NEW, FORTHCOMING, & ONLINE
ANCIENT WORLD MOVIES
The Battle for Rome (shown in the UK as Ancient Rome: Rise & Fall of an Empire) is airing in May on The Military Channel; you can see the schedule here. Each episode dramatizes the life of a key figure in Roman history (Tiberius Gracchus, Julius Caesar, Nero, Vespasian, Constantine, and Alaric the Visigoth). Click here to read Lindsey Davis’s tart review for the Sunday Times, “All Tantrums and Togas.” If you know of a US DVD release , please let Steven know!
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David Wyler, son of director William Wyler (who won an Oscar for Ben-Hur in 1959), is producing a new version of Ben-Hur as a $30 million TV miniseries. Christian Duguay (Joan of Arc) will direct. The project was announced just days after the original film’s star, Charlton Heston, died at the age of 84. Heston won a Best Actor Oscar for the 1959 version, and reprised his role for a 2003 animated version (shown here). |
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Coming down the chimney in 2008?: Nicholas of Myra, about the original St. Nick. (No, Virginia, not Santa Claus, but his ancient prototype, who attended the Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D.) Also in the movie: Constantine the Great, played by Robert Vincent Jones — who does bear a certain resemblance to the first Christian emperor. (Cornel Wilde, without a cleft chin, played him in the 1962 epic Constantine and the Cross.)
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Season 4 of the British series Doctor Who took the traveling Time Lord (David Tennant) to Mount Vesuvius in 79 A.D., along with new sidekick Donna (Catherine Tate). The episode “The Fires of Pompeii” premiered in May on SciFi Channel; watch for repeat broadcasts and a DVD release later this year.
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Odysseus: Voyage to the Underworld premiered on SciFi Channel in April. Arnold Vosloo (Imhotep in The Mummy) stars as the Greek hero; Steve Bacic costars. Steven says: “I didn’t think SciFi could make a myth-&-monster movie worse than Minotaur. I was wrong.” Expect repeat telecasts and a DVD release sometime in 2008. |
Young Alexander the Great, about the conqueror’s teenaged years, stars Sam Heughan as Alexander, super-hunk Paul Telfer (of Hercules and Spartacus) as Hephaestion, and luscious Lauren Cohen as Leto. (Think “Alexander 90210.”) Will we see it in 2008?
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Gavin O’Connor will direct Warrior, a feature film about Boudica, Queen of the Iceni, who led the Britons in revolt against Roman rule in 61 A.D. (A previous Boudica movie, Warrior Queen, starred Alex Kingston.) |
Oscar winner Roman Polanski (The Pianist) is set to direct a big-budget movie of the Robert Harris thriller Pompeii. The eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 A.D. is seen through the eyes of a young engineer who’s charged with repairing the aqueduct and encounters deadly corruption in Pompeii. Hmm, political shenanigans centered around the water supply? Sounds a bit like Polanski’s classic murder mystery Chinatown!
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Despite repeated setbacks, Vin Diesel has reiterated his intention to make his directorial debut and star as Hannibal the Conqueror, the Carthaginian general who crossed the Alps with elephants to menace Rome, in an epic based on the novel by Ross Leckie. (Victor Mature previously played the role in the 1960 release Hannibal.) Meanwhile, the Brits beat Diesel to the punch with a 2006 BBC telemovie starring Alexander Siddig (see “Where Are the Euro Movies?” below). |
John Boorman plans to film the classic novel by Marguerite Yourcenar about one of Rome’s greatest emperors, Memoirs of Hadrian. Possible cast (still in negotiation): Antonio Banderas as Hadrian and Charlie Hunnam as Antinous, Hadrian’s ill-fated lover who was deified by the emperor after drowning in the Nile. (Hunnam played Nathan in the original British version of “Queer As Folk.”) For another fictional take on Hadrian and Antinous, read The Water Thief by Ben Pastor. For the ultimate in Antinous worship, check out The Sacred Antinous.
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Will Leonardo DiCaprio star in a big-screen version of I, Claudius? According to The Hollywood Reporter, rights to Robert Graves’s novel have been obtained by producer Scott Rudin, and DiCaprio and screenwriter William Monahan are “circling the project.” The pair last collaborated on the Oscar-winner The Departed. (Derek Jacobi played the stuttering emperor in the classic BBC miniseries I, Claudius in 1976.)
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For some otherwise impossible-to-find DVDs, check out Maximus Media in Canada. Their historical category includes The Last Roman (aka Struggle for Rome) from 1968, starring Orson Welles as the emperor Justinian; the addictive 1984 miniseries The Last Days of Pompeii; and the uncut 9-hour version of the 1985 miniseries A.D. (Anno Domini), scripted by Anthony Burgess with an all-star cast.
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From Achilles to Zeus: Stephen Moss, film writer for The Guardian, offers an A-Z guide to Ancient World movies. His spot-on entry for the letter S: “Slaves: Notable by their absence in films about Sparta, even though they were the bedrock of Spartan society. Presumably acknowledgment of Sparta’s large slave population would sit oddly with a portrayal of a heroic society that valued freedom...” Click here to read the entire alphabet.
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