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Last Days of Pompeii [DVD] [1975] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]

Preston Foster , Basil Rathbone , Ernest B. Schoedsack , Merian C. Cooper    DVD
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
Price: £19.95
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Region 1 encoding (requires a North American or multi-region DVD player and NTSC compatible TV. More about DVD formats.)

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Frequently Bought Together

Last Days of Pompeii [DVD] [1975] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC] + Spanish Main [DVD] [1945]
Price For Both: £29.12

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  • Spanish Main [DVD] [1945] £9.17

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Product details

  • Actors: Preston Foster, Basil Rathbone, Alan Hale, John Wood, Louis Calhern
  • Directors: Ernest B. Schoedsack, Merian C. Cooper
  • Writers: Boris Ingster, G.B. Stern, James Ashmore Creelman, Jerry Hutchinson, Melville Baker
  • Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, DVD-Video, Subtitled, NTSC
  • Language: English
  • Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
  • Region: Region 1 (US and Canada DVD formats.)
  • Aspect Ratio: 4:3 - 1.33:1
  • Number of discs: 1
  • Classification: Unrated (US MPAA rating. See details.)
  • Studio: Turner Home Ent
  • DVD Release Date: 22 Nov 2005
  • Run Time: 96 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B000B7MX70
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 144,133 in Film & TV (See Top 100 in Film & TV)


Customer Reviews

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Pompeii gets the King Kong Treatment 14 Feb 2009
By Guy Mannering TOP 1000 REVIEWER VINE™ VOICE
Format:DVD
This 1935 movie was produced by the same team who gave us King Kong (you can tell this almost immediately when you hear the thumping opening music) and was Hollywood's last stab at the sword and sandal genre until the late 40s. Sadly, it's not based on Bulwer-Lytton's classic 19th century romance, but is a tale of a young blacksmith reduced by poverty to fighting as a gladiator and who during a visit to Judea has a fateful encounter with Pontius Pilate and Jesus Christ. The movie zaps along at a fair old pace but you have to wait to the very end for the King Kong style special effects and spectacle. But it's worth the wait, the scenes in the amphitheatre and the destruction of Pompeii by Mount Vesuvius are pretty impressive. If you like this sort of thing, though, seek out the 1980s mini-series, available as a German release with the original English soundtrack. It's even more impressive and sticks closely to the plot of Bulwer-Lytton's novel.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
By A. W. Wilson TOP 1000 REVIEWER
Format:DVD|Amazon Verified Purchase
I typed the title above so there should be no confusion as to which DVD I am writing about. As we know Amazon tend to put reviews of one release under many, thus confusing the issue...Nuff said. This B/W 1935 film from RKO is well worth getting, as, whilst obviously it has dated, it still holds up, particulaly for the older viewer (that's me), tho younger viewers may find it odd and a bit dull(?). Anyway, I enjoyed it - The casting is a bit odd - Pres Foster is a bit hard to take as Marcus, the hero, but he is big. Alan hale as his villainous faithfull best friend is Alan Hale doing his usual faithfull etc.., Basil Rathbone is good as Pontius Pilate and the plot moves along well apart from a slight sagging in the middle. The climax, whilst good for it's time, seems a bit hasty, and were there some shots from a silent film? Maybe not. The plot has nothing to do with the book (which they do admit to in a prologue), but that's OK. It is quite religious as well with a great heavenly choir for the dramatic moments. The print (sound and picture) is really very good, with no reservations. If you have a liking for vintage films/epics I am pretty sure you will enjoy this as I did. Take a chance...
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Amazon.com: 4.4 out of 5 stars  22 reviews
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A movie with depth and style 2 July 2005
By nightshade - Published on Amazon.com
I first saw this movie as a child in the 50's on TV and fell in love with it. My mother would let me cut school in order to see it on tv( and my family was not particularly religious), along with a number of others like Cyrano de Bergerac, Androcles and the Lion, Sign of the cross, and The High and the Mighty, and Captain Sirocco. I combed the tv guide once a week for classics like these. The redeeming quality of all of the movies I become attached to is "nobility". Aside from the awesome eruption of Vesuvius, and awesome it was for its day, and as thrilled as I am about the special effects and the disater movie perspective ....the story is simply ...Sublime.

Preston Foster, in typical post silent era acting style, plays Marcus - with dash and bravura. Marcus is a simple, humble man. He is completely contented with his life as a blacksmith and has a wife and son he cherishes, everything any man could hope for. He is quickly reminded of the foolishness of his take on life by a jaded slave dealer and a kindly but skeptical roman patrician who gives his son a gold coin. Marcus and his wife Julia close shop for the day and set out to celebrate the windfall by purchasing a ball too big for the tiny grasp of his small child. The fates intervine... the ball rolls into the street and Julia and the infant are over run by a speeding chariot. So the saga begins, brilliantly, with such irony, the gift and joy of a gold coin and a new toy leading to a tragedy as Marcus' wife and child both die. Marcus now impoverished, and a broken man.....having given up his ideals and sense of morality to fight in the gladitorial arena, as the only way to get the money he needed to try and get medical help for his family and with nothing left of his former life to live for embraces a new view of life and the Gods he once loved. A world weary and newly cynical Marcus becomes a Gladiator commenting "it's easy to get money. All you have to do...is Kill". Thru success after success in the gladitoral arena he becomes a famous man, a formerly detested slaver, and thru' clever manipulation of events and opportunities , ultimately head of the Arena itself. During one of his triumphs in the arena he meets the son of a fallen foe named The Wolf. Distraught at the appearance of the young boy waiting for his fathers victory he reluctantly asks if the boy knows what happens to people when they die. Marcus overwhelmed by guilt and reemorse asks the child if he would like to become his son. The child agrees and a new life centered around this child emerges as he lives his life now to make up for taking the life of the boys father and to give the boy every opportunity in life. While in Judea the young boy is struck down in an accident and he is healed by the Christ, a moment of passion in this film that foeshadows Christs own travails later in the movie, and the dilema put forth to Marcus to intervene. One of the hallmarks of this film is Pontius Pilate, played with sensitivity, grace, and remarkable understatement by the great Basil Rathbone. This one of the truly remarkable small parts in movie history. Totally unforgetable and worth the watch of the film, if for no other reason.This film goes on and on with jewels of philosophical wisdom from a kindly Greek tutor, plentious action, and an intelligent and intriguing perspective on the spiritual defeat and then reawakening of the magnificent and earnest Marcus. Who in the end makes the right decisions for the right reasons. I NEVER get tired of watching this movie! It is one of my top 20 all time favorites!
18 of 19 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars Morality and Ashes. 17 Sep 2006
By tvtv3 - Published on Amazon.com
Format:DVD
Produced and ghost directed by Merian C. Cooper, THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII is a morality tale loosely based upon minor events in Sir Edward George Bulwer-Lytton's novel THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII. The film stars Preston Foster as Marcus, a simple blacksmith of Pompeii. Marcus is a happy man. He has a beautiful wife and an energetic young son. Though the family doesn't have much money, Marcus is happy at his chosen career and what he has is enough. The man in charge of the arena thinks Marcus would make a formidable gladiator, but he can't seem to convince him to abandon his job as a blacksmith for more money. Marcus' wife and son are tragically run over by a runaway chariot. Unable to pay for medical care because of his modest means his family dies. The loss of his family fills Marcus with despair and fuels an ambition to gain wealth. Thus the second act of the film begins as Marcus begins his new life as a gladiator.

Marcus becomes the finest gladiator in the land, an unbeatable opponent. After one fatal match, Marcus discovers the boy of his fallen foe. The child is now an orphan. Reminded of his own dead son, Marcus adopts the boy as his own. To secure the boys' future and to insure that he will not have to fight in the arena, Marcus begins taking suspicious and dangerous assignments that pay him extremely well and help him become the Master of the Arena itself. While on one of these assignments to Judea, Marcus' son, Flavius is struck down in a freak accident. The child is healed and that encounter changes the boy's life forever. Marcus is grateful, but he is still tainted by the greed and ambition birthed from the grief of his wife and first son. Years later it is revealed that Flavius has been helping slaves and gladiators escape from Pompeii. Marcus is crushed, but loves his son so deeply that he will do everything in his power to protect him. Then the volcano erupts and judgment comes.

Hoping to capitalize on the success of KING KONG, Merian C. Cooper invested a great deal of time and money into this picture. Watching the film one can tell that it was an expensive picture to make (at the time). The sets are lavish and are quite reminiscent of a Cecil B. de Mille picture. The movie has some of the same religious overtones and morality of a de Mille picture, too. But a Cecil B. de Mille picture this is not. The screenplay is basically a morality play forced into the usual three-act structure. Foster does a decent job in his role, but he and everyone else in the cast is outshone by Basil Rathbone who portrays Pontius Pilate. Rathbone brings an element of humanity that is often lacked in other portrayals of the famed leader. He illustrates that arrogance of Pilate, but tempers it with sensitivity and a tortured conscious over his dealings with Jesus.

When it was initially released, THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII was a flop and the film had to be re-released several times (often as a double bill with King Kong) in order to earn back its cost. Over seventy years later, the movie hasn't changed much. It still comes off as being an average movie with one outstanding performance. For film buffs it's worth watching for Rathbone's performance. Anyone who likes big spectacle films might enjoy it as well as anyone who likes old-time Bible-type films.
13 of 14 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars I love this movie. . . 18 Dec 2001
By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com
This is one of my all time favorite classics! Basil Rathbone plays Pontious Pilate, a man plagued by questions and doubts with his decision to crucify Christ and whether or not Christ was worthy of crucifiction. This movie deals with what really is important in life and it does it tastefully. Preston Foster is the man who has lost everything, including his family; gains wealth as a fighting gladiator, then comes to the conclusion in the end about what is really valuable. I can watch this film over and over again without getting tired of it.
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