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Gladiator....
#1
I noticed the commotion about Gladiator started by Woad Warrior and could not resist posting this: http://www.duncanbeedie.co.uk/gladiator.htm (ducking)
Robert Vermaat
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FECTIO Late Romans
THE CAUSE OF WAR MUST BE JUST
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#2
Ah Gladiator...

Since you have opened the door Vortigern, allow me to walk in.

On the train ride home this afternoon I came upon the following in a book I am re-reading. (1.5 hrs on the train each way gives me a lot of time for reading.) This passage bears on both Gladiator and the accuracy of films about Rome, and the general level of knowledge about Ancient Rome. It is a question of the Rome of our imagination and the Rome of history which is at the heard of Woadwarrior's initial post.

Well into my adulthood, most of what I knew about ancient Rome
was learned from Hollywood and television. In my head were
images of men in togas, striding about marbled palaces, mouthing
lapidary phrases in stage-mannered accents, and of course images
of chariot races and frenzied arena crowds giving thumbs-down to
hapless victims.

In my woeful ignorance I was no different from many other educated
Americans who have passed from grade school to the postdoctoral
level without ever learning anything sensible about Roman history.

To this day, dubious film representations about ancient Rome
continue to be mass-marketed. In 2000, while I was working on
this book, Hollywood brought forth Gladiator, a swashbuckling epic
about revenge and heroism, offering endless episodes of arena
bloodletting. Unencumbered by any trace of artistic merit, Gladiator
played before packed houses in the United States and abroad,
winning a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award.

Worth noting is how the Roman Senate is depicted. We are asked
to believe that the Senate was populated by public-spirited men
devoted to people's welfare. But the people themselves are
portrayed as little more than a rabble. In one scene two Senate
leaders are seated in the Coliseum. When one of them complains
of the unsavory proceedings blow, the other opines that the
crowd is interested only in bread and circuses, war and violence.
"Rome is the mob....The beating heart of Rome is not the marble
of the Senate. It is the sands of the Coliseum. The Emperor will
bring them death and they will love him for it."

This view of the Roman populace as mindless riffraff unfortunately
remains the anti-people's history purveyed by both the entertainment
media and many classical scholars.

From: The Assassination Of Julius Caesar A People's History Of Ancient Rome

By Michael Parenti 2003 The New Press ISBN: 1-56584-942-6

This is just my attempt to keep the conversation lively.


:wink:

Narukami
David Reinke
Burbank CA
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#3
Quote:I noticed the commotion about Gladiator started by Woad Warrior and could not resist posting this: http://www.duncanbeedie.co.uk/gladiator.htm.. . (ducking)

:lol:

Any spoof that contains cartoon characters and genitalia gets my vote!



The link doesn't work anymore....sigh.

Accents...can't be worse than Sean Connery's welsh accent being passed off as Russian!!! :roll:
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-Tom
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#4
My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.

Someone needs to make a Roman movie after reading more Juvenal Seneca and Plautus.

Romans did not speak in shakesperean english.

Far from it.

Travis
Theodoros of Smyrna (Byzantine name)
aka Travis Lee Clark (21st C. American name)

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#5
Quote:My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.

Someone needs to make a Roman movie after reading more Juvenal Seneca and Plautus.

Romans did not speak in shakesperean english.

Far from it.

Travis
that is what I liked about The Passion of the Christ....although some of the Roman soldiers were portrayed in a unpleasant light .... they spoke in Latin...!
The spoof is hilarious.........but I don't get it....!
Cristina
The Hoplite Association
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#6
Quote:My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.

Someone needs to make a Roman movie after reading more Juvenal Seneca and Plautus.

Romans did not speak in shakesperean english.

Far from it.

Travis

Or American actors effecting an English accent in any foreign role. :roll: :?
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#7
Quote:
tlclark:ihauakxs Wrote:My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.

Someone needs to make a Roman movie after reading more Juvenal Seneca and Plautus.

Romans did not speak in shakesperean english.

Far from it.

Travis
that is what I liked about The Passion of the Christ....although some of the Roman soldiers were portrayed in a unpleasant light .... they spoke in Latin...!

I liked that, too, even if the accents were Medieval Latin rather than classical. :wink:
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-Tom
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#8
Quote:
tlclark:1qjhwkrz Wrote:My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.

Someone needs to make a Roman movie after reading more Juvenal Seneca and Plautus.

Romans did not speak in shakesperean english.

Far from it.

Travis

Or American actors effecting an English accent in any foreign role. :roll: :?

I've been reading a lot of Josephus and Tacitus lately. Every time I hear Vespasian I think "Tony Soprano". James Gandolfini should be cast to play him some day.

Travis
Theodoros of Smyrna (Byzantine name)
aka Travis Lee Clark (21st C. American name)

Moderator, RAT

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#9
Quote:My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.

There are noteable exceptions... American Stephen Boyd played Romans in both Ben Hur and Fall of the Roman Empire (which also featured Canadian Christopher Plummer as Commodus). And in the Biblical Epic The Greatest Story Ever Told, IIRC, all of the Romans speak with American accents -- including Telly Savalas as Pontius Pilate, and (believe it or not) John Wayne as the centurion who oversees Christ's crucifixion!
David Wilson


Ego numquam pronunciare mendacium, sed ego sum homo indomitus.
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#10
Quote:I've been reading a lot of Josephus and Tacitus lately. Every time I hear Vespasian I think "Tony Soprano". James Gandolfini should be cast to play him some day.

Travis

I dunno... I think Ed Harris is a dead ringer for Gaius Julius Caesar.... :lol:
David Wilson


Ego numquam pronunciare mendacium, sed ego sum homo indomitus.
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#11
Quote:
tlclark:12wbsxck Wrote:I've been reading a lot of Josephus and Tacitus lately. Every time I hear Vespasian I think "Tony Soprano". James Gandolfini should be cast to play him some day.

Travis

I dunno... I think Ed Harris is a dead ringer for Gaius Julius Caesar.... :lol:

LOL.

Yeah he has the receding hairline and the sharp nose too. He'd have to thin out though. Caesar was pretty thin.

Actually, I don't know if you know him, but former coach for BYU Lavell Edwards looks like he could be Vespasian's twin!

Here's Vespasian:

http://www.utexas.edu/courses/romanciv/ ... pasian.jpg

Here's Edwards:

http://www.scoutmedia.org/Images/testim ... dwards.jpg

Proof of reincarnation!
Theodoros of Smyrna (Byzantine name)
aka Travis Lee Clark (21st C. American name)

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#12
Hi

Quote:Accents...can't be worse than Sean Connery's welsh accent being passed off as Russian!!!

Or even a Scottish accent passed off as Russian!

Quote:There are noteable exceptions... American Stephen Boyd played Romans in both Ben Hur and Fall of the Roman Empire (which also featured Canadian Christopher Plummer as Commodus)

Stephen Boyd was Irish!

Quote:that is what I liked about The Passion of the Christ....although some of the Roman soldiers were portrayed in a unpleasant light .... they spoke in Latin...!

Even better if they had spoken Greek.

Quote:My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.
Romans did not speak in shakesperean english.

Charlton Heston said that because they perfomed Shakespeare it made the Brits the best actors in the world. Peter Ustinov however said that Americans were more like the ancient Romans in Character. One of my favourites is Remington Olmstead who played the centurion in Ben-Hur "No water for him!!" Ben -Hur nevertheless started some sort of tradition for having the Brits as Romans and the supposed good guys(depends on your point of view, I always rooted for the Romano British myself) played by Americans, see also Masada. Mel Gibson's Roman thugs, shaven headed in 'The Passion', looked almost the same as the shaven headed English executioners in 'Braveheart'. I expect that if ever he does make 'Boudicca' then the Roman bad guys who flog Boudicca and assault her daughters will look much the same and probably Boudicca will be played by an American!

Graham.
"Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream" Edgar Allan Poe.

"Every brush-stroke is torn from my body" The Rebel, Tony Hancock.

"..I sweated in that damn dirty armor....TWENTY YEARS!', Charlton Heston, The Warlord.
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#13
Quote:Hi

Quote:There are noteable exceptions... American Stephen Boyd played Romans in both Ben Hur and Fall of the Roman Empire (which also featured Canadian Christopher Plummer as Commodus)

Stephen Boyd was Irish!

Really!! Imagine a Roman with an Irish accent!

On Stephen boyd, He really was a fine actor. loathsome in Ben Hur, inspiring in FOTRE. Had the physique too. Those men were real men I tell you.

Quote:
Quote:My biggest beef with Roman movies is that they all use british actors.
Romans did not speak in shakesperean english.

Charlton Heston said that because they perfomed Shakespeare it made the Brits the best actors in the world. Peter Ustinov however said that Americans were more like the ancient Romans in Character.

I think it's possible both could be true. That could be insulting to the Americans or the British depending on which aspects of the romans you emphasize, their blood-thirstiness or their virtues. Actually, this is an old meme from the enlightenment where the British preferred to think of themselves as the New Greeks, and the originators of all our culture, which was only a mere shadow of their own. Of course that was a bigoted way of looking at Romans too.

Quote:One of my favourites is Remington Olmstead who played the centurion in Ben-Hur "No water for him!!"

GREAT scene, and not a bad musculata either, but the pteruges as usual, are aenemic.

Quote:Ben -Hur nevertheless started some sort of tradition for having the Brits as Romans and the supposed good guys(depends on your point of view, I always rooted for the Romano British myself) played by Americans, see also Masada. Mel Gibson's Roman thugs, shaven headed in 'The Passion', looked almost the same as the shaven headed English executioners in 'Braveheart'. I expect that if ever he does make 'Boudicca' then the Roman bad guys who flog Boudicca and assault her daughters will look much the same and probably Boudicca will be played by an American!

Graham.
[/quote]

I think we have Shakespeare to thank for the belief that Romans spoke Shakesperean english! All those Romano-phile plays of his. As far as British actors playing bad guys, well c'mon, imagine a super arch villian with say Bill Clinton's or Bush's accent? Would you be intimidated?

Also you're forgetting "The Patriot" which makes the Brits looks absolutely thuggish. Anyway, Mel Gibson has a penchant for violence and torture scenes.

More importantly, why hasn't someone hired YOU as a costume designer/consultant?!

Thanks again.

Travis
Theodoros of Smyrna (Byzantine name)
aka Travis Lee Clark (21st C. American name)

Moderator, RAT

Rules for RAT:
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Oh! and the Toledo helmet .... oh hell, forget it. :? <img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_confused.gif" alt=":?" title="Confused" />:?
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#14
And while we are on the subject of who played who...

If I remember correctly in Spartacus the part of Gaius Julius Caesar was played by the American actor John Gavin (who also played a German soldier in A Time To Love And A Time To Die -- remember that one folks?)

Perhaps Kubrick thought of Caesar as a 'democrat' and champion of the people. Actually quite a radical thought for that day and age, but then Kubrick did like tweaking noses.

This trend of British accents signaling "imperial evil" and American accents "democratic good" is seen in the original Star Wars film as well, to the point that Lucas, reportedly, worked his casting to avoid this, but obviously did not quite succeed (Obi Wan Kenobi's two actors not withstanding).

Narukami
David Reinke
Burbank CA
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#15
Quote:Really!! Imagine a Roman with an Irish accent!

Ciaran Hinds as J.C. in 'Rome'.

Quote:If I remember correctly in Spartacus the part of Gaius Julius Caesar was played by the American actor John Gavin (who also played a German soldier in A Time To Love And A Time To Die -- remember that one folks?)

Indeed I do, a story by the author of 'All Quiet on the Western Front'.

An Irish German Liam Neeson who everyone thought wonderful in Schindler's List but laughable as a Scot in 'Rob Roy'! Never figured that one out or why that film was overshadowed by 'Braveheart'.


Quote:Also you're forgetting "The Patriot" which makes the Brits looks absolutely thuggish.
No. it was just from the same children's colouring book as 'Braveheart'.

I quite liked the idea of Patrick Stewart playing J.C with Antonio Banderas as Antony and Leonardo Di Caprio as Octavian! Ralph Fiennes as Brutus, Tim Roth as Casca and Gary Oldman as Cassius, Brits as Baddies again! but a mixture of Brits and Americans as the Good Guys, sorry I am a Caesarian!

Graham
"Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream" Edgar Allan Poe.

"Every brush-stroke is torn from my body" The Rebel, Tony Hancock.

"..I sweated in that damn dirty armor....TWENTY YEARS!', Charlton Heston, The Warlord.
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