Review of Caligula (1979) by Kris W — 07 Apr 2010

Basically a soft core porno with a few really respected ( in some cases academy award winning) actors slumming it. As disgusting and repulsive as what happens on screen for almost 3 hours is, I was never bored and it did have many memorable moments.

From Roger ebert's original review from 1980:

You have heard that this is a violent film. But who could have suspected how violent, and to what vile purpose, it really is? In this film, there are scenes depicting a man whose urinary tract is closed, and who has gallons of wine poured down his throat. His bursting stomach is punctured with a sword. There is a scene in which a man is emasculated, and his genitals thrown to dogs, who eagerly eat them on the screen. There are scenes of decapitation, evisceration, rape, bestiality, sadomasochism, necrophilia.

These scenes -- indeed, the movie itself -- reflect a curiously distanced sensibility. Nobody in this film really seems to be there. Not the famous actors like Malcolm McDowell and (very briefly) Peter O'Toole and John Gielgud, whose scenes have been augmented by additional porn shot later with other people and inserted to spice things up. Not the director (who removed his credit from the film). Not the writer (what in the world can it mean that this movie is "Adapted from an Original Screenplay by Gore Vidal"?).