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Quo Vadis [DVD] [1951]
 
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Quo Vadis [DVD] [1951]

DVD ~ Robert Taylor
4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
RRP: £15.99
Price: £7.98 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
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Frequently Bought Together

Quo Vadis [DVD] [1951] + Masada [DVD] + The Robe [DVD] [1953]
Total RRP: £48.97
Price For All Three: £22.84

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  • This item: Quo Vadis [DVD] [1951] DVD ~ Robert Taylor

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  • Masada [DVD] DVD ~ Peter O'Toole

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  • The Robe [DVD] [1953] DVD ~ Richard Burton

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What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

Quo Vadis [DVD] [1951]
86% buy the item featured on this page:
Quo Vadis [DVD] [1951] 4.5 out of 5 stars (4)
£7.98
Masada [DVD]
7% buy
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Taras Bulba [DVD] [1962]
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Quo Vadis [Blu-ray] [1951]
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Product details

  • Actors: Robert Taylor, Deborah Kerr, Peter Ustinov, Leo Genn, Patricia Laffan
  • Directors: Mervyn LeRoy
  • Format: PAL
  • Region: Region 2 (This DVD may not be viewable outside Europe. Read more about DVD formats.)
  • Number of discs: 2
  • Classification: PG
  • Studio: Warner Home Video
  • DVD Release Date: 2 Feb 2009
  • Run Time: 167 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B001IWELJ0
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 3,017 in DVD (See Bestsellers in DVD)

    Popular in these categories:

    #30 in  DVD > Drama > Historical
    #100 in  DVD > Classics > Drama

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Reviews

Synopsis
MGM turned Henry Sinkiewicz's Nobel Prize-winning novel into one of the most extravagant productions in film history. The epic tale is set in the decadence and decay of Nero's Rome, where Christianity is just beginning to foment. Robert Taylor (BILLY THE KID, JOHNNY EAGER) stars as Marcus Vinicius, a Roman military commander who falls in love with Lygia, played by Deborah Kerr (KING SOLOMON'S MINES, THE KING AND I). Lygia has recently converted to Christianity, and Marcus follows suit. The conversion establishes a rift between Marcus and the emperor Nero (Sir Peter Ustinov), who blames the growing religion for the turmoil within his empire, going so far as to throw Christian converts to the lions. But the real appeal of QUO VADIS is the grand Technicolor spectacle of ancient Rome burning, of pagan orgies, of marching armies, and of man-eating lions. Combined with the stunning score by Miklos Rozsa, QUO VADIS is worth watching simply for the audiovisual feast it offers.

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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars One of the great blockbusters, 24 Jan 2009
By Guy Mannering (Maidenhead, England) - See all my reviews
Polish author Henryk Sienciewicz (pronounced I believe shee-en-kay-evich) published his novel Quo Vadis in 1896, and like The Last Days of Pompeii and Ben-Hur it met with instant and enduring international success (Henryk went on to win the Nobel Prize) both literary and cinematic. The story is set in ancient Rome during the reign of emperor Nero. The centurion Marcus Vinicius falls in love with christian girl Lygia but Marcus has caught the lustful eye of Nero's feline empress and when the mad emperor sets Rome on fire she suggests that the blame should be placed on the christians who are then rounded up and thrown to the lions. Sienciewicz weaves the characters of the apostles Peter and Paul into his story and the novel's title derives from the legend that as Peter is fleeing the persecution in Rome he encounters along the Appian Way a vision of Christ and the apostle asks the question "Quo Vadis Domine?" or "Where are you going Lord?". It is the answer to this question that convinces Peter that he must return to Rome and face matyrdom.

Movies based on classical or biblical subjects were a staple of the silent cinema from the earliest days and there were at least two silent versions of Quo Vadis.Indeed the first version of 1912, followed by The Last Days of Pompeii and Cabiria, all made in Italy, can be credited with establishing the cinema as a serious art form. But with the advent of the talkies the popularity of the genre started to wane. Cecil B. deMille attempted to revive it in the early 30s with The Sign of the Cross (the storyline of which closely resembles that of Quo Vadis)and his risible Cleopatra and the team at RKO who gave us King Kong had another stab at The Last Days of Pompeii in 1935, but these movies enjoyed only limited success and after them the genre was pretty much stone dead. A revival started in the late 40s, first with Fabiola, a Franco-Italian production, and then in Hollywood with deMille's Sampson and Delilah. MGM had had Quo Vadis on the back-burner for a number of years and it was probably the success of Samson and Delilah that spurred MGM on to have another bash at it in 1951 with no expense spared, and the result was a lavish, jaw-dropping spectacle which even in our age of CGI effects has few equals. The movie in fact was made in Rome, MGM figuring they could get double the value for their dollars in impoverished post-war Italy - hence the cast of thousands. The success of this blockbuster led to another 15 years of epic productions (and not-so-epic in the case of Italian sword-and-sandal productions of the 50s and early 60s) before once again fashions changed and the genre fizzled out until Gladiator inspired a brief revival in the late 20th century.

The movie holds up remarkably well. The production values, the musical score by Miklos Rozsa and the casting are all superb (only Robert Taylor as the hero Marcus Vinicius is perhaps a tad too old and stodgy for the part). The one actor who leaves an indelible impression is of course Peter Ustinov at the beginning of his career who gives an enjoyably OTT performance as Nero, both hilarious in his deluded belief that he is a great musician and fatally impervious to the malign influence of his empress Poppaea (the fabulous Patricia Laffan) and the flattery of his suave courtier Petronius (the uncle of Marcus played by Leo Genn. Petronius and Poppaea are based on real historical characters.)

The technical quality of this 2-disc release is excellent, the digital remastering has resulted in a crisp picture with vibrant colour and Rozsa's brassy score sounds wonderfully sonorous. Some nice extras too including a documentary on the making of Quo Vadis from which I learned that at an early stage MGM were eying up Orson Welles and Marlene Dietrich(presumably to play Nero and his feline empress) and rather more seriously considered Gregory Peck for the part of Marcus Vinicius (another stolid actor like Bob Taylor, but he might have looked fresher and younger.) The documentary also gives an insight into how those monumental sets of imperial Rome and Nero's circus were achieved. A highly recommendable release then and the Amazon price makes it a bargain.

There are two other versions of Quo Vadis you can consider. There's the 1980s TV mini-series with Klaus Maria Brandauer giving an outstanding performance as Nero. This production usually receives a rather negative critical reaction but unfairly so in my opinion. True, it has none of the great dollops of spectacle or over-the-top performances that enliven the MGM version but it's historically more accurate and it skilfully weaves into the plot of Sienciewicz's novel additional material from the ancient historians and portrays Nero's Rome as a nightmarish place. The empress Poppaea is also correctly portrayed as a hapless victim of Nero's brutality rather than, as in the MGM version, his evil genius. Brandauer's Nero is a slimey psycopath, you don't dare laugh at this guy as you do at Ustinov's Nero.

There's also the recent Polish production which you may find difficult to track down with subtitles but if like me you persevere you'll be rewarded. It's a mighty impressive production and the final scenes in the amphitheatre are as impressive as anything you'll see in the MGM version or the more recent Gladiator. It suffers from a rather underpowered Nero but of the three versions it has the best-looking Marcus Vinicius and Lygia. In my opinion all three versions are worth watching, but maybe not one after the other.

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11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Buy it with close eyes, 28 Oct 2008
By V. K. Manglaveras (thessaloniki, greece) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
YES. That's the long awaited 1951 version with peter ustinov in the role of nero in two discs special editions with commentairies and extras including the quo vadis' legacy to the history cinema.
BUY IT WITH CLOSE EYES.
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1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars Time for a remake?, 21 Mar 2009
By N. A. FURNIVAL "Nicholas Furnival" (Warsaw, Poland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
What a historic film! But then, again, what a mediocre film. The included original trailer thrills us with the idea of a cast of thousands, which doesn't exactly thrill these days. If you're interested in film history you really should watch this and the documentaries will be interesting, too.

It seems to have proven impossible to make an excellent film version of the unbelievable book by Sienkiewicz (who won the Nobel Prize for Literature), which is a shame as it seems the kind of book which would transfer to the screen quite well.

I'd love Hollywood to give it another try as the book is practically unknown and it really shouldn't be.
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5.0 out of 5 stars Quo Vadis 2009 dvd editon
Quo Vadis . The very name conjures up the sweeping spectacle of the old blockbuster age. Based on Hollywoods version of ancient Rome and the Emperor Nero,s dealing with the... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Mr. B James

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