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Cleopatra (Five Star Collection)Rating:
Release Date: 03 April, 2001 Retail Price: $26.98 Sorry, this product is not currently available. Cast: |
Cleopatra (Five Star Collection) Reviews
true classic
my dad made me watch this with him as a teenager, and I absolutely loved it! So happy to see it on DVD.
Overlong, Overwrought, and Overdone....
Here is a film more famous for what went on behind the camera than before it. Nearly bankrupting 20th Century Fox, which would not recoup the losses from this debacle until the box office receipts from "Planet of the Apes" would be tabulated nearly four years later, "Cleopatra" (1963), clealy demonstrated all that was inherently wrong with Hollywood--even over 40 years ago.
On a technical scale, the film is a remarkable achievement; one merely needs to only look at the quality of workmanship of the numerous Roman and Egyptian sets employed throughout the film long before the words "computer animation" or "computer imaging" ever entered our lexicon.
More than a portent to the end of the so-called "historical epic" (Anthony Mann's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," made in 1964, would be the last real historical epic made for some time), "Cleopatra" faced problems from the start including Ms. Taylor's countless "illnesses" to an emergency tracheotomy, to a number of romps with Burton in her trailer (she was married to Eddie Fisher at the time) cost 20th Century hundreds of thousands of dollars in costly delays running the picture seriously overbudget. Let alone her 1 million dollar salary for the role and her ability to fire or hire directors at will didn't help either--concessions made to an alledged "star" that were considered risky and ill-advised.
Incidentally, after the initial director, Roberto Mamoulian would bow out of the movie, George Stevens was considered a replacement, but he was committed to the biblical epic, "The Greatest Story Ever Told" and was unavailable. The director's job then went to Joe Mankiewicz who completed the picture.
The picture showcases some fine acting by several of the leads, particularly Burton and Harrison. Burton, no stranger to roles dedicated to characters larger than life, like Alexander the Great and Thomas Becket, plays Antony with all the gusto he can muster and with his theatrical roots revealing Antony's Shakespearean origins.
Harrison too, not unfamiliar to playing great men, from Pope Julius II who inspired and bullied Micahelangelo in "The Agony and the Ecstacy" and as whimsical Professor Higgins in "My Fair Lady" would get top billing the following year for these pictures. Even Martin Landau as Rufio, Antony's able and loyal lieutenant, demonstrates his tremendous range that would earn him an Academy Award two decades later. His commentary, along with that of Tom Mankiewicz offers a revealing and informative inside look into the making of this film. Landau is a great storyteller; it's a shame his commentary lasts approximately only 45 mins. He really shares some revealing insights into the mammoth task it was to coordinate this film.
Sadly, Liz Taylor, perhaps the most overrated actress of all time, comes off sounding more like a fishwife from London's Eastend rather than the Egypt's Queen of the Nile, nagging her paramour to choose either her love or an empire.
Clealry, Taylor seemed more suited to roles that would distinguish her later collaborations with Burton; for example, "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" and "Divorce His, Divorce Hers." No doubt the multitude of costume changes in "Cleopatra" kept the audience distracted from Ms. Taylor's apparent lack of range for this role.
Some of the elements in the film are impressive--like an ancient Roman Bacchanalian rite, it is a visual feast for the senses replete with a full-scale Roman Forum (despite a historical innaccuracy depicting the Arch of Constantine that would not be built over 300 years later), with the Battle of Actium nicely depicted as is Cleopatra's triumphant entry into Rome, but the rest feels and sounds like a melodramatic soap opera of a couple who cannot conquer the obstacles in their relationship, much less a world.
Funny, not much has changed 2500 years later....
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