Jules César

When it comes to cinematically pulling anything off that has its basis in the world of William Shakespeare, the task can frequently be enormous. In general, Orson Welles and Lord Laurence Olivier (but call him Larry) are the two men most identified with successes at the Bard's work, on both sides of the camera; then there's Franco Zeffirelli (especially with his classic 1968 film version of ROMEO AND JULIET), and the later adaptations of Kenneth Branagh. And much more controversially, there is director Roman Polanski's extremely violent 1971 take on MACBETH, which was as close as The Bard came to outright horror.

And then there's the political/historical tragedy that is JULIUS CAESAR.

The 1953 version, adapted for the screen and directed by Joseph Mankiewicz, was and still is considered one of the best of the Bard's adaptations ever to make it to the screen. And then in 1969, an enterprising and young Canadian producer named Peter Snell decided to mount a new adaptation of this work. The result was, by all accounts, one that arguably fell into the shadow of Mankiewicz's version, which after all had Marlon Brando as Marc Antony; Louis Calhern as Caesar; and Sir John Gielgud as Cassisus, one of the conspirators. Indeed, many consider this film wildly erratic for various reasons, including one quixotic bit of casting that didn't come off. Still, the play is the thing, as the old saying goes.

For this go-around at JULIUS CAESAR, the film is helmed by English director Stuart Burge, who did a yeoman adaptation of the Bard's OTHELLO in 1965, with Robert Furnival faithfully adapting the play to good effect. And you have, in the main, a great cast. Gielgud appears here in the title role, and he does a superlative job. Charlton Heston does a solid turn as Marc Antony (although in his journals he admits that's not such a big trick, since, in his view, if you can't do Marc Antony, you probably shouldn't be doing The Bard in the first place). The film also benefits from the turns given by Richard Chamberlain (as Octavius Caesar), Robert Vaughn (as Casca), Christopher Lee (as Artemidorus), Richard Johnson (as Cassius), Diana Rigg (as Portia), and Jill Bennett (as Calpurnia).

The thing, though, is that a lot of the focus of the play, and subsequently the film, is not so much on Caesar as much as it is on Marcus Brutus, the man torn between his allegiance to Caesar and a need to save the Roman Republic from Caesar's machinations. It takes a solid performance to pull it off really well; and if the actor doing Brutus isn't well versed in Shakespeare, the film will invariably suffer. This is what happens here, with Jason Robards having accepted a role he just wasn't cut out for, when the oft-elusive Orson Welles was unavailable.. What worked in the plays of Eugene O'Neill, and on screen in films like ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN, ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST, THE BALLAD OF CABLE HOGUE, and MAGNOLIA doesn't really work well here. He is simply a great actor in a great role, but it was not one that he could have ever showed his best at—though over the course of the film, he does improve.

That having been said, the stellar performances of Heston, Gielgud, Vaughn, and the others make up for Robards' inadequacies; and Burge's direction, while not really on a par with Welles, Olivier, or Zefirelli, is solid enough. Clearly, this isn't the most successful adaptation of The Bard. But given how hard it is to pull Shakespeare off cinematically, it is worth a 7 (out of 10).

By now in his late forties and sporting an obvious, bright red hairpiece, Charlton Heston seemed an odd Antony when first seen. But Heston remained fit all through his long career. While he does not as much look the part, his Marc Antony provides a sturdy center for this second filming of the Shakespeare tragedy. Also, Charlton Heston had a scholarly side unusual for a Hollywood actor. He clearly gave much thought to this portrayal which on the whole is better than the misplaced Method emoting of Marlon Brando's Antony, some seventeen years earlier.

Featuring a mixed cast of British and American actors, the result is mainly predictable but some surprises and disappointments also feature. One disappointment is Gielgud as Caesar. Sir John was a veteran Shakespearian by 1970 with a fine voice and tons of dignity. Yet at sixty-six he was a touch too old for the part. More to the point, the effete Gielgud lacked the masculine force to play this virile ex-general whose battlefield victories were said to be matched only by his conquests in the bedroom.

One surprise is the subtle portrayal of the conspirator Casca by American Robert Vaughan. "Sour" Casca, the cynical observer, is a minor character but sharply drawn and Vaughan makes him come alive during his few minutes on stage. Jill Bennet is sympathetic as the prophetic wife of Caesar but in the role of Brutus' wife the well-born Portia, Diana Rigg at age thirty-two looks luscious and is simply superb--Shakespeare in the finest style. Another veteran Shakespearian, Richard Johnson, is nearly as good as the jealous, manipulative Cassius.

Jason Robards plays Brutus like a wooden Indian for the first two acts. In the third act however--that is, after Brutus and Cassius have fled Rome--he seems to grow in the part and his acting gains conviction.

The importance of the plebeians to the play was understood by this director, who cast the roles carefully.

I've seen plenty bum Shakespeare, but Jason Robards as Brutus he takes me the cake. He resembled nothing so much as a barrel with a head on top. The rest of the cast was pretty good, however, especially Richard Johnson as Cassius (why wasn't HE Brutus), Diana Rigg as Portia and Charlton Heston as Antony. John Gielgud as Caesar does his lines beautifully, as always, but does not quite convey the menace and power of Caesar. (He was better as Cassius in the 1953 version.) Interesting here is the contrast in line delivery between Johnson and Robards; it makes you wonder why Cassius isn't the leader and hope of the conspiracy. Production values are sometimes dubious; but battle scenes are better than the cowboys-and-Indians fight in the 1953 version. Of course, the text is shortened, but all essential scenes are kept.

Like another reviewer stated, this is a respectable but highly flawed film adaptation of the play "The Tragedy of Julius Caesar". The performances are respectable enough, depending on the actor one references. Charlton Heston does a great job, but Robards performance as Brutus doesn't weigh in until about half way through the drama, and seems to be a little undirected for the first half of the play. It seems like a lot of the money that went into this project went into paying the actors' salaries, for the art direction gets the period wrong in several places, and puts Marc Antony's famous speech on an indoor set instead of an outdoor plaza as was meant.

The most jarring for the military afficionados is the inappropriate armor and armament for the soldiers. The generals wear naval hats, and the armor is some kind of mish mash from other periods in history. I can only guess that this was done because the director liked the style (which was common for this period in film making for Hollywood to take such atrocious liberties with history).

It's worth it for seeing Chuck Heston's Marc Antony, but the version with Marlon Brando some yhears earlier (shot in black and white) is the one to see.

For all it's flaws, and there are many, this 1970 version staring Heston is worth a look. Heston plays Marc Antony as a passionate loyalist who seethes with the angst of betrayal, and does an ecellent job of it. Gielgud's Julius Caesar is solid, but I think the audience deserved someone with more gravitas and "a martial countenance", to borrow from the language of the time.

See it once.

I shall not cavil: Julius Caesar is my favourite Shakespearean play and i can bore anyone to tears by reciting great chunks of it. My dear wife may love Hamlet, but for me it is Caesar; I have loved this play since I was in elementary school, and had the great joy of seeing it in 1966 at Stratford Ontario with a brilliant young Bruno Gerussi as Antony: there was a lively Antony to make Brando's look somnambulant. Given my love for the play, I await the day that some computer genius releases this version having excised poor Jason Robarts and inserted James Mason from the Brando movie. According to some reports, Robarts (and actor whom I admired tremendously) was very simply drunk out of his mind for the filming of this motion picture. He does an excellent job for someone sloshed; sad, because as we see from his other work, he could have been a fine Brutus, though perhaps a better Cassius. But it is Heston who shines as Antony. Where Brando methodically plays Antony as Brando (with hints of his future Fletcher Christian), Heston *is* Antony, fearlessly playing the manipulative, self-serving (anti-)hero. Just listen to his dismissive "So is my horse, Octavius" to hear a true master at work. A flawed but faithful Julius Caesar.