1961 ‘Il colosso di Rodi’ Directed by Sergio Leone
While on holiday in Rhodes, Athenian war hero Darios becomes involved in two different plots to overthrow the tyrannical king, one from Rhodian patriots and the other from sinister Phoenician agents.
Rory Calhoun Lea Massari Georges Marchal Conrado San Martín Ángel Aranda Mabel Karr Mimmo Palmara Roberto Camardiel Alfio Caltabiano George Rigaud Yann Larvor Carlo Tamberlani Félix Fernández Ignazio Dolce Antonio Casas Fernando Calzado Arturo Cabré Álvaro de Luna Ángel Menéndez Nello Pazzafini Gustavo Re José María Vilches
Sergio Leone Luciano Martino Ennio De Concini Luciano Chitarrini Carlo Gualtieri Ageo Savioli Cesare Seccia
Produzioni Atlas Consorziate Procusa Comptoir Français de Productions Cinématographiques (CFPC) CTI (Cinema Television International) Cineproduzioni Associate Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Колосс Родосский, O Colosso de Rodes, Le colosse de Rhode, 古國焚城錄, Родоският колос, Kolossens hemmelighed, Der Koloss von Rhodos, Ο Κολοσσός της Ρόδου, El coloso de Rodas, Taistelu Rhodoksesta, Le colosse de Rhodes, A rodoszi kolosszus, 오드의 투기장, Kolos z Rodos, 罗德岛巨像
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The peplum film (pepla plural), also known as sword-and-sandal, is a genre of largely Italian-made historical or Biblical epics (costume dramas) that dominated the Italian film industry from 1958 to 1965.
The terms "peplum" (referring to the tunic-style Greek and Roman garment often worn by characters in the films) and "sword-and-sandal" were used in a condescending way by film critics. Later, the terms were embraced by fans of the films, similar to the terms "spaghetti western" or "shoot-'em-ups". Italian director Vittorio Cottafavi called the genre "Neo-Mythology". -- (wikipedia)
Although I love Sergio Leone, I don't love peplum films and therefore got very little out of this. But always important to see where a director started.
Watched the Warner Archive Collection Blu-ray.
Action! - Spaghetti alla Sergio: Il Leone del Western
Before becoming synonymous with the Spaghetti Western, Sergio Leone broke into the industry with a sword and sandal film, a genre the director was no stranger to as he had worked on films such as Ben-Hur and Quo Vadis. It's also noteworthy since it's set in the Hellenistic period, when most films of its type have been set in either Classical Greece or even before, or the later Roman period.
The movie itself is fine. Aside from those details, however, the film has no distinguishing features whatsoever. The cinematography is great, and the set design helps sell the film's vast scope. Sadly, the film does not make use of this element,…
my favorite thing about old-school day-for-night photography in movies is that they'd put a blue tint over the camera lens but then they'd also accidentally photograph the sun and so you'd just have this glaring blue star glowering over the entire darkened landscape and making the entire film look like it takes place on some distant alien planet
Cinematic Time Capsule
1961 Marathon - Film #32
Hey Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?
Great catapults of molten lead, Darios! It’s a sword and sandal epic from Sergio Leone!
By pure coincidence, Kurosawa’s 'Yojimbo' debuted a mere two months after this one. At that point, one of these two directors made a masive change in their directorial career…. Can you guess which one?
"We never meant to fight you, but you forced us to fight."
“Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus; and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs, and peep about
To find ourselves dishonourable graves.” -Shakespeare (nif)
- 5X5 Directors Challenge (Leone 5/5): boxd.it/3IUJC
- Leone Ranked: boxd.it/47LBa
A colossal failure.
This was my first Sergio Leone film and simultaneously my first sword-and-sandal film and I am admittedly a bit disappointed. The story wasn’t very good, the acting was maybe even worse and the score was generic. The props and costumes were alright but this film just felt way longer than it actually was (I saw a 143 minute long cut of the film). However, I am looking forward to both Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars and William Wyler’s Ben-Hur.
You know, if this had been any good, then perhaps Sergio Leone would have kept making sword and sandal pics and never given us his iconic spaghetti westerns. So, we should all be happy about how unwatchable this is.
The Colossus of Rhodes is a traditional sword and sandal film, which is not really a genre I care for. Ultimately it is not a very interesting work. The setting, in the glory days of the Mediterranean empires, allows for some impressive production design. Indulgent and decadant lifestyles lend themselves to spectacle. The titular statue is also impressively depicted. Sadly the direction of this film feels rather anonymous, and Sergio Leone doesn't seem to have a unique vision in this film. Though like A Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More, it is not an ambitious work and instead just plays with popular conventions of Italian genre cinema. The Colossus of Rhodes does make sense as a learning…
Another big-budget yawn from Sergio Leone, similar to THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII. His first credited work as a director, too. I was beginning to wonder how he'd been given the opportunity to make such lavish sword and sandal epics considering a). the risk involved on the studio side to throw something so grand in scale and technically impressive to a debut filmmaker, and b). the assumption that neither POMPEII or COLOSSUS seems to foreshadow his westerns to come. After doing a little research, I learned this wasn't the first or even second rodeo for the big spaghetti-eating boy. Leone had been a first and second unit director since the 1940's and had already worked on well over 50 muscle-casted epics,…
Sergio Leone’s directorial debut is an ambitious, if unrefined, production that’s much inferior to his finest works but it still manages to create moments of tension & suspense by skilfully utilising all the available resources to finish as an amusing, if somewhat forgettable, sword-n-sandal epic.
Set in 280 BC, during the void years after the days of Alexander the Great but before the advent of Roman Empire, The Colossus of Rhodes (Il Colosso di Rodi) follows a Greek military hero who visits his uncle on the island of Rhodes to enjoy his vacation but inadvertently finds himself involved in two different plots to overthrow the tyrannical king.
Directed by Sergio Leone (Dollars Trilogy & Once Upon a Time in the West), the…
"I can grant your most secret desire."
"Which one?"
From the perspective of set design and costume design, a total triumph. It's a nice looking movie, even somehow the Leone film I've seen where it feels like it has the highest budget. It's then funny to say that and then follow it with saying that in terms of its actual writing and characters, it's like consuming white bread that was dipped in water. It's not even a bad movie so much as it's like eating a nothing sandwich. I feel exactly the same about The Colossus of Rhodes having watched it as I did before watching it. There were swords, sandles, homoerotic gladiator torture, and a giant statue that guys…
This overlong and uninspired sword-and-sandal epic is a rather inauspicious start to the otherwise fantastic directorial career of Sergio Leone. Given Leone’s background as a second unit director for such films as Ben-Hur and The Last Days of Pompeii, the sword-and-sandal genre feels like a predicable starting point for his directorial debut; unfortunately, The Colossus of Rhodes is a far cry from Ben-Hur in terms of story and execution. The plot is a bore, the effects are rather unimpressive, and the acting (led by Rory Calhoun) leaves much to be desired. All of this adds up to a 127-minute slog of a film that feels so much longer than it actually is. On the bright side, I am now certainly through the roughest patch, and can complete Sergio Leone’s career with a watch of Duck, You Sucker!
