Summer of Movies #93: Spartacus

Welcome back to Summer of movies, after a week hiateus and two un-playable discs, I'm finally back. But today's movie is one that is considered a classic, but can it hold up against the epics of today? What am I talking about? Well if you can't read titles, then this might help...

 Let's Begin

PLOT

Back in the age of the Roman Empire and before Cesar's dictatorship, a boy is born, named Spartacus. He becomes a slave at 13 and lives the rest of his life as such, until one day he and many other slaves are chosen to be gladiators for a small village. He trains and keeps quiet, even meets a girl, until he's pushed too far. He then starts the first and biggest slave uprising in human history, and he's the leader of the while thing.

PROS

Since this is a 50's-60's era epic, the scope and direction is on a huge scale that very few modern movies can match. While the budget is small by today's standards, it still seems massive. All of those people are real people, all paid and fed. 

The final battle scene, near the end of the movie, is something to behold. It seems epic and chaotic, while director Stanley Kubrick finds a way to make it all make sense and focus on what's important. It even seems a little more brutal than most movies today.

The sets and costumes are very impressive, it really feels like your back in Roman era.

The acting is very good. I've seen some movies from this era of epics where the acting is less than stelar, but not here. everyone, for the most part, delivers.

CONS

This movie is 3hr long, that's too long. It takes 2 extremely slow hours for the movie to get interesting, but you can't skip that 2hr, or the last hour won't make sense. It's hard to get through, heck, it took me two days to get through it, but it's worth it if your interested in the movie itself.

The film focuses to much on the Roman's and their politics. The most interesting parts involve Spartacus and his slave army training and trashing the Italian countryside, but that's a small side story compared to the boring Roman politics.   

CONCLUSION

While I can see how this was the phenomenon back in the day, it just doesn't hold up today. It's slow and boring, until that 2hr and a half mark, then it gets good and only gets better from there. I don't think it's good enough to sit through the whole thing, but if you are interested and think I'm just some dumb teenager who doesn't know about the "good 'ol days", be my guest, but may god have mercy on your soul. I hate to do this, but...

RATING

RUN AWAY!