Quo Vadis - 2-Disc Special Edition (1951) (DVD)

This early Roman gladiator/Biblical spectacular was made just prior to the advent of CinemaScope, but does boast some impressive big-screen Technicolor photography all the same. While nominated for no less than eight Oscars: perversely enough, it failed to win a single one! A great pity, especially for Peter Ustinov; his over-the-top performance alone as the demented Emperor Nero is worth seeing the movie for! And Miklos Rozsa's musical score here is not dissimilar to his Oscar-winning Ben-Hur that came nine years later. Directed by Mervyn LeRoy for MGM; the fact that 32 000 costumes were worn in this film (still a world record) will indicate the size of the cast as a whole. Why, there are more than a thousand speaking parts alone!

The action takes place in AD64-68. Robert Taylor plays returning victorious military commander Marcus Vinucius, who falls in love with a devout Christian, Lygia (Deborah Kerr), and slowly becomes intrigued by her religion. Her bodyguard is a giant of a man, Ursus (Buddy Baer), who must later save Lygia in the Colosseum arena by fighting a wild bull.

Also in the cast are Leo Genn - as Petronious, Nero's most trusted advisor - while Finlay Currie - with Scots accent and all - is well-cast as St Peter. But you'll need a sharp eye to spot Elizabeth Taylor and Sophia Loren; both unbilled, and cast among the extras!

Verdict: still well-worth seeing - even more than 60 years after its initial release!

Rome burns. Nero fiddles. Christianity rises. And moviegoers turned out in throngs for this years-in-the-making film colossus boasting eight Oscar nominations (including Best Picture) and featuring 110 speaking parts, 30,000 participants and a filmed-on-location panoply of marching legions, magisterial pageantry and massive spectacle that includes the martyrdom of Christians thrown to the lions before cheering Coliseum throngs.

Robert Taylor plays the Legion commander whose love for a Christian slave girl crosses the divide between Empire and a sect with a higher loyalty. Presiding over all is Nero.

He is Caesar, madman, murderer - an imperial ruler of the spectacular, and spectacularly doomed, glory that was Rome.

General

Studio:	Warner Home Entertainment
Country of origin:	United Kingdom
Release date:	February 2009
Movie released:	1951
Actors:	Robert Taylor • Deborah Kerr • Peter Ustinov
Dimensions:	192 x 137 x 15mm (L x W x T)
Format:
Disks:	2
Running time:	2 hours, 47 minutes
Region encoding:	Region 2. This DVD will play in all South African DVD players.
Audio format:	Dolby Digital Mono
Video format:	Standard 4:3 (1.33:1)
Languages:	English
Subtitles:	Catalan • English • German • Portuguese • Romanian • Danish • Norwegian • Swedish • Bulgarian • Polish • Finnish • Greek • Hungarian
Age restriction:	PG
Categories:	DVD > Classics DVD > Epic DVD > Feature Film DVD > Historical Period
LSN:	X98-UWR-FNE-6
Barcode:	5051892001373

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