccable. I make such judgements as a historian, and don't make them lightly. Certainly, there are many flights of fancy and conjecture in this historical fiction, but it is one grand historical fiction! They have the timeline down pat, and the familial and dynastic relationships as well. Poetic liscense is taken, again, in all of the fiction and conjecture, but it really all fits into place with the history, and with what contemporaries wrote of the Julio-Claudian line. Claudius, the grandson of the first emperor of Rome, Augustus, is played by Derek Jacobi. Claudius was a stammerrer/stutterrer and had a lame foot. Who would have known the greatness that was destined for him other than the Sybill? Claudius' life is chronicled from the retrospectof his autobiography(it would be wonderful is such a one existed!). All of the players for power in his family are there, from Augustus, played by Brian Blessed, to his wife Livia, played by Sian Phillips, to Caligula, played by John Hurt, to the ambitious Sejanus, played by Patrick Stewart(with hair!), and the awful Nero. Claudius' rise to power is the culmination, and his poisoning by his wife the climax. At the end, he and the Sybill(the oracle), laugh about how he cheated death....as he buried a copy of his autobiography that Nero and his mother had so craftilly destroyed. Another note on the acting in this. Most of these actors are Shakespearian actors. Derek Jacobi's performance is stupendous! I also particularly liked Brian Blessed as Augustus, John Hurt made a very believable Caligula, and Patrick Stewart, so far away from his role as the captain of the Enterprise, plays a villanious and conniving Sejanus. All in all, get this, beg borrow or steal to watch it. I know its long....13 hours to be precise. But it is worth it. Like a good book, you can't put it down! The DVD Format is very nice as well.
Rating:
Summary: Can you say, "classic"?
Review: This miniseries blows any other miniseries out of the water. It is the quintessential Roman epic. Derek Jacobi is astounding as Claudius. This is the second movie of his that I've seen. The first Derek Jacobi movie I saw was the Kenneth Branagh version of Hamlet. Ironically, his character's name was Claudius in that one too. All of the actors are stupendous from the big to the small, from the major roles to the minor roles. There are some very sad parts like when they kill Sejanus's kids. When I first read a synopsis on the Internet of Sejanus's last episode. I thought, "Oh, my God. They kill those cute kids." I was shocked. I'll admit that it took me a while to recognize Patrick Stewart as Sejanus. I thought he was going to be bald like in Star Trek. George Baker was amazing as Tiberius. He was so strong. He portrayed Tiberius as a man who won't take any bull from anybody, not even his mother, Livia (who was beautifully portrayed to perfection by Sian Phillips). Frances White was simply delightful as Julia. There was one thing I didn't like about her. Her nose was so big. I wonder if that's her real nose. Despite that, Frances White's performance was over too quickly. All of the characters in this show age considerably. For example, Livia is 50 at the beginning of the show. Then, she's 60 and her hair is grey. In her last episode, she's in her 80s and her hair was so white, I thought she was bald. Brian Blessed must be one of the most popular actors alive. He keeps getting hired for everything. For a more recent look at the actor, rent Star Wars: Episode I: The Phantom Menace. He was Boss Nass. There is also an appearance by another popular actor, John Rhys-Davies. His most recent role was Gimli in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. He is also known for portraying Sallah in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade. He was good. I didn't really recognize him partly because he had a beard in all the other movies I saw him in. My favorite episodes are the early episodes where everything isn't as tragic and dramatic. Things kind of get tragic after Augustus dies and Tiberius takes over. Things are just as good in the last episode where not only is there an appearance made by a character from the first and last episodes (the Sibyl) but there is also a scene where Claudius is in the Senate and all of a sudden, the ghosts of Augustus, Livia, Antonia (his mother), Tiberius, and Caligula (played by John Hurt). Augustus congratulates Claudius on becoming emperor, Livia calls Claudius a fool, Antonia tells Claudius that his nose is running, Caligula tells him that he found out he was mad, and Tiberius tells Claudius that being emperor just isn't worth it. I was moved by this sequence because I enjoyed seeing old faces again. I sort of wish that Julia was there too and all the other people who died along the way. John Hurt played Caligula with a very childish air. I personally didn't know he was so mad that he ate his own child. However, John Hurt's laugh is incredibly annoying. There's another thing I didn't like about the movie. There was too much nudity. I felt like I was watching a movie that was a period piece and a porn movie at the same time. The guy who played Nero made Nero look like [a goon] and it became brazenly obvious how the empire fell. All in all, buy this movie. It is fabulous. It doesn't have subtitles but that's the way it is.
Rating:
Summary: An Epic in the true sense of the word. Excellent! Wonderful!
Review: I had not seen "I,Claudius" since it was first broadcast on British television in the late 70s, but as I watched it unfold on video, I found myself remembering vividly every scene. It is that powerful. "I,Claudius" has got to be one of the best historical dramas ever shown on television. From the remarkable script to the first class acting, it has everything. Jack Pullman's script extracts the very essence of the source novels by Robert Graves. The viewer is drawn effortlessly into a world of power, intrigue, murder, incest, and cruelty. At the centre of all this is the stuttering, crippled fool, Clau-Clau-Claudius, who survives palace revolutions and mad emperors through pure luck and by seeming more foolish than he really is. In fact, he survives them all to become a reluctant Emperor until he falls victim to.... well, I wont give the ending away, although it is historical record. Shall we just say that women are rather negatively portrayed. (This is not the fault of Jack Pullman or Robert Graves, but that of the ancient scribbler, Suetonius, whose book -or should that be scroll? -, "The Twelve Caesars," portrayed the Caesars as men of good intentions who became corrupted by power. Seutonius was a republican who loathed the idea of an all-powerful Caesar. He thought that the wives of the Caesars, conniving poisoners all, had a corrupting influence. The Senate, therefore, should be the sole repository of authority, away from the perfidious influence of women. Suetonius was not exactly an early feminist. Graves' source material, as he well knew, is suspect.) However, allowing for Suetonius prejudices, and we are talking about the turn of the 1st millennium here, if women do not come over as sympathetic, then they are at least strong. Livia, the wife of Augustus and aunt of Claudius, practically ran the Empire through her husband. She was evil personified. Only Messalina, the wife of Claudius, and Livilla, the sister of Claudius, (see a pattern here?) match her for sheer evil. The acting is sheer joy. Derek Jacobi, John Hurt, Patricia Quinn (the sexiest woman ever to grace a film set), and Sian Phillips, all shine. However, it is Brian Blessed who truly stands out. For once Blessed doesn't overact. He brings both subtlety and authority to his role as Augustus and it is a joy to behold. I cannot fault "I,Claudius". It is excellent, truly excellent. Buy it and be entranced. Four videos, each at three hours, and not a minute too long.
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