Demetrius and the Gladiators

Described by George MacDonald Fraser as "(r)ipe melodrama, but not bad history", 'Demetrius and the Gladiators' manages to be that rarest thing: a sequel that improves upon the original. Returning from 'The Robe' is writer Philip Dunne - who provides a script according to Fraser "well above par for this kind of film" - as well as composer Franz Waxman and cameraman Milton Krasner.

In the title role Victor Mature is upped to star billing, with Jay Robinson's seriously mad Caligula ("why should I suffer death like any plebeian?") and Michael Rennie as St. Peter returning from the earlier film. New additions to the cast include Barry Jones, who gives the thing gravitas as Claudius, and Ernest Borgnine and black American actor William Marshall in dignified supporting roles. It also has a strong female contingent led by Susan Hayward's haughty, flame-haired Messalina who boasts that "my claws are sharper than the tiger's"; with Anne Bancroft in a small part and even an unbilled Julie Newmar shaking those hips as a dancing girl.

The most decisive piece of casting, however, is director Delmer Daves, who just rolls up his sleeves and gets stuck into delivering all this nonsense with gusto.

Demetrius and the Gladiators is a sequel to The Robe. It's directed by Delmer Daves and stars Victor Mature as Demetrius, a Christian slave made to fight in the Roman arena as a gladiator (and ultimately entering into a bigger fight, that of faith), and Susan Hayward as Messalina. Filling out the support cast are Ernest Borgnine, William Marshall, Michael Rennie, and Jay Robinson as the maniacal emperor Caligula. The screenplay is from Philip Dunne (How Green Was My Valley/The Agony and the Ecstasy) and cinematography comes courtesy of Milton R. Krasner (Academy Award winner Best Colour Cinematography for Three Coins in the Fountain 1955).

Following straight on from The Robe, Demetrius and the Gladiators is a safe and enjoyable Biblical picture that doesn't outstay its welcome. Running at just over 100 minutes, the film is far from being epic in its telling. However, and without cramming in, it does contain all the necessary ingredients to make up a sweaty sword and sandals pie. Filmed in CinemaScope it has a persecuted hero, a bonkers villain, a sexy babe, huge sets, colourful costumes and fights, lots of fights. Thankfully the serious dialogue is mostly kept brief, as there a few things worse in this genre of film than bloated discourse on religious beliefs and political dalliances. Just get in there, let us know what is going on, and move on to the next chapter of the story. This is something that Daves' film does very well, it has an eagerness to entertain with dots of gusto and sexual swagger. The acting is mixed, Mature is solid without ever really convincing as the heroic figure of Demetrius, Hayward and Robinson are camping it up and thus entertain royally, while Borgnine and Rennie earn their respective pay.

Very much like another Phillip Dunne screenplay genre piece, David And Bathsheba, this one is often overlooked or forgotten in discussion about the sword & sandals genre. That both films are not in the same league as the likes of Ben-Hur and Spartacus is a given, but both have much to offer the discerning cinephile. So this one is recommended Sunday afternoon fare with a flagon of claret and a roast ox dinner. 7/10

A follow-up to 20th Century Fox's first big CinemaScope success , the religious mammoth epic titled The Robe from bestselling novel by Lloyd C. Douglas , that begins where the former one left off and resulting to be better than the original . Stars Victor Mature again as the title role , Demetrius , the Greek who is given charge of the rob of Jesus Christ at the Crucifixion. In fact , there's a brief introduction about legionnaire Marcellus : Richard Burton , as he was in charge of the group that was assigned to crucify Christ and from his official duties he won Jesus' homespun robe in a dice-game . Meanwhile , Christ's garment is now the object of quest of Emperor Caligula and he will stop at nothing to get it and at whatever means . As the holy-robe-carrying slave is enlisted as one of Caligula's gladiators and along the way he mixes with the sex-hungry Messalina . The religious and pieties from previous film have partially gone , to be replaced by the tortuous court machinations of nasty Caligula : repeating role Jay Robinson, his astute uncle Claudius : Barry Jones and cunning Messalina : Susan Hayward .

This is an overwhelming Colossal turning out to be the continuation of the Robe, packing breathtaking combats among furious gladiators , a sensitive love story between Victor Mature/Debra Paget , an adequate cast of thousands , religious remarks mainly starred by apostle Saint Peter : Michael Wilding and reaching an exciting peak at the end . There are some moving battles in the arena and an impressive fight between Victor Mature and various hungry tigers. There are also some historical characters as the extremely baddie and sadistic Caligula giving him a hammy overacting by Jay Robinson , the allegedly silly but really intelligent Claudius finely played by Barry Jones and the tempter , seducer Messalina nicely performed by the trampy Susan Hayward . While the main star Victor Mature provides a wooden interpretation , as usual . They are competently performed by an attractive support cas , such as : Ernest Borgnine playing a gladiator trainer, Richard Egan as a brave hunk gladiator , William Marshall as Glycon , Anne Bancroft , Charles Evans and uncredited as gladiators : Michael Conrad , Russell Johnson , Jeff York and Ed Fury , the latter to be continued an Italian career as a Peplum or Sword and Sandal heroe , in addition , appearing as uncredited dancer girl , Julie Newmar .

It contains a rousing as well as lyric musical score by great composer Franz Waxman . As well as colorful and brilliant cinematography by Milton R. Krasner in glimmer Technicolor . The motion picture was well directed by Delmer Daves (The Red House , Broken Arrow , Cowboy , Jubal, The Last Wagon, Destination Tokyo, An Affair to Remember) and showing much more ease in the CinemaScope format than The Robe by Henry Koster . Rating : 6.6/10 . Decent Colossal that will appeal to star-studded fans and Roman time lovers .

The historical epics which were so popular in the fifties and early sixties frequently had a religious theme. Some were based on stories taken directly from the Bible ("The Ten Commandments", "Solomon and Sheba", "King of Kings"), while others tried to convey a Christian message indirectly. Thus the central character of "Spartacus" is treated as a metaphorical Christ-figure, and "The Egyptian" draws parallels between Christianity and the monotheistic religion of Atenism which briefly flourished under the heretical Pharaoh Akhnaten. "Demetrius and the Gladiators" is one of a number of films (the most famous is "Ben Hur", but others include "The Robe", to which "Demetrius" is a sequel, "Quo Vadis" and "The Fall of the Roman Empire") which deal with the early days of the Christian church and its persecution by the Roman emperors. The stories told by such films were normally fictitious, but were set against a background of historical fact.

The central character, Demetrius, is a former slave who, after assaulting a soldier who is molesting his girlfriend Lucia, is sentenced to fight in the arena as a gladiator. This causes him difficulties as he is a Christian whose moral code will not permit him to kill another man, even in self-defence. He survives, however, largely because he attracts the attention of Messalina, the wife of Claudius, uncle of the Emperor Caligula. Later, believing that Lucia has accidentally been killed by another gladiator, Demetrius renounces his Christian faith, and fights fiercely, killing the man he believes to have been responsible for her death and several others. His courage and skill with a sword lead to his being made a tribune in the Praetorian Guard, and he becomes Messalina's lover. As in "The Robe", the robe which Christ wore to His crucifixion plays an important part in the film; Caligula wants to get his hands on it because he believes that it has magical powers and that it will give him the secret of eternal life.

Several of the epics of this period combined, incongruously, an improving religious message with a good deal of eroticism, with much bare female flesh on display- examples include "Solomon and Sheba", "Esther and the King" and "Salome", where we get to see the famous dance of the seven veils, but it is made clear that, contrary to the Biblical version of the story, Rita Hayworth's character is in fact a virtuous heroine who only is flashing her legs in public in a desperate attempt to save John the Baptist from his fate. There are elements of this strange combination of godliness and sexiness in "Demetrius", but the sexiness is very much downplayed. Messalina's notorious promiscuity is alluded to rather than shown on screen, and the scene between the gladiators and the women brought in to entertain them may be an orgy, but it is a very decorous one. The film-makers were clearly more interested in the element of godliness, and, unlike some films of this type, "Demetrius" raises genuine moral issues about pacifism, non-violence and Christian forgiveness.

Demetrius himself is a man who goes through a crisis of faith and abandons his Christian beliefs in favour of an ethic based on revenge and worldly ambition. His conscience, however, is troubled, especially after he is reproached by his old friend St Peter. He is a more complex and interesting figure than many epic heroes, so it is unfortunate that the part was played by Victor Mature, an actor whose success often seemed to owe more to his ruggedly masculine good looks and his virile physique than to his acting technique. Susan Hayward (an actress who could often look bored and listless when asked to play roles that did not interest her) makes a weak Messalina. Neither give their worst performance (in Hayward's case that must surely have been "The Conqueror"), and Mature brings a certain rough sincerity to his part, but I felt that the film might have been improved with other actors in these roles.

Nevertheless, there was much I enjoyed about the film. Michael Rennie was appropriately dignified as Peter, played as a sort of ascetic philosopher, although I would agree with the reviewer who pointed out that it would be hard to imagine him ever working as a fisherman. I also liked William Marshall as Glycon, the former African king now forced to fight as a gladiator, who befriends Demetrius. ("Spartacus", a better film than "Demetrius" although it owes something to it, also features a sympathetic black gladiator who befriends the hero).

Jay Robinson, who played Caligula, has been criticised by some reviewers for overacting, although I must say I liked his performance. Historians have doubted whether the real Caligula was actually insane, although he was undoubtedly cruel and eccentric, but in the context of this film he is definitely presented as a lunatic, a man who has literally been driven mad by power to the point where he believes himself to be a god. (Not even Hitler went that far). There is an interesting contrast with a modern epic, "Gladiator", in which Joaquin Phoenix plays another tyrannical Roman Emperor, Commodus, as a basically weak and insecure young man. Although Phoenix's performance works well in the context of that particular film, the way the role of Caligula was written called for something quite different- the sort of ranting, over-the-top performance which might be unfashionable now but would have been less controversial in the fifties.

Although the standard of the acting is mixed, I generally enjoyed the film. It does not reach the standard of the really great epics, such as "Spartacus" or "Ben-Hur", but it works well on the level of spectacle, with fine sets and costumes and some exciting scenes of gladiatorial combat, and has a more intelligent script than many epics. 7/10

As a young boy going to the movies was entertaining and wondrous as I imagined how they could make men and animals so lifelike and real. When I first saw this movie " Demetrius and the Gladiators ", I was very impressed with the acting skills of both my favorite actors at the time. I loved the dynamic style of Victor Mature who plays Demetrius, and awed with his being able to fight a tiger to the death. I was further enthralled with my other favorite Richard Egan who played Dardanius. As a regular 'good guy' it was entertaining to see him play a heavy. Then again I felt that way about Ernest Borgnine who is Strabo and William Marshall as majestic 'Glycon, King of Swords'. The story is actually part two of the movie "The Robe" which I believed centered more on the Icon than on the slave character. There was something shortcoming about this sequel in that it concentrated on the search for the robe by the Mad Emperor Caligula, played to the hilt by superb actor Jay Robinson. With additional actors like Michael Rennie playing Peter the apostle and Barry Jones playing Claudius, the director tried to make this sequel as reverential as the first. But that was not what I sought when I first saw it. It was a great film for the arena action and that's what made it fun. I realize there are superior movies out there like 'Gladiator' by Ridley Scott, but I remember early films as a child and that's what made this one a Classic. ****