agit,<br>
Gladiator was hardly a realistic portrayal of the Roman army, or anything else Roman for that matter. Saying that, I am still not as critical as many members of RAT on this subject because I know that this film was instrumental in geting people interested in the Roman army, and Roman history in general. I honestly doubt we would have even half as many RAT members (or new Roman renactors) if it had not been for this movie. I also doubt Deepeeka would have agreed to all of the Roman products I developed for them had it not been for the teeming masses out there interested in buying Roman military equipment if they had not been inspired by Gladiator.<br>
<br>
thanks to Ridley/Gladiator, other producers now dare to make other historical(?) ancient films, like Troy, Alexander the Great and Hannibal. Even (gag) Lord of the Rings probably would not have been produced if it had not been for Gladiator.<br>
<br>
But in a nutshell, just a few of the things wrong with the military equipment in gladiator include,<br>
1. the cheap vacuform helmets are not a copy of any real Roman headgear, but instead pressed from a mold intended for 17th century lobstertail helmets<br>
2. The linoleum lorica sementata did not attempt to duplicate any paticular type of real armor, but just had the vague look of a segmented cuirass.<br>
3. Maximus' horse chamfron (head armor) dated to the 15th century. His, and other officer type armor/helmets were terrible.<br>
4. Although reasonable pila were depicted, they were not thrown but simply used as pikes.<br>
5. although the scuta were good (copied exactly out of my book), a more period emblem would have been better, and oval shields would have been in use as well.<br>
6.Fanciful repeating crossbows and excessive pyrotechnics.<br>
7. No evidence for the black Algemeine SS / Praetorian Guard outfits.<br>
The list goes on and on.<br>
<br>
<br>
I have little doubt this new project will be filled with historical inaccuracies as well, not to mention the very premise.<br>
<br>
It is not that Ridley Scott wanted these things to be wrong. It is that there are many unscrupulous costumes suppliers that will assure the producer everything will be authentic, but the film people are too ignorant of the subject to realize they are not getting "the right stuff".<br>
<br>
Dan<br>
<p></p><i></i>
![[Image: PRIMANI_ban2.gif]](http://web.tiscali.it/iulianevivas/PRIMANI_ban2.gif)
