Movie: Last Days of Pompeii (1913)

[amedia]

We saw clips from this when we went to the Pompeii exhibit (part of the Big Christmas Road Trip), and decided we wanted to see the whole thing.

Pros: Gorgeous sets with lots of nice details, especially the interiors and the gardens. We spotted some replicas of items we had seen in the museum; a famous relief depicting a Dionysian procession is prominently displayed early on. The women's hair seems appropriately elaborate. Impressive crowd scenes. Surprisingly good special effects for 1913.

Cons: Silly plot that disregards petty details like, oh, Roman culture or Egyptian religion. (meritahut's SPQR Blues has spoiled us - we expect WAY more accuracy!) Presumably this is the fault of the original novel. Also, the costumes don't look right - I honestly don't think Roman men wore gauze paisley shawls during any period of the Republic or the Empire, nor, I suspect, did they wear their hair Prince Valiant-style.

Comments

[whswhs.livejournal.com]

chorale and I went to the Pompeii exhibit when it was in San Diego, and it was quite fascinating. I was doing research toward my current game book, a new edition of GURPS Low-Tech (a guide to technology before the Industrial Revolution), and I found it interesting to see actual Roman surgical instruments . . . and even more so to learn that the Romans had invented the beam balance, the kind of scale a lot of doctors' offices have with the little weight sliding along a linear scale (technically called a "steelyard"). Actually seeing early technology adds something you don't get from reading descriptions or looking at photos.

And then we came to the exit, with the casts of victims of the eruption: the dog doubled up in agony, the man reaching out his hand to touch a woman who was with him, the slave hampered in getting away by his fetters. . . . Wow. Having that moment of empathy with two-thousand-year-old pain was astonishing. And a bit disturbing.

[chorale.livejournal.com]

Yes, seeing those casts was disturbing.

[amedia.livejournal.com]

Actually seeing early technology adds something you don't get from reading descriptions or looking at photos.

I've seen a few good TV specials on early technology, too; the one where they reconstructed the Roman odometer based on what they learned from x-raying the Antikythera Mechanism was fascinating.

The exhibit we just saw didn't have the casts, but I saw them in Houston. What bothered me most at the time was the dog - for some reason that just broke my heart. Later what bothered me was that the dog bothered me more than the people! I uuess I'd seen so many pictures of the people-casts that they didn't affect me as much, or maybe it was because the poor dog was tied up and couldn't run away, and his people just left him there.

[chorale.livejournal.com]

I'm interested in seeing the film now; I love paisley. ;-)

[amedia.livejournal.com]

LOL!!!!