O Filho de Spartacus

From Sergio Corbucci, director of the classic spaghetti westerns "The Great Silence" and "Django," comes a routine, but serviceable Italian sword-and-sandal epic staring Steve Reeves, best know for his many Hercules films. This was Reeves final on-screen appearance in this particular genre, later moving onto pirate and western films. "The Slave" has Reeves cast a Roman soldier who discovers he's actually the son of Spartacus, a slave turned gladiator turned rebel leader against the Roman Empire. Like his father, Reeves ends up leading a slave revolt. Unlike the Stanley Kubrick version of Spartacus, this film is minus interesting characters, dialogue, and narrative. However, Corbucci does bring strong visuals to the film and the production values of "The Slave" is better than most Italian sword-and-sandal pictures, which makes this film worth checking out for fans of these admittedly silly films.

By 1970 Son of Spartacus (now out on DVD) found itself relegated to Saturday morning matinées, which is hardly surprising since Steve Reeves here seems to be getting twice as much combat duty as in most of the other Italian epics. So much so, one could hardly miss the kiddies re-enacting his many sword fights on the way home. Grown-ups too had something to admire, especially the eye-catching Ombretta Colli who conveniently gets shipwrecked with Reeves on a beach with her costume cut to shreds. This might prove an embarrassment to Miss Colli in later years when she went into Italian politics, no doubt hoping her voters would not remember her cheesecake days.

However, it is film music fans who have most to cheer, with a score derived from no less than three of the top Italian film composers. While Son of Spartacus was being filmed in Egypt during March and April of 1962, veteran maestro Carlo Innocenzi sadly died (on March 24). His stirring main title can still be heard in the M-G-M release, and it's an impressive full orchestral version of the slow execution march for Princess Elea in Goliath Against the Giants (1961). For the opening scenes M-G-M simply recycle Innocenzi's battle music from Goliath Against the Giants, but the opening narration is accompanied by the lovely "Glauco e Antonino" track from Lavagnino's Last Days of Pompeii (1959). For the rest of the score we get a mixture of new music by Piero Piccioni (a haunting desert tune and a rousing finale march when Reeves ultimately triumphs), plus some prior Piccioni material from Duel of the Titans (1961). The Italian language version (also available on DVD) is scored by Piccioni throughout, with a different main title adapted from "Amulio" in Duel of the Titans. Piccioni's entire score, including some unused cues, can be enjoyed on a CD thanks to those dedicated vault raiders at Digitmovies

A political and financial patron of Julius Caesar, Crassus joined Caesar and Pompey in the unofficial political alliance known as the First Triumvirate. Together, the three men dominated the Roman political system, but the alliance did not last long, due to the ambitions, egos, and jealousies of the three men. While Caesar and Crassus were lifelong allies, Crassus and Pompey disliked each other and Pompey grew increasingly envious of Caesar's spectacular successes in the Gallic Wars. The alliance was restabilized at the Luca Conference in 56 BC, after which Crassus and Pompey again served jointly as consuls. Following his second consulship, Crassus was appointed as the governor of Roman Syria. Crassus used Syria as the launchpad for a military campaign against the Parthian Empire, Rome's long-time eastern enemy. In This Son of Spartacus , stars the decurion Randus (Steve Reeves) holds himself so well in the command of his troops, that Caesar promotes him to centurion . He is subsequently dispatched and sent to Egyp , to keep Julius Caesar (Ivo Garrani) informed on the actions , to observe movements and intentions of co-triumvir Marcus Licinius Crassus (Claudio Gora).

This Sword-and sandals movie is plenty of adventures , emotions, thrills , sword-play , impressive battles, atmospheric settings and colorful scenarios well photographed by Enzo Barboni , shot mostly on location in Egypt. It is widely considered to be one of the top 10 greatest Peplum films of all time. This great film will surely attract a whole new generation of classic Peplum fans . And for seasoned cinematic connoseuirs, Son of Spartacus will rekindle an era of film making at its best. This is one of the best Steve Reeves' Peplums along with Hercules (1958) and second and last film portrayal of Hercules Unchained (1959) that in certain ways, better than his first . This marked the final Italian sword and sandal/mythological muscleman movie to be made by Steve Reeves . He would make two adventure movies : Sandokan the Great (1963) , Sandokan pirates of seven seas (1964) and a spaghetti western : Vivo per la tua morte (1968) by Camilo Bazzoni , before retiring from the screen. Here Reeves plays in his usual stoic style a Roman centurion, who is actually the lost son of Spartacus, who is dispatched to Crassus' camp to observe his movements and keep Caesar informed .The corpulent Steve Reeves was a hunk man who made lots of roman epic films also called ¨Musclemen movies¨. Luck's Reeves changed when Italian director Pietro Francisci persuaded him to go overseas to star ¨Hercules¨ and sequel ¨Hercules and queen of Lydia also titled Hercules unchained ¨ that served as the prototypes of all cloak-and-sandal movies to come and both of them became a surprise US hit smash . Later on, he followed with ¨Goliath and the Barbarians, The giant of Marathon, The Trojan horse, The son of Spartacus and The Avenger¨ among them . Steve was an American bouncing who emigrated Italy and created a true star-system based on pumped-up heroes. He paved the way for other actors to seek their fame and fortune in Italy playing bouncing adventurers . Other stars by the time on this type of movies are Mark Forest, Gordon Mitchell, Dan Vadis, Brad Harris and 'Gordon Scott' who made him more important competence. Nobody, nevertheless, topped Steve in popularity .

There are some historical remarks about Julius Caesar and especially Crassus and his death . The actual events were the following ones : In 53 BC, at the battle of Carrhae , Crassus' legions were defeated by a numerically inferior Parthian force. Crassus' legions were primarily heavy infantry, but were not prepared for the type of swift, cavalry-and-arrow attack in which Parthian troops were particularly adept. The Parthian horse archers devastated the unprepared Romans with hit-and-run techniques and feigned retreats with the ability to shoot as well backwards as they could forwards. Crassus refused his quaestor Gaius Cassius Longinus' plans to reconstitute the Roman battle line, and remained in the testudo formation to protect his flanks until the Parthians eventually ran out of arrows. However, the Parthians had stationed camels carrying arrows to allow their archers to continually reload and relentlessly barrage the Romans until dusk. Despite taking severe casualties, the Romans successfully retreated to Carrhae, forced to leave many wounded behind to be later slaughtered by the Parthians.cSubsequently, Crassus' men, being near mutiny, demanded he parley with the Parthians, who had offered to meet with him. Crassus, despondent at the death of his son Publius in the battle, finally agreed to meet the Parthian general Surena; however, when Crassus mounted a horse to ride to the Parthian camp for a peace negotiation, his junior officer Octavius suspected a Parthian trap and grabbed Crassus' horse by the bridle, instigating a sudden fight with the Parthians that left the Roman party dead, including Crassus. A story later emerged to the effect that, after Crassus' death, the Parthians poured molten gold into his mouth in symbolic mockery of his thirst for wealth. It has also been documented that the severed head of Crassus was used as a prop in the Parthian adaptation of the Euripides play The Bacchae.

Sergio Corbucci's direction is pretty good. Corbucci was a notorious and prolific writer/filmmaker. He would make several Spaghetti classics : ¨The great silence¨, ¨Compañeros¨ and ¨the Mercenary¨ and other considerable Westerns : ¨Hellbenders¨, ¨Far west story¨ , ¨Johnny Oro¨ and ¨Navajo Joe¨. Furthermore , he made terror , action , comedy and all kinds of genres . Rating : 6.5/10 . Good , high recommended for Peplum fans and for others who simply enjoy watching timeless pieces with icons such as Steve Reeves.

This is one of Steve Reeve's best ever films and possibly the last one in which he was in a tribune or Roman centurion costume...... Italian director Sergio Corbucci conconted up an idea to continue the life of Spartacus with Reeves as his son gaining a large measure of revenge on corrupt Roman counsel Ceasar Crassus who is running an illegal corrupt empire right in the heart of roman territory....In fact Crassus is getting so powerful that Ceaser himself sends Reeves to investigate what Crassus's methods are and report back to Caeser. Along the way on his trip to see Crassus the ship that Reeves is in hits a river barge and dumps him and a lovely Italian slave named Saida into the river. Reeves survives and he and Saida walk through the roman desert unaware that slave drivers are rounding up all the slaves they can to be bought and sold. Reeves and his gal are captured and Reeves breaks loose from the pack and wreaks his revenge on slave leaders with some dazzling sword work, wiping out a flock of slave drivers. One of the members of the slave band recognize a medallion worn by Reeves as the symbol of Spartacus, since the slave member was a member of Spartacus's force twenty years earlier. Reeves initially is unconvinced that he is truly the son of Spartacus and muses in a catacomb about his true identity. He sees the sword handle of Spartacus and it is the same talisman as his medallion. Reeves recognizes his true heritage and goes to work on wiping out Crassus and his evil empire......raid by raid Reeves and his band wipe out Crassus's gang all the while maintaining his identity as a roman centurion from Caesar.....in the end Reeves is caught and given a death sentence by Crassus....his followers then free him and Caesar must make a decision as to whether or not Reeves followed his orders as a true centurion. Caesar gives Reeves a death sentence but Reeves followers come to his rescue and Caesar relents. Good love story and the beautiful Ombretta Colli is Reeves's love interest. After this film Reeves became "Sandokan" and made one western in 1966 before retiring for good. I just love this film and Reeves had that marvelous physique that made any man drool!!!!! The immortal Steve Reeves, what a face and a body......

That "Il figlio di Spartacus" is one of the better sword'n'sandal flicks of the main period (1958-64) is basically due to two aspects: a fluent storyline and original sets in Egypt.

Writers Adriano Bolzoni, Bruno Corbucci and Giovanni Grimaldi (plus perhaps director Sergio Corbucci) have scripted a plot that continues the story of Spartacus where Stanley Kubrick left off in 1960 in his Hollywood production with Kirk Douglas. While Kubrick certainly stuck to the historical facts, the follow-up is complete fiction. Tough daredevil Douglas is replaced by smart bodybuilder Steve Reeves as his son, although this was not the worst choice. Reeves, the original Hercules performer of 1958, does quite well in the rôle of Randus, a Roman centurio (this seems to be considered as the highest military rank in "peplums"!), who is confronted with the fact that he seems to be the son of the legendary slave leader, Spartacus, who had once been smashed and crucified by the Roman consul, Crassus. Reeves' good looks distinguish him from Douglas very remarkably, but there's his Germanic combatant Verus (Franco Balducci), who is styled like Douglas two years ealier.

They needed to change history to a considerable extent (the story takes place in 48 B.C. when the real Crassus was already dead for five years) so that the fictive Randus could be 23 (Reeves was 36 by then) and Caesar could be involved. Note that the Sphinx has already lost its nose (which it did only 1850 years later) while serving as a likeable background to a talk between Caesar (Ivo Garrani), his adjutant Verulus (Renato Baldini, who has almost nothing to say), and Randus. Choosing the Egyptian landscape, including desert, oases and the pyramids of Gizeh, for the outdoor scenes adds greatly to the picture's atmosphere.

Corbucci manages to handle the camera positions and angles very well, almost experimentally for a production like this. Director of photography was Enzo Barboni, the later standard director of the Terence Hill/Bud Spencer movies. There is a foreshadowing of the spaghetti westerns not only in the techniques, but also with a surprisingly high level of brutality as depicted by Corbucci.

The story's main idea has Randus in the dilemma of being a Roman officer on the one hand and having the experience of being enslaved on the other. Only in this situation, he feels into the slaves' minds and puts himself at the head of the revolt against Crassus. The rest is a bit stealing from the "Zorro" idea, including the "S" (for Spartacus) mark. As Western European ideology would have it (we're at the climax of American-Russian confrontation) before a revolutionary attitude became fashionable in Italo westerns, Randus fights for freedom (from slavery), not for redistribution of capital.

Gianna Maria Canale, leading actress of many a peplum since the earlier days (playing the title rôle in "Teodora", among others), is fine as Crassus' love interest. But Claudio Gora can give all he can as the terrible Crassus, right down to an exaggerated paranoid Nero-like figure.

It's worth while, anyway.