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Androcles is an escaped slave who is on the run from his Roman captors. While hiding in the forest he comes upon a wild lion, who instead of attacking him, approaches him with a wounded paw. Seeing the lion in pain, he removes a huge thorn from the beast's paw, creating a friend for life. Androcles is eventually recaptured and sentenced to be thrown to the lions in the arena. But amongst the pack of lions is one who remembers the painful thorn…
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase
Ah, the joyous hyperbole of the golden age of movie advertising. `Flaming story of history's most fabulous era!' screamed the poster for Chester Erskine's Androcles and the Lion, which featured Jean Simmons wrapping herself around Victor Mature against a background of orgies and gladiators being torn apart by lions, with no sign of Alan Young's Androcles anywhere to be found, still less any indication that the film was a mild satire of Christianity and the futility of repression: if anything, it looks more like the following year's The Robe. (Nicholas Ray was brought in to shoot a Vestal Virgins bath sequence to spice up the film, but thanks to the censors that never made the final cut.) A one-time Harpo Marx project and later adapted for US TV with Norman Wisdom, it's a minor Shaw play, something of a pleasant trifle that plays around with stereotypes as the Christians regard their martyrdom as cause for some good-natured humor, Maurice Evans' emperor cheerfully realises that all he's doing is ensuring that for every Christian who dies in the arena two will leave the audience, Robert Newton's Christian soldier constantly walks the tightrope between keeping the faith and losing his temper with increasingly erratic balance and Alan Young's sweet-natured but henpecked animal lover Androcles regards martyrdom as something of a blessed release after being married to Elsa Lanchester.
As usual Shaw (who died two years before the film was released) insisted on Gabriel Pascal producing despite the massive failure of his wildly overbudget 1945 version of Caesar and Cleopatra, but this time round the budget is much tighter (black and white and a cast of hundreds rather than Technicolor and a cast of thousands), which results in an often stagebound film that's an erratic mixture of the good and the bad. Still, Young is very good indeed, enough of the barbs hit home to make it worthwhile and you can even forgive the very obvious man in the lion suit in the arena scene (reputedly no less a figure than Woody Strode!) thanks to one outrageous sight gag.
Odeon's UK DVD is extras-free but boasts the same excellent transfer used on the Criterion Eclipse US DVD, which is a massive improvement over most of the shoddy TV prints.
As usual Shaw (who died two years before the film was released) insisted on Gabriel Pascal producing despite the massive failure of his wildly overbudget 1945 version of Caesar and Cleopatra, but this time round the budget is much tighter (black and white and a cast of hundreds rather than Technicolor and a cast of thousands), which results in an often stagebound film that's an erratic mixture of the good and the bad. Still, Young is very good indeed, enough of the barbs hit home to make it worthwhile and you can even forgive the very obvious man in the lion suit in the arena scene (reputedly no less a figure than Woody Strode!) thanks to one outrageous sight gag.
Odeon's UK DVD is extras-free but boasts the same excellent transfer used on the Criterion Eclipse US DVD, which is a massive improvement over most of the shoddy TV prints.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
Satire? Comedy? It's a riot either way!
Androcles is a devout Christian, all creatures are friends of the Earth. During an encounter with a lion, who is roaring in pain, he removes a huge thorn from the beasts' paw, thus creating a friend for life. A short time after the incident, Androcles and a number of other Christians are arrested and condemned to death in the arena. They are to die by fighting with gladiators or eaten alive by lions, is there any chance that Androcles and his companions can survive their fate?
During my viewing of this film I was eating some soup and bread, I literally nearly choked on the bread and expelled the soup via my nose! Such is the hammy comedy on offer here, Androcles And The Lion, adapted from a George Bernard Shaw play, is an enjoyable picture if one is prepared for just what a ham sandwich it is. The cast, featuring Victor Mature, Jean Simmons, Alan Young and Robert Newton, play it as cardboard cutouts {Simmons possibly the only one taking it serious}, with the technical aspects so bad I dare you not to laugh out loud as Young dances with a man in a Lion suit!!
Don't take it serious and you should be OK, and I'm certainly not annoyed that I sat thru it, but I would rather wrestle a Lion and two Tigers before I had to sit and watch it again! 4/10
Androcles is a devout Christian, all creatures are friends of the Earth. During an encounter with a lion, who is roaring in pain, he removes a huge thorn from the beasts' paw, thus creating a friend for life. A short time after the incident, Androcles and a number of other Christians are arrested and condemned to death in the arena. They are to die by fighting with gladiators or eaten alive by lions, is there any chance that Androcles and his companions can survive their fate?
During my viewing of this film I was eating some soup and bread, I literally nearly choked on the bread and expelled the soup via my nose! Such is the hammy comedy on offer here, Androcles And The Lion, adapted from a George Bernard Shaw play, is an enjoyable picture if one is prepared for just what a ham sandwich it is. The cast, featuring Victor Mature, Jean Simmons, Alan Young and Robert Newton, play it as cardboard cutouts {Simmons possibly the only one taking it serious}, with the technical aspects so bad I dare you not to laugh out loud as Young dances with a man in a Lion suit!!
Don't take it serious and you should be OK, and I'm certainly not annoyed that I sat thru it, but I would rather wrestle a Lion and two Tigers before I had to sit and watch it again! 4/10
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:DVD
Awesome B & W film from when I was a kid - well produced on DVD and with a great story for the whole family to enjoy. Has been rar to locate on DVD - grab it if you can find it as you will not be disapointed!
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