ANCIENT PERIOD MOVIE REVIEWS

[Narukami]

Review posted on the Ancient Warfare Magazine web site (Editor's Blog)



Hollywood Romans



Masada

1981 Universal / ABC Mini-Series
383 minutes
Director: Boris Sagal
Screenwriter: Joel Oliansky
Based on the Novel “The Antagonists” by Ernest K Gann
Starring: Peter O’Toole, Peter Strauss, Anthony Quayle, and David Warner

“A victory? What have we won? We've won a rock in the middle of a wasteland, on the shores of a poisoned sea.“
– Flavius Silva in the 1981 mini-series Masada


I vaguely remember watching at least part of Masada when it was first broadcast in 1981. A direct result of the record-breaking success enjoyed by Roots, Masada was part of that Golden Age of the Television Mini-Series when the viewing public had an insatiable appetite for long form epic dramas of historic events. So long as it was “Based Upon A True Story” the audience would seemingly buy anything, and lots of it.

Reviews of Masada, then and now, have for the most part been excellent, with near universal praise for the acting (particularly by Peter O’Toole as Flavius Silva) for the production design and for a screenplay that was both dramatic and literate.

One university professor, who shows the film every year to his Ancient Civilizations class, considers the film not only a great drama but also great history.

“The music, the material, the true story and the detail from building the ramp to the costumes and location re-create what actually happened better than any textbook or lecture could.”

So it was that I sat down to view this 6+ hour epic with much anticipation.

Now it may seem like a fool’s errand to seek historical accuracy in a Hollywood film, and to say I was disappointed would not be entirely accurate for I did find myself becoming involved in the story, but not because of anything having to do with the Romans or the siege of Masada.

Indeed the story being told here has more to do with late 70’s America than it does early 70’s Judea.

Now this should come as no surprise. Storytellers have been doing this from the very start and continue to do so today. HG Wells wanted to comment on Victorian England’s colonial hubris and so wrote The War Of The Worlds where the Martians are the technologically superior imperialists and the English the hapless natives.

In the same way writer Joel Oliansky and director Boris Sagal have used the setting of ancient Judea and the siege of Masada to comment on post-Vietnam America, with the Romans as the Americans. It is the story of relatively young, polytheistic superpower confronting a much older, monotheistic culture that refuses to submit despite the obvious technical and military superiority of the invaders. (That the film has renewed resonance now, due to current political and military events, is an unforeseen bonus.)

This is why the film spend the majority of its time with the Romans for not only are they the more interesting characters dramatically, they are also the ones the director wants his audience to identify with even though the natural tendency of the American public will be to identify with the rebels.

Seemingly at cross-purposes to this goal the director has cast British actors as the Romans and non-British, though not necessarily American actors, as the Jewish rebels. The casting works for generally the British actors are the stronger in their craft and this is all to the good as they must carry this film. It also helps that the Roman characters are more fully developed giving actors like Peter O’Toole, Anthony Quayle and David Warner something to work with.



So, as dramatic entertainment, Masada does work, but is it history? Does it, “recreate what actually happened” as the professor believes it does?

In a word – No.

Everything is true … except for the parts we made up.

While it is clear that the production team spent considerable time and energy trying to “get it right,” in terms of the look and physicality of the film, it is also abundantly clear that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

One hears the title “Decurion” thrown about quite liberally by the infantry even though this was a rank title used in the cavalry. Likewise, legionaries are heard referring to Maniples (“He’s with the 3rd Cohort 2nd Maniple.”) when that term had fallen out of active use many years before any of the current legionaries were even born.

There is also an inconsistency to what is worn and when. Signifer are seen wearing an animal skin on their helmet in one scene, not in the next, and then back on again. In the case of the Aquilifer, he wears a wolf pelt, not a lion or bear and then only in the final scene.



The armor and helmets will look familiar to anyone who has seen any of the Roman themed films of the 1960’s and 70’s. We are again presented with leather Lorica Segmentata, and a wide array of helmets that run the gamut from the reasonably correct Imperial Gallic “C” and “D” and the less probable Imperial Italic “G” to some very odd helmets worn by the messengers. These helmets look like no others and most interestingly they have little wings on them making their wearer look as if he should be delivering flowers for FTD.

Some effort has been made to distinguish the Centurions from the rank and file. They carry a vine staff and wear their gladius and pugio on the correct sides. Their helmets do bear crests but not transverse ones. Instead it seems an attempt has been made to differentiate the various grades of Centurion by the style and color of their crest. Junior Centurions have small tufts in tubes on either side of their helmet while seemingly more senior Centurions have the tufts along with a full crest running from front to back.

Tribunes have a small metal comb on the top of their helmet while the various senior officers seem never to wear their helmets at all.

Some other nice touches include pilum (though I wonder if the legionaries would actually carry them in the final assault into the fortress), and the cavalry carrying oblong shields. The scutum carried by the infantry is rectangular but seems far too small, not painted and made of metal. In fact these seem like they very same scutum used in the recent HBO series Rome.

Once again, in the best tradition of Hollywood Romans, the tunic color is red and is worn by all.



Eastern Archers actually look pretty good, but there is no indication of there being any other Auxiliary Troops present and indeed when the 10th Legion first arrives at Masada their formation looks rather puny, and this is where Masada runs off the tracks. The filmmakers undercut the history even though the history is so much more exciting.

Much is made throughout the film of the disparity of the forces involved – 5000 legionaries of the 10th Legion against 960 men, woman and children defending Masada, yet historians put the Roman forces at closer to 15,000 (including Auxiliary troops, camp followers, and Jewish POW labor). Why not use the more accurate number?

This is also true of the siege tower. Josephus describes a 90’ tall tower covered in metal and bristling with ballista and catapults. What the film gives us is a 50’ tower with a few metal plates on the front and some Eastern Archers on the top. It is quite an accomplishment of movie prop construction, but it fails to impress, as it should.



In this same way, the Roman camp does not impress. To the film’s credit the buildings are constructed of stone with the leather tents used as the roof, and as the production team was at Masada itself, what they have constructed may in fact be closer to the historical record than we might otherwise give them credit for. However, the camp looks poorly laid out and not at all in the style of other Roman camps we have seen.

Generally speaking the extras do not wear their costumes well nor do they move with any sense of military bearing. This may well be the intent of the director, reinforcing his story by giving the Roman Army a “I just want to go home” look, but it is yet another example of the production undercutting the impact of their story.

Indeed, this comes to the crux of the problem and the source of my disappointment – The Romans do not impress.

Rather than the fiction of Jewish captives building the ramp, why not have the legionaries do it?

Why insert the “African Village” type scene of Falco having Jewish captives launched by catapult against the walls of Masada in an attempt to force the defender’s surrender?

The answer of course is obvious – this is more dramatic.

But Other Than That Mrs. Lincoln, How Was The Play?

Filmmaker John Sayles once opined, “If historical accuracy were the thing people went to he movies for, historians would be the vice presidents of studios. Every studio would have two or three historians.”

At its best the mini-series genre, as seen in HBO’s Band Of Brothers, can be a riveting piece of drama that maintains fidelity with the history on which it is based. At its worst, as in Starz’s Spartacus, it is gratuitous nonsense wrapped in a thin veneer of history.

Masada does remain true to the spirit of the times, if not the details, and is an entertaining drama. However, it is disappointing that the filmmakers did not trust the history – Masada could have been so much more.



Further Reading and Links of Interest:

Books

Past Imperfect – History According To Hollywood, c1995 ISBN: 0-8050-3759-4

The Jewish War by Flavius Josephus, Penguin Classics 1981 Revised Edition

Apocalypse – The Great Jewish Revolt Against Rome AD 66—73 by Neil Faulkner, c2002 ISNBN: 0-7524-2573-0

Rome And Jerusalem The Clash of Ancient Civilizations by Martin Goodman, c2007 ISBN: 978-0-375-41185-4

Web Sites & Links

IMDB listing for Masada
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081900/usercomments

An interesting discussion of the conflicting evidence concerning those last hours inside Masada
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/...asada.html

The DVD is currently available from Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/Masada-Complete-Mi...715&sr=1-1

:wink:

Narukami