Cheapo DVD Review: Gladiator of Pompeii (2013)

Starring

Linda Batista

Victor Alfieri

Tomas Arana

Vanessa Gravina

Tony Musante

Luca Ward

Bettina Zimmerman

The DVD cover blurb reads thus: 

"Epic drama of Pompeii at the city's height of glory, up to the eruption of Vesuvius in AD79, this film is one of titanic proportions, recounting on the grandest scale, its untimely destruction which killed 20,000 people in a matter of hours.

Pompeii was a world where men and women ahd slaves and where gladiators fought to the death to provide entertainment to the bloodthirsty crowds. Helpless agaisnt a succession of apocalyptic events (A great earthquake, tidal waves, thunder and lightning), the inferno continued for three days and then all was silent. From the Ashes a Hero will Rise"

  This is not a movie about gladiators.

This is a movie about Pompeii that has some gladiators in it. Important difference.

  It's also, technically, not actually a movie. I was a bit nonplussed when part of the opening credits showed up again about 1/3rd of the way through until a little bit of research revealed that "Gladiator Of Pompeii" started life as a 2007 Italian TV series called "Pompei, ieri, oggi, domani" (Thank you IMDB

 Basically they stitched the three parts together, wrapped the whole thing in a mildly-misleading DVD case and hoped to cash in on "Spartacus - Blood And Sand".

 Notice how the guy on the cover is wearing Russell Crowe's helmet from "Gladiator"? Tell me that's not deliberate.

 While we're on the subject of the cover let's address a couple of the things stated therein.

"From the Ashes a Hero will Arise" - No, no he doesn't. But then "A hero manages to successfully leg it" is a crap selling point.

"A lavish production with EPIC FIGHT sequences." - Wow. They put the EPIC FIGHTS all in capitals so they must be really cool, right? 

Again, no. A Channel 4 documentary about gladiators would probably definitely do a better job. 

   Having got that out of the way. let's move on to the actual film.

 The story opens with a hotshot Vulcanologist being pulled out of the field to come look at Vesuvius. While in Italy he's given a tour of Pompeii by a beautiful Italian vulcanologist/archaelogist/research assistant and she tell a him a story about the last days of the city...

(Fade to AD79.)

 The next two and a half hours are a mix of historical drama and disaster movie, the latter becoming more and more prominent as we get closer to the big finale.   

 A Thracian gladiator falls in love with a slave girl.

An exiled and enslaved princess catches the eye of the local Consul.

The local Christians manage to get right up the noses of the authorities

And the Consul's sister does wonders for the reputation of Roman noblewomen by being a bit of a bitch - when she's not telling her brother "Look, these earth tremors and clouds of smoke coming out of the mountain are worrying me somewhat. Can we get the Hades out of here please?"

 If you've got used to the "Blood, backstabbing and boobs" approach to historical drama ("Rome" and that "Spartacus" thing again.) then the whole thing comes across as stately and curiously old-fashioned. There's a definite air of the old 50s/60s epics about it. 

 If you're a fan of Italian sword & sandal movies then you're really on familiar ground. Muscular men in short kilts, haughty noble men and women being mean to lovely slave girls and some atrocious dubbing. 

 But I have to admit that after a slow start I found myself getting into it and the climax is suitably dynamic. 

(Spoiler alert: The mountain goes bang and not all of the cast survive.)

 For the most part the end of Pompeii is handled well, despite some SFX failures, but is it enough to save the film? Maybe. 

The one thing that does puzzle me is the framing storyline. The vulcanologists, remember?

  There doesn't seem to be any reason whatsoever for them to be in the film. They meet, she tells him a story, they end up in bed (somehow) and then when he buggers off to visit another volcano, she does the old "Race to the airport to catch him" cliche. And the point of all that was...?

 The director could have got an easy crowd-pop in by making them reincarnations of Pompeiian citizens but nope, doesn't happen. 

 The bloody film is three hours long so it's not as if they needed to pad the story out, is it?

How much did I pay for this: £2

Was it worth it? Once I realised that I wasn't watching the film I expected then I did manage to get into it. But I would still say "Approach with caution" unless you're a fan of Peplum movies and want to see what  the modern equivalent looks like. 

Ps. Memo to self:  Track down the lying get who designs the DVD covers for these things and give him a good backhand across the mouth. 

Trailer here if you're still interested. 

That's all folks.