Quo Vadis (DVD)

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Watching MGM's 1951 Biblical epic "Quo Vadis" is not so much like watching a motion picture with a plot and characters as it is looking at a series of elaborate tableaus, each depicting some massive scene in a glorious but detached spectacle. The movie was one of the biggest of its day, enormous in scope, in cast, in costumes, in settings, and in cost. Given its popularity at the time, it surprises me that Warner Bros. waited so long finally to bring it to DVD.

"Quo Vadis" was one of the films that led to the reemergence of so-called sword-and-sandals flicks from the late 1940s through the early 1960s. Leading the charge were Cecil B. DeMille's "Samson and Delilah," followed by this one, "The Robe," "Demetrius and the Gladiators," "The Ten Commandments," "Ben-Hur," "Spartacus," "El Cid," and "The Fall of the Roman Empire," to name but a few. If you're keeping score, "The Ten Commandments" probably headed the list in sheer spectacle, with "Ben-Hur" and "Spartacus" the most intelligent. But there's no denying "Quo Vadis" as a contender.

Mervyn LeRoy ("Anthony Adverse," "Random Harvest," "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo," "Mister Roberts," "Gypsy") directed "Quo Vadis," with uncredited help from Anthony Mann ("The Far Country," "God's Little Acre," "Cimarron," "El Cid"), the filmmakers basing their story on the best-selling novel by Henryk Sienkiewicz. The tale gets its name from the Latin term meaning "Where are you going?," taken from the passage in John 13:36 where Peter says to Jesus, "Lord, whither goest thou? Jesus answered him, Whither I go, thou canst not follow me now; but thou shalt follow me afterwards." Thus, the story's title sets the tone and premise of what will follow.

In fact, for a movie nearly three hours long, "Quo Vadis" has surprisingly little plot or characterization going for it. It's mostly an unabashed declaration of Christianity and the power of love. Certainly nothing wrong with that, except the film can become tiresome in long stretches.

Robert Taylor stars as General Marcus Vinicius, commander of the Roman 14th Legion in the year 64 A.D. He's just returning from the victorious suppression of a British revolt, and he's the toast of Rome. But it's not long after his return that he meets and falls in love with a beautiful young woman, Lygia (Deborah Kerr), the adopted daughter of a retired Roman general. The trouble for them is that he is a Roman, devoted to the many Roman gods carried over from the Greeks, and she is a secret member of a fledgling new religous sect, the Christians. He is not too keen on the idea of giving up his soldiering ways for this newfangled love-your-neighbor business. After all, the Romans built their empire on conquering every country they could find and enslaving many of their subjects. The Christians, though, believe that all people should be free. Not an easy concept to accept, but as everyone knows, love conquers all. It doesn't help, either, that Vinicious's idea of courtship is to buy the girl, literally, and force himself upon her, a plan that naturally backfires.

Well, you can see that the romance between the Roman commander and the Christian follower is really a representation of the conflict between the pagan empire and the new religion. The Romans figure they'll be around forever, the might of Rome being so extensive and all, and the upstart Christians will soon die out like so many other cults. Hint: Bet on the Christians in the long run.

Everything about the film is big. It begins with a three-minute overture of composer Miklos Rozsa's music and ends with exit music. It's narrated by an uncredited Walter Pidgeon. The filmmakers shot much of the story on location in Italy, several of the scenes looking as though the filmmakers shot them on the actual Appian Way. The sets and matte paintings are glorious, and the cast is enormous. Recreating a coliseum full of Roman citizens was a neat trick; today we'd use CGI, but for 1951 it must have taken some ingenuity.

You can also probably tell from what I've told you that the film is solemn to a fault, including Taylor and Kerr, whose sincerity in their roles makes them seem more wooden than they might normally be. Also, like most big epics, this one rather lumbers along, moving slowly in order to establish its credentials as a "serious" movie.