Masada [DVD]

Proof, if more were needed, that history provides the basis for the best stories. Masada tells the tale of a small band of hardened Jewish rebels who are the last remaining resistance to the Roman domination of their land. Told largely from the point of view of the two leaders involved it culminates in the siege of the 'impregnable' fortress of Masada, on the shores of the Dead Sea, by the Tenth Legion. Often tense, gripping and dramatic it is lifted by big performances from big character actors - Peter O'Toole, Anthony Quayle, Denis Quilley, David Warner, Timothy West and Peter Strauss amongst others. Another real bonus is the top notch score by Hollywood legend, Jerry Goldsmith.

Back in 1981 this epic mini-series about the ill-fated Jewish rebellion against Roman rule pulled in what was then the biggest TV audience of all time, yet it's languished on the shelf forgotten for the past couple of decades. This DVD does include the uncut six-hour-plus series, but not the abridged feature film version released outside the US as The Antagonists, which apparently featured some different scenes (despite being intended as a Sidney Pollack-directed film in the early 70s until the Yom Kippur war made filming on location impossible, the abridged version was not a success: in the UK it had the dubious honor of being the lowest-grossing film of it's year).

As with most siege epics, the action is limited to the beginning and the end, with much of the interim filled in with intrigue and character development while we wait for the big battle that in this case, famously, never actually happens. Not altogether surprisingly it spends more screen time with the Romans than with the Zealots - even if the Zealots' strategy was more than simply watching and waiting while sporadically taunting their would-be conquerors, with their penchant for spectacle and infighting, the Romans are always better dramatic value in these sorts of epics. Certainly Peter O'Toole effortlessly dominates the series as the humane Roman commander forced by the political situation back in Rome to fight the rebels rather than negotiate with them only to find himself facing mutiny, senatorial spies and other political animals as well as heat, windstorms and not enough water before his legions can even start to virtually move mountains to reach the clifftop fortress of Masada. By contrast, then-reigning king of the miniseries Peter Strauss has less to work with as his character spends much of the series waiting and trying to raise moral with only a few half-hearted attempts at soul-searching along the way, only really coming into his own in the still powerful final scenes.

The supporting cast is impressive, with a line-up of familiar Brits including David Warner, Anthony Quayle, Timothy West, Dennis Quilley, Anthony Valentine and Nigel Davenport making up the officers, emperors and senators while the likes of Jack Watson, Norman Rossington, Warren Clarke, Michael Elphick and Nick Brimble swell the Roman ranks. The Judeans have to make do with Barbara Carrera, Joseph Wiseman, David Opatoshu and Paul L. Smith. For the most part they're blessed with exceptionally good dialogue with few lapses (though Anthony Valentine's "I'm a tribune, darling" is an unwelcome moment of unintended camp) thanks to Joel Oliansky's surprisingly intelligent and often witty screenplay, which boasts a good understanding of the politics of the day on both sides and an ability to offer memorable character moments for even the bit players - siege engineer's Quayle's briefing on the practicalities how to get the most out of slave labor is a perfect example of how to juggle exposition and background research without it seeming like a history lecture.

Visually it's often impressive too, although at times Boris Sagal's direction is caught between location naturalism and old-school studio work due to location problems driving the show $7m over its then-huge $18m budget. The destruction of Jerusalem has something of the look of a late De Mille epic to it, with Albert Whitlock's old school columns of fire matte paintings having an almost storybook stylisation that wouldn't look out of place in The Ten Commandments but despite some obvious studio interior-`exteriors' in a few scenes, it's a genuinely spectacular production from a time when the big-screen epic had long fallen from favor. There's also an extraordinarily good score from Jerry Goldsmith (with additional music by Morton Stevens based on his themes) at the peak of his powers even if his great elegiac finale cue was never used. Still pretty impressive stuff.

"We have won a rock in the middle of a wasteland on the shore of a poison sea."

Like Tora Tora Tora, this is a brilliant and authentically detailed drama about a very important event. As with TTT you would think that you knew whose side you would be on, but as you watch you realise that command decisions and human error mean that neither side is wholly right or wrong. The deliberately drawn modern parallels at the beginning and end, as my husband points out, also give one pause for thought, given the continuing situation in the middle east.

And, on a lighter note, it's hard to decide which is more beautiful - the way Peter O'Toole says "Rome" or the way Peter Strauss says "Israel". This is not just for those who have reached Cambridge Latin Course Book IV (but if you did it helps!).

Get this if you are interested in accurate portrayal of the ancient Romans, or if you would like to see some good acting from 1980. Get it if you liked Peter O'Toole in Lawrence of Arabia. It's 6 hours of good historical entertainment, with no explicit sex, and not much violence.