{"id":5193,"date":"2012-07-07T16:21:41","date_gmt":"2012-07-07T20:21:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=5193"},"modified":"2016-12-12T13:18:02","modified_gmt":"2016-12-12T18:18:02","slug":"br-demetrius-and-the-gladiators-1954","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=5193","title":{"rendered":"BR: Demetrius and the Gladiators (1954)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Film: Very Good<\/p>\n

Transfer: Excellent<\/p>\n

Extras: Good<\/p>\n

Label: Twilight Time<\/a><\/p>\n

Region: All<\/p>\n

Released: March, 2012<\/p>\n

Genre: Biblical Epic \/ Sword and Sandal \/ Drama<\/p>\n

Synopsis: After the death of Gallio, Demetrius and Peter attempt to propagate the beauty of Christianty, but morals are put to the test when Demetrius is forced to fight to the death in Caligula’s bloody gladiator tournaments.<\/p>\n

Special Features:\u00a0Stereo Isolated Music Track \/ Theatrical Trailer \/ Limted to 3,000 copies \/ Available exclusively from Screen Archives<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Review:<\/p>\n

Perhaps long before film editors has snipped together a rough cut of Gallio (Richard Burton) and Diana\u2019s (Jean Simmons) happy walk to death in The Robe<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0(1953), Fox greenlit a sequel where Demetrius (Victor Mature), Peter (Michael Rennie) and Caligula (Jay Robinson) duke it out in ancient Rome.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a really savvy move, considering The Robe <\/strong>hadn\u2019t even been released to the few theatres equipped to exhibit CinemaScope and Perspecta surround sound. Robe<\/strong> co-screenwriter Philip Dunne was brought back to hammer out a new story where freed slave and newbie Christian convert Demetrius is thrown into Caligula\u2019s gladiator school when he refuses to divulge the location of Jesus\u2019 humble (and oft-sniffed) robe, and tried to defend his girlfriend Lucia (Debra Paget, once again pouty & victimized by men) from authoritarian Roman scum.<\/p>\n

Demetrius initially refuses to fight as a gladiator \u2013 he\u2019s a Jesus boy! \u2013 but a wretched event causes him to lose faith, and with a black heart he fills it with multiple kills, gilded material possessions, indulges in a hunger for Claudius\u2019 wife Messalina (bitch!) until he once again he sees the Holy Light and shames Caligula\u2019s empire for its wicked, bloodthirsty ways\u2026 just as the emperor\u2019s own generals are posed to hack him to pieces, setting the stage for a more pragmatic rule by Claudius. With Claudius\u2019 benevolent mind now leading Rome, Christians could sleep better, knowing the next few years will yield a more moderate, enlightened period.<\/p>\n

Demetrius<\/strong> is a classic feel-good Biblical epic that reinforces pride in faith, fidelity, good morals, and good governance for a film-going public which, as detailed in The Robe<\/strong> BR extras, were largely Christian and avid church attendees. Religion perhaps maintained its prominence in films so potently because it also acted as a colourful, affecting film diorama when the psychological horrors of WWII combat, poverty, and the potential Red Menace were making the postwar life more challenging than the wondrous world depicted in washing machine, sports car, and breakfast cereal ads on the idiot box.<\/p>\n

The need to make audiences feel good after 100 minutes (using a tried & true Biblical epic formula pioneered with gusto by Cecil B. DeMille) also ensured a lot of contrived plot twists, many of which are a little rich.<\/p>\n

MAJOR SPOILERS<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

When girlfriend Lucia is killed by alpha gladiator Dardanius (buffed Richard Egan), it\u2019s a major shocker, because it happens brutally fast, and the subtext of the scene \u2013 better to be dead than gang-raped by sex-starved, bloodthirsty gladiators \u2013 is really shocking for the time. (Then again, had there been any objections, Dunne, Robe producer Frank Ross, and director Delmer Daves could\u2019ve used the DeMille Clause: \u2018These things happened in evil Rome, and given the film is a faithful recreation of the era, we must be accurate!<\/em>\u2019)<\/p>\n

However, when Lucia emerges alive, it is a twist steeped in pure scriptorial bullshit: apparently a vision of Jesus convinced her it \u2018twasn\u2019t her time, a lo she doth returned to the world of the living, waiting for the right time to reveal herself to boyfriend Demetrius when he was at his most cold-hearted, and un-Christian. (The trailer included on Twilight Time\u2019s Blu-ray contains additional dialogue that was snipped from the release version. It\u2019s an alternate scene that went too far in the faith verbiage, hence the scene\u2019s current and less bathetic state.)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

END OF SPOILERS<\/p>\n

Even with its obvious goofiness, Demetrius<\/strong> is great fun: Mature fights more men than he can physically handle and<\/em> fights & kills Caligula\u2019s lions in a steeped homage to Mature\u2019s lion fight in DeMille\u2019s Samson and Delilah <\/strong>(1948); it\u2019s a moment of hyperbolic ego that would reach ludicrous proportions when Mature would \u2018fight\u2019 frayed power lines like some giant nest of rattlesnakes in the 3D puffball thriller Dangerous Mission<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0(1954).<\/p>\n

Susan Hayward is great as assertive, sleazy bitch Messalina, and it\u2019s fun to see her outsmart & upstage all the men, and in a great vase-knocking scene emasculate Demetrius with a self-satisfying grin.<\/p>\n

The film\u2019s real stars, however, are the up-and-coming contract actors who distinguish themselves in small supporting roles and bit parts, including Egan, soon to star in a string of big Fox productions (not to mention Howard Hughes\u2019 \/ RKO\u2019s breast-centric Underwater!<\/a><\/strong>); Paget, slowly making her way up from ing\u00e9nue roles to her patented screen persona of the timeless brutalized waif; Anne Bancroft as a hooker (filmed the same year as her own 3D thriller, Gorilla at Large<\/strong>); British character actor Barry Jones (Prince Valiant<\/a><\/strong>) as a very convincing, less nuanced Claudius; William Marshall (Blacula<\/strong>) as moral gladiator Glycon; and Ernest Borgnine as the head of Caligula\u2019s gladiator school. (Reportedly within the extras are Julie Newmar as a dancer, and both Russell Johnson and Woody Strode as gladiators.)<\/p>\n

Milton Krasner\u2019s cinematography makes use of the same elaborate sets erected with scope and style for The Robe<\/strong>, but he sort of goofed in an early shot when the camera tracks out into the gladiator forum and behind the Roman pillars are Los Angeles telephone poles. Oops.<\/p>\n

Franz Waxman\u2019s score balances Alfred Newman\u2019s gorgeous Robe<\/strong> theme with new material (the opening scene is still one of the best title sequences Waxman ever scored), and the gladiator combat sequences are really engaging, perhaps because director Daves had already done a spate of westerns and seemed to figure there was no reason to change his filming style because of a wider ratio.<\/p>\n

Twilight Time\u2019s BR includes a theatrical trailer as well as another concise essay by film historian Julie Kirgo. The HD transfer is very nice, and is perhaps more natural than the glitzier Fox BR of The Robe<\/strong> due to less digital noise scrubbing; it\u2019s an un-restored print, but still looks and sounds far better than prior DVD incarnations.<\/p>\n

Pity there aren\u2019t any ephemeral extras beyond the trailer \u2013 perhaps Fox chose to save just The Robe<\/strong> publicity pap and buried the rest in deep storage \u2013 but TT\u2019s BR does feature Waxman\u2019s score, isolated in booming, uncompressed stereo.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Postscript<\/strong><\/p>\n

Delmer Daves may be one of Fox\u2019s least remembered directors except by the fans who recognized his skills as writer & director in genres kind of foisted onto him by the studio. He directed beautiful, mopey Paget several times \u2013 Broken Arrow<\/strong> (1950), the richly exotic Bird of Paradise<\/strong> (1951) \u2013 and years later directed Egan as the frustrated yet reasonable dad in the teen weepy A Summer Place<\/strong> (1959), after which he settled into a string of clich\u00e9d romantic mush pictures.<\/p>\n

Fox liked to move their stars and fresh talent like chess pieces, so it was only a matter of time (like, one year) before Egan, Mature, and Borgnine would play a rich snot, a decent sheriff, and a Amish pacifist farmer, respectively, in the underrated Violent Saturday<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0(1955) \u2013 another film that proved both Egan and Mature could hold their own with stage and live TV actors such as veteran Borgnine.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a9 2012 Mark R. Hasan<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

External References<\/em>:<\/p>\n

IMDB <\/a>—Soundtrack Album Review <\/a>—\u00a0Soundtrack Album<\/a> — Composer Filmography<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Film: Very Good Transfer: Excellent Extras: Good Label: Twilight Time Region: All Released: March, 2012 Genre: Biblical Epic \/ Sword and Sandal \/ Drama Synopsis: After the death of Gallio, Demetrius and Peter attempt to propagate the beauty of Christianty, but morals are put to the test when Demetrius is forced to fight to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[18],"tags":[355,367,1406,1405,377,1404,531],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-1lL","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5193"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5193"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14915,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5193\/revisions\/14915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}