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Rome, the Eternal Story: From Ben Hur to The Eagle

Posted January 21, 2011 to photo album "Rome, the Eternal Story: From Ben Hur to The Eagle"

The Eagle explores a part of ancient Roman history rarely seen on stage. But the history of Rome changes throughout history as well.

Slide 2: Rome - The Eternal, Ever-Changing City

Slide 3: Rome and the American Imagination

Slide 4: Ben Hur, the great American/Roman Novel

Slide 6: Ben-Hur (1925) and the Epic Grandeur of Rome

Slide 7: Scipio Africanus: The Defeat of Hannibal and the Fascist Italy

Slide 8: Quo Vadis - Nero’s Rome as a Totalitarian State

Slide 9: Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1959) and the Race to Freedom

Slide 10: Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1959) and Making Rome Gay

Slide 11: Spartacus (1960) and the Return of the Opressed

Slide 13: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum: Rome turned Jewish

Slide 14: Satryicon (1969), Ancient Rome through Fellini’s Eyes

Slide 15: Caligula (1979): Rome Goes All The Way

Slide 16: Monty Python’s The Life of Brian - Rome as Parody

Slide 16: Gladiator (2000), and the Return of Rome

Slide 14: Satryicon (1969), Ancient Rome through Fellini’s Eyes

Federico Fellini has never fully explained what he was trying to do with Satryicon, a film based, sort of, on the work of the Roman author Petronius Arbiter, and for which he received an Academy award nomination for best director. He once said he was trying to make an analogy between ancient Rome and contemporary society. At another time, he described his film as: “A voyage into total obscurity! An unknown planet for me to populate!” And, taking another tack, he said: “From a pre-Christian to a post-Christian one: Christ has disappeared and we've got to get along without him. This is the relevance of the film to today.” Critic Carl J. Mora writes that the film “reflects Italy's postwar status-no longer a country with imperial or military aspirations but a more prosperous society in which Fellini discerns moral and spiritual decay.”