In my opinion, the reason is that there is a very detached air about it, which leaves the audience unengaged. Specifically, I think the blame lies in the camerawork, pacing, editing.
What do others think?
It should be against the law to use 'LOL'; unless you really did LOL!
I disagree with the camerawork, which shows lots of memorable images (like the funeral sequence). I suppose the film's real problem is that Stephen Boyd and Sophia Loren- although capable actors in other films- failed to make their leading characters more impressionable. One wonders if original Livius choice Charlton Heston would have been successful if he had decided to swallow his pride and work with Loren again.
The film flopped for several reasons. Biographer Mel Martin gives that the film's downbeat ending was too much for American audiences still going through a lost of innocence when Kennedy was killed. Another reason is that by 1964 the attraction to Ancient Epic spectacles had waned, and audiences had had enough of the genre. They had already suffered fatigue from the CLEOPATRA hoopla the previous year, and the next year people stayed away from George Stevens' THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD.
It amazes me how much money went into building the forum set and how under utilized it was in the finished film.
Compare Commodus's entry into Rome in this and Gladiator and there is no comparison which is better. A travesty that the sets for this and 55 were never even nominated for an Oscar.
Agreed.
Call me crazy but I preferred this movie to Gladiator, except Joaquin Phoenix was a far better Commodus, imo. He made the role his own. Definitive even.
I disagree. I think the movie is hugely entertaining. One of the best Roman epics ever. Maybe the audience just got tired of these grand-scale costume epics. Recall that Cleopatra (1963) just flopped the previous year despite being the top grossing movie of that same year. And that had Liz Taylor and Richard Burton when they were together.
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