This is the first Kubrick film I’m blogging about that I actually saw before this “Kubrick kick” of mine. In fact, I’ve seen it many times. I took four years of Latin from 8th grade through 11th grade, and each year our teacher got us out of our usual classes to watch Spartacus in the auditorium. This was in the early to mid-80s. We always did this just before Winter Break. I think she figured we’d all be excited about the upcoming vacation, so we might as well be antsy while watching a movie that featured some of the things about Roman culture that she’d been teaching us.
I have to admit, as a kid, I found this movie boring. I just couldn’t get into it. Not in four years. I almost would have rather been in classes! Of course, I liked school, so I was a funny kid I guess. I even liked Latin.
Well, I just watched it today for the fifth time. I will say, it was more interesting to me now than when I was a kid. I got into it a little bit… and I certainly appreciated certain things about it. I appreciated Kirk Douglas and Laurence Olivier and Jean Simmons and Tony Curtis. I don’t think I fully appreciated who they were as a kid. Sure, I’d heard of them… but it means more to me now. And of course, when I was a kid, I’d never been to Rome or Italy. I spent three years in Italy when I was in the Navy in my early 20s, and I’ve been to Rome and the entire area pictured in the film many, many times. That makes it easier to get into and appreciate, too.
As far as Kubrick’s craft goes, this was really the first movie at that “Kubrick epic scale” that I think of when I think of his films. Spartacus was released in 1960. In terms of filmmaking craft, there’s much to appreciate. From what I read, Kubrick didn’t have complete artistic control (the first and probably only movie where that was the case). That makes it hard to judge his work because I don’t know what he really wanted to do. It was the first movie of his where I really noticed and appreciated the cinematography — and the soundtrack. The music is very dramatic, and I don’t think the film would have worked without it.
For me the fighting scenes are still boring, but that sort of thing always bores me. The love story between Douglas and Simmons is pretty corny (and fictional, not historical fiction which is what the film is overall). I enjoyed the interpersonal scenes between Olivier and Curtis, which are fascinating from an lgbtq perspective.
I’m trying really hard to think of nice things to say, but overall, in spite of skillful filmmaking, the movie just isn’t my kind of movie, even four decades later. (Okay, now I feel old.) And Kubrick makes wonderful anti-war films, but here the war/violence is “noble” in the sense that it’s hard to argue against slaves fighting a revolution. So that feels off-kilter for a Kubrick film somehow. Also, there is no “psychological thriller” edge anywhere that I can find, and I might miss that the most of all. It comes across as cornball, really.
Plus, three hours? One hour too long.
Fool of Spirit 