we're on a mission from god

wendy so i got that going darling

looks like i picked the wrong way to

quit sniffing blue light

of my life we enjoy your films

[Music]

welcome to vintage video where we'll be

reviewing every major film release of

the 1980s in real time i'm patrick

o'reilly

i'm jesse bayless and i'm richard wells

and today marks the 40th anniversary of

the release of caligula

on february 15 1980. that's the american

release of caligula

it was written by gore vidal and

masolino d'amico

directed by tinto brass and technically

bob guccione also

uh and was released by that you can't

say it was written by

everything you've just said is up for

debate well he wrote he wrote the

replay it was base done he wrote a novel

he wrote the screenplay adapted from the

novel and then

and then uh no they didn't change the

dialogue

significantly um and it was released by

analysis film

release corporation well except they

said that his

his version was too homosexual and they

had him rewrite that right

but he still gets a screenwriting credit

okay fair enough fair enough he wrote

the original screenplay

i do think it's funny that they made him

rewrite it so it would have broad appeal

though

no i didn't mean it like that but too

much fella appeal but

i'm like wait you really want this

you know porn to be more well recepted

by a wide range of people

on that note if you're listening to this

podcast with children present

uh we won't be using any words that you

can't say on television

but uh but we will be using words that

you shouldn't say

on television on television

or network broadcast um they're one of

the same kind of at this point

we're not i'm not talking about like

premium cable

but uh anyway so this was adapted from

like we said gore vidal's novel caligula

this was the first time that a film was

funded entirely by penthouse

uh they had previously partially funded

movies like chinatown and day of the

locust

and bob guccione who was the founder of

penthouse magazine wanted to do what

basically what bert reynolds was doing

in boogie nights which was porn with a

story

where you wanted to see the ending um

vidal script was extensively rewritten

because as we said it had a very strong

focus on homosexual relationships which

um was not something they thought they

could sell to a mainstream audience well

also his version

uh caligula is good

in the beginning and the power corrupts

him right first

reptile yeah which i think is a better

like

you know it's it's a better analogy to

what he was trying to say about you know

absolute power corrupting absolutely the

state of politics but he was also like a

fourth or fifth generation caesar

so it's like that that person's going to

be evil from birth that's not something

that's not

enough yeah

guccione thought that this movie was

going to be like a modern-day citizen

kane

because of the cast that he had locked

down um john houston was approached to

direct and said no thank you

uh tinto brass was brought on because he

had done a movie called salon kitty

a lot of people are from that movie

right a lot of the cast ended up coming

over from that movie

um but uh guccione thought oh this guy's

like the perfect choice because he has

like

an eye for things and he can deal with

like erotic material

so he's like the great great choice for

this well apparently he

originally was the one that expanded the

sort of sexual content and

all scripts well it's funny because he

came in and rewrote the screenplay

but it specifically says that they

didn't change the dialogue

so he literally just came in and wrote

action lines to describe orgies in the

background

like it didn't actually change the story

that was happening

right just what was happening beyond it

but at the same time this is the same

guy who then

refused to shoot those scenes well the

hardcore stuff yeah yeah

and then so he disavowed himself from

the film because he wouldn't shoot those

exercises right

you know it's bad when an italian

director won't shoot sex scenes

yeah um principal photography actually

began in rome

in 1976 so that's if you're keeping

track

four years before 1980 was the pope then

for you

math nerds who was the pope in 76

wasn't that around the year that we had

like two popes in one

year in one month in one month

or three popes in it uh giovanni

batista enrico antonio maria

montini oh i stand corrected so six

popes

that is also also known as pope paul vi

okay yeah who i'm sure was not a fan

of this movie you don't know that it's

his great great uncle

um but yeah uh maria schneider was cast

as drusilla

um and was lectured repeatedly for

sewing up the sides of her open tunic

because she was not comfortable with how

it flowed

and she was completely naked underneath

it um and eventually she quit after

filming one scene with malcolm mcdowell

how unusual

was it malcolm mcdowell's fault it's not

clear from the information i have

yeah but she was like you know what i

just realized i don't want to be

naked in the middle of every shot of

this movie where there's like

stuff happening in the background

constantly um

she was replaced by teresa ann savoy um

john gilgood was offered the role of

tiberius

and uh asked and said instead for the

nerva roll

because uh the tiberius role was a

little too pornographic for his taste

but peter o'toole had no problem taking

it up

um the federal jew was an actor he is

he's gonna he's gonna do what he's gotta

do

exactly he's like you want me to be in

this movie i'm gonna do it you're gonna

give me some money and i'm gonna

do it but yeah um the there's a scene

with a full-scale roman vessel complete

with hand-carved ores

120 of them why would you bother hand

carving those it was the largest prop

ever built at the time

which is based on a real thing yeah it's

it's the actual dimensions of the real

thing of like a real ship of a real

roman vessel the real the real floating

palace that

that was built yeah that was turned into

basically a whorehouse for the senator's

wives

it was over 175 feet long and 30 feet

tall

in post tinto brass's cut of the film

was basically thrown out he's

pretty famous for editing all of his own

films but uh

bob guccione threw out that like

completely disassembled the edit

uh snuck back onto the set to shoot a

bunch of extra hardcore porn scenes

which he then edited into the film and

then tinto brass was like yeah this

isn't this isn't my movie anymore so in

in the opening credits it literally says

edited by the production because there

are so many different editors working on

it that they were like i don't even know

how to credit this

um it ended up grossing 23 million

dollars

which is the highest grossing

independent porn ever

or at least at the time probably i don't

know if

pamela anderson or paris hilton have

beaten that by now

um according to malcolm mcdowell peter

o'toole's first words to john gill good

on set were

hello johnny what is a knight of the

realm doing in a porno movie

which is hilarious um ebert walked out

of it

he stayed for two hours and left 50

minutes before it ended notoriously does

not

do that yeah right this is one of like

two movies that he's done that for i

don't even know what the other one was

maybe

freddie got fingered he had a pretty

notoriously scathing review of that um

of the entire cast it seems like miron

and gilgat are the only two that didn't

really regret working on it because they

didn't take it very seriously yeah

like everybody else was like either in

love with the director or hated the

director or hated what was going on on

set and the two of them were just like

oh no whatever you know it's great like

helen and aaron literally

like irresistible or something yeah it

was like an irresistible blend of

like nudity and genitals

or something like that but then like

john gilgood had some quote where

someone's like oh how's the movie going

and he's like oh it's great there's

dicks everywhere it's wonderful

let's just embrace it the two of them

didn't care which is funny because both

of them have played hobson

in arthur movies so that's what's gonna

say uh because i i

i love uh moore's arthur gill good was

hobson and then helen mirren played the

part for

the uh russell brand brussels brand

remake

but i think the two of them got along

well on this set even though they don't

have any scenes together

or any maybe i really like that

wikipedia called this an erratic

historical drama yeah i mean i mean

it's accurate but i just think it's

really funny because it's a strange mix

of words

it's well it's a strange mix of words

and it's way too much

like porn to appease the historical

drama people

and wayne too much historical drama to

appease the porn people

nobody's really not sure who was happy

with this movie exactly

it was it was basically just bob

guccione was happy with it

and whatever teenager snuck in um

so we start the film with basically

caligula and his sister girlfriend

yeah frolicking and and the repeated

tune

that will be heard throughout this movie

and has burned into my mind

and upsets me very much because it's

also the reoccurring

theme song for the hudsucker proxy oh is

it really

for tim robbins and jennifer jason lee's

characters um

apparently it's from a uh version of

spartacus not the

famous spartacus right but uh another

version uh

uh with a russian i believe he's a

russian composer

and because a lot of music in this movie

is borrowed yeah they also borrow the

famous some music from the roman juliet

which i believe is the italian version

of the romeo and juliet

yes blanking on the director uh uh

franco uh

what's his name not franco nero who is

django no um

franco zepharelli that sounds right i'm

just looking it up

that's the olivia hussy one yeah

yeah franco zepharelli you're right yeah

so

there are a lot of borrowed songs yeah i

mean there is some original music

uh but uh they repeat a bunch of

songs over and over and over again to

kind of like fill in the thing

yeah so he uh one morning while he's

lying in bed with his sister a bird

flies into the room and he just

freaks out about it and it's like a

recurring theme of people freaking out

about birds

one time they make a connection to it

just once i think every time they make a

connection to it there's three scenes

where birds show up and all three scenes

are

indicate someone is about to die or

something important is about to happen

is that what that is

yeah okay because because the one time

that was the obvious connection that i

needed i needed

i needed it spelled out for me yeah is

when they fade out from the bird to the

crest on uh

uh macros uh breastplate right

and i was like okay so it's like that

that's the symbol there

but uh like this like his reaction of

just like

yeah he's immediately terrified i guess

this has like been a common theme from

before the movie started where

every time he sees a crow it means

someone important is going to die or

doom him but he keeps thinking that he's

about to get killed

so uh he finds out that um

his great uncle is requesting his

presence that's tiberius the peter

o'toole character

um and so he goes there expecting that

his uncle's gonna kill him

um when he first walks in because his

uncle is the current caesar yeah he's

the current caesar and

what grandson of julius yeah son of

augustus grandson of julia well

at one time he refers to him as adopted

to caligula correct yes um he's like an

adopted

because his stepbrother his younger

stepbrother is is like

the genetic heir yeah claudius um

or no no uncle yeah his uncle is there

claudius but

his his younger stepbrother knows

jamelis yeah who is who is actually like

the blood heir

um but yeah so he goes to see his uncle

and it's pretty sure that he's going to

get killed but uh

when he gets there there's people being

tortured all over the place

sexy george sexy torture and

just orgies around the torture and i

have to say i applaud this movie

for sexually exploiting not just women

and not just men equally oh but

animals but animals little people

and total recall face mutants yeah

yeah that was interesting an interesting

choice that they they would

imply that a person would survive to

adulthood with that

condition where there were two faces

melded together just like this

a two-faced person three and three-eyed

was it or one eye in the middle

no i think yeah i think it was three

eyes i was like is this is this

like i was 100 certain that this was

going to go

like brazil yeah like this was going to

be it was going to be a surrealist

yeah this is this is this isn't really

happening it's just the craziness of the

situation he's seeing things like no

you see that person sleeping later that

they just yeah they just have

two crazy faces well there's a lot of

like

this this movie vacillates very quickly

from being

like obviously there's a lot of huge

names in it but it's also

so much of it looks so cheap because

they have these really wide shots

that are wider than they should be so

that you can see around the set and you

can just see the big

curtain that's lit with like one colored

light in the background

and it just looks like they're on a

stage constantly but at the same time

what a stage yeah like that that sex

dungeon is like

that's a pretty crazy

if they had tight angles on everything

yeah it would look it would look

real you know it would look like an

actual place but because we're seeing it

so wide it's just

every single shot is a bad sound stage

it reminded me of the opening of the

muppets

there's all the different layers now i

can't

un-picture that thank you

when he first walks into the torture

dungeon there they're

wrapping a cord around a guy's dick and

then they

fill him with wine until he's like

bursting at the seams and then they come

back and they're like

you think he's had enough and he's like

yeah i think so and he just stabs him in

the bladder with a sword

yeah and there's just blood and wine

pouring out of this guy

like this i don't want to have to relive

in this podcast but i feel like that's

definitely something that

they actually did like that seems like

an authentic roman torture

um but basically tiberius uh is

suffering from some sort of like

presumably sexually transmitted disease

yeah and he's just swimming in a pool

with a bunch of naked women and men

and his skin is peeling off of his face

like his death becomes him

but like whose babies

are those yeah there's a lot of babies

that's true he should have a lot of

heirs

yeah that's what i was like i think are

those his babies

uh he's not even keeping track of that i

don't know if you could keep track

considering

all the things that are happening in the

background of this movie

well maybe he doesn't even consider them

children if they weren't born out of

wedlock

so they're just like oh yeah no that's

just like you know

debris it's human debris from me

according to wikipedia i missed this

point but

tiberius tries to poison caligula there

yeah i didn't notice that

yeah he he he offers him a drink and

first clicky takes and then says here

are you first jamilas

uh and then tiberius just takes it away

from him he hands it

off to some girl who then drinks it and

dies

in the background yeah i missed that

point yeah but yeah so he

successfully dodged that poison possibly

because of the bird

that was like hey someone's trying to

try to kill you soon after this

uh nerva kills himself is he uh that's

the john gilgood character and he's just

kind of like

hanging out in a pool nearby yeah and he

just doesn't want to be a part of this

anymore yeah he

he knows tiberius is going to die and

thinks he should because he doesn't like

him anymore but he also doesn't want to

be a part of the whole like scrambling

for the throne

yeah and and caligula's suspected

rise to rule right and he also doesn't

want to be killed

so it's kind of like i get to choose

when i die like that's the my last

choice that i get to make so

he slits his wrists and just floats in

this big tub of

hot water yeah so caligula you know

comes in and like

you know is very abusive to the dying

man

like he does this a couple times in the

movie he's strangely

interested he's obsessed with death yeah

he wants to know about

isis and uh how to join like what does

she say

yeah he wants yeah he wants to know if

he sees isis or if he hears her or what

she has to say

and what the afterlife looks like and

what it feels like to die and he's like

it doesn't feel like anything it's just

warm and i'm

i'm dying and he's like grabbing him by

the hair and shaking his head around and

pushing him underwater so it's like just

ruining his last like 30 seconds yeah he

doesn't get to die

really by his own hand yeah as he wanted

because caligula

is forcing him to die sooner yeah so

shortly after this

uh tiberius falls

deathly ill i guess like yeah more like

he's been running around and being

pretty jazzy

up until this point and now he's just in

bed and you think oh he's

whatever he's been suffering from is

like officially taking him out of the

game

uh and macro who is been just kind of

whispering in caligula's ear this whole

time like

you're next you're taking over yeah yeah

this is don't worry this ain't going to

last long

because i'm the head of the praetorian

guard the victorian guard

controls everything including the caesar

yeah uh we let him do his thing while we

do our thing

uh and apparently caligula is betrothed

to macro's wife no i i did notice that

later in the film i don't i didn't

realize that they

say that anything about that here yeah

he keeps referring to my wife

says she misses you um and then and we

see

well we'll we'll get to that i guess in

a second but

tiberius is laying near death and

everyone leaves him alone with

calligraphy because they kind of know

the plan at this point like

okay here's where caligula is supposed

to kill him and takes over the throne

and after a while uh the the head of the

praetorian guard macro comes back in and

he's like

okay this hasn't happened yet do you

need some help need some help it looks

like you're trying to kill an emperor

may i make him a suggestion let's

strangle him with this completely

breathable cloth

yeah like how is he being is he he's

being suffocated by

being choked it's he's not yeah

asphyxiated yeah his face is shrouded

but it's tight around them

okay okay but they leave it on then like

i think it's kind of strange

death shroud like even when they were

like preparing him for his funeral like

they left

that's true he is he's he gets an open

casket funeral and he's still

wrapped in his scarf that they killed

him but but that makes sense because

literally no one cares yeah everyone's

like throw him in the river we're done

no more speeches

he's dead yeah blah blah blah

caligula is named the the new caesar

yeah

um and he also says that his sister is

his equal

and that everyone should respect her the

same way that they respect him

a lot of the senators are like okay well

that's gross but

there's a lot of fun like background

dialogue of

oh he's going crazy oh yeah this will

never

this will never stand it's all going on

in the background i'm trying to listen

every time someone is like all the time

the mix is really weird too

like the dialogue keeps fading into the

background they re-recorded all this

stuff because i guess not all of it but

basically every character except for the

major cast

was like some italian person that they

got off the street so they had to

so they had adr all of that but they

said that they re-recorded

like peter o'toole as well like was he

speaking italian no it was just in

scenes where

they were talking over him and they had

to re-record his lines to get them clean

and all those sex machines were like

really noisy especially

especially the one that was going on

oh god if you could have seen the hand

gesture that went along with that

you would know exactly which one he's

talking about

it's kind of a ferris wheel

oh yeah there's a lot of really

disturbing stuff in the background that

we won't describe in too much detail

you'll have to check the movie out

and whatever you're imagining well you

don't know what's going on

if you haven't seen this movie it's

probably worse than you're imagining

uh so jemelis is a threat

macro macro tells caligula jamels is a

threat uh

which i don't believe no i don't believe

it at all because jemelis is like this

little like

dainty character with like sunken eyes

who's like two feet shorter than

caligula

he just doesn't seem to want to do

anything he kind of reminds me of

um you know from monty python and the

holy grail you know

the guy who just wants to sing stop that

you're not going into a song while i'm

here

with father and father

[Laughter]

so the plan is to get rid of them right

and so caligula

says hey macro let's go get him right

now let's do this now and macro's like

super excited he's like right now

we're like we're doing this now and

jamels is brought in

and they have all these people kind of

stand in a lineup for him yeah

like like they're the usual suspects

yeah and he's like hey jemelis

which one of these guys uh killed uh

killed your uncle or the emperor

and he's like he's leaning his head and

rolling his eyes

he's gesturing with his eyeballs like

this guy

say this guy which again it's just for

show cause no one in the audience cares

yeah and jamela sure enough like

realizes okay well i guess i'm supposed

to say macro then macro did it

because he didn't know i don't think

macro was in the room when it happened

but he came in very shortly after no

but he was the first person into the

room and saw presumably

that tiberius's face is like wrapped in

this cloth and was like oh okay somebody

killed him

because he's dead over there and that's

not natural causes

but yeah so they have their their very

quick trial

um yeah so after macro is uh

sentenced to execution yeah yeah so

that's what i wanted to get to

the wife that he's supposed to marry

she's like

already grooming herself for being queen

and she has a grooming ritual which we

won't go into

where she covers herself in fluid

substance

we'll give you a clue it's one of the

fluids that came out of simon

but it's not his blood it's not his

urine

uh and so he's explaining to her

like he's like she's all like super

excited about being the empress

they're talking what if what if we moved

to alexandrita uh or example

alexandredas where you were supposed to

start for looking for the grail

uh and she's like oh i could never leave

rome and he goes well second thought

macro is gonna be executed

and she's like wait hold on what and now

and now you're banished

you're banished you're done

and she doesn't try to leave her chair

they just picked the whole chair up and

started she's probably

stuck to it

so they pick the whole thing up and walk

her out of the room and she's just

screaming

she's just

basted as she's getting walked out into

the sunlight

and presumably just left in the desert

i mean that's where they're they're

taking her out into the middle of

nowhere yeah that's she's

she's gotta leave the the entirety of

the roman empire which which i love when

we go into the map room later

yeah we'll get into we'll get into that

but they have like

like a freaking war room with instead of

like people on phones they're putting in

scrolls

yeah just pushing them in uh we'll get

to that

uh so now he needs to get a wife he

wants to marry drusilla

right and she says no i'm gonna find you

an appropriate wife

but but that was part that was part of

why he kind of wanted to go

to to egypt is that he wanted to

he wanted to go to egypt so that it'd be

okay for him to marry his sister

right he said we could be egyptians we

could do that and

she says no we're not egyptians we're

not going to do that

and his first choice when she's trying

to set him up with somebody's like oh

who's that she's pretty

and she's like yeah she's she's a virgin

she's not your style and she's about to

get married so just forget about her

like i won't forget about her yeah oh

but we need to talk about

i know we're good we'll i just jumped

ahead because we skipped over macros

execution which is my favorite scene in

the whole movie

this is the craziest set piece

i have ever seen it's it's amazing

i i don't know what it is it's like an

entire soccer field

and there's just people buried up to

their necks

in this field and a that wall

that looks like a lawnmower it's just

getting pushed slowly across the field

it's like so it's like an alleyway

that's just excessively wide with like

people

flanked on down the alleyway and this

but there's like stadium sitting the

whole way

right so everyone's watching and except

for the people that i guess are behind

the wall

yeah they miss they miss all the action

so as the wall moves forward it's like a

like a lawnmower action but it's a

really cool like

i hope that caligula patented this

because it has a slicing motion

and a catching motion yeah you got to

sweep the heads

under after you chop them off yeah and

and like

people are throwing like eggs and rotten

i'm assuming a rotten apple yeah

so there's like eight dudes with their

head sticking out of the ground and just

eggs landing near them

and then for some reason they're like

trying to get the egg

like is there is that how you get like a

reprieve

are you gonna like all right dig that

guy off he's he got an egg in his mouth

he got two you've got two and you've got

two eggs that's the rule

but they're like some of them are

putting weirdly a lot of effort into

catching this egg that i think is just

there to humiliate them

yeah but but the the approaching wall

isn't just a wall it's like

got people dancing and waving palm from

yeah and like just doing stuff it's like

a

like a tapestry or a mural

that's going to kill you yeah with this

giant

blade and they don't shy away from the

heads just going

no it just clips heads off and they just

like bounce up and roll around

and there's like there's little like

goals

at the bottom where the heads should be

scooped into but

when it gets macro's head it doesn't

even go into one of the

like the holes that it's supposed to go

into so the head is just going to get

smashed by the

machinations of the wall as it moves

forward

but uh that's definitely the the i told

you before we watched the movie i was

like

the one thing i remember is like this

people buried up to their necks

and then this massive lawnmower thing

just chopping all the heads off

but i'm just thinking that like

something simple like a

mower like a john deere mower going down

this alley

not an entire wall which is blood red

yeah stark contrast to the white painted

around it yeah yeah

or maybe probably paint it with blood

yeah that's how you made paint do they

take the bodies back

up or do they leave them in the ground

well you just go out and you plant a

seed in the throat

and then you get a little criminal

forest

right i don't know were these all people

who committed treason or is this like

you know three strikes law for

for people who like cross the street in

front of a carriage well he seems to

kill people

at random except the two people who can

do him the most damage

gemellus and claudius i don't think

jamalus can do that much damage

i mean even though he's technically like

we said the blood

heir like he doesn't seem to have anyone

on his side yeah claudius does

claudius seems to be in some place of

importance

but now we get to the the priestesses of

isis is it

i think yes and that's who he's choosing

his wife this is where he's going to go

pick out a lady

so he dresses as a lady to go pick out a

new wife

and he sees uh helen mirren from across

the room yeah

and it's like what about that one she's

like yeah she's great she's the most

promiscuous woman in all of rome

yeah perfect that's what he wanted

yeah but his sister wasn't thrilled

about that she was trying to talk him

out of it

yeah well they also kind of hint at her

just being

like as much as she doesn't want him to

like

yeah marry her she also doesn't want him

to marry anybody else really

but yeah she's like oh well she's a

little gross but yeah you can go with

her i guess

and so he moves to mary scizonia

s-c-zonia is that what it is yeah

for help helen mirren right it's

character again um and she's into it

yeah like it's not like the other lady

who was kind of just like

like you know oh yeah i'm going to be

prayer and pramper now hell like

so zoney is like yeah i'm not only going

to be in this a minute to win it

and she's also acting like she's she was

his wife already

yeah like she's like oh yeah we are

gonna get married and then i'm gonna

tell you exactly what to do yeah and

we're gonna we're gonna stir the pot

because she she is like she's a lot like

her character i know i

i know we haven't watched excalibur yet

right uh

morgana right yeah she plays morgana and

she's morgan lopez she's very similar

character into that just very ambitious

yeah and very like sneaky

and but and plays the game really well

and that's what i was like because yeah

helen mirren i i totally see why she's

awesome

to be in this character because this

character is a very commanding well

i also feel like their their characters

in the film kind of represent their

attitude

towards it because helen mirren's like

yeah i'm here for the money like that's

what i that's what i came to this job to

do and

and i'm gonna get what i want from this

so uh here we go

and john gilga's like this is dumb i'm

just gonna kill myself

i don't want to be in this so bye guys

um but both of their characters i felt

like reflected their attitudes toward

the film where they're like

whatever this is what's happening i'm in

control

everybody else is all fighting i know um

tinto brass got along really well with

malcolm mcdowell

but peter o'toole could not stand him uh

malcolm mcdowell or

brass uh with brass okay yeah peter

o'toole had a huge problem with the

director

um but malcolm mcdowell was like

whatever you want me to do

including like making up his own scene

later in the movie

which i don't know if we've gotten to

yet during the thunderstorm uh not yet

not yet because we're

uh we're getting into like

uh as far as the story yeah uh

the there's the wedding where the

primonocta situation yeah

where the girl that he wanted first but

couldn't have because she's a virgin and

she's gonna marry some other guy

he decides to make a cameo at their

wedding yeah and just totally ruin their

their lives yeah he just starts digging

into the cake

oh just like did not think you're gonna

say cake

then he digs into something else no he

uh

it's a weird cake shaped like a dude's

ass

um but yeah at first they're just like

oh how great the

you know the caesar is here oh that's so

wonderful that you come by and he's like

oh no you're a soldier you're

you're a hero that i'd come i would come

no matter what you're you're

amazing part of rome's army um and then

he's like

now which way is the marital bed and

they're like it's right on the other

side of that door because we don't waste

time

here in rome well also get married and

walk a kitchen

it wasn't yeah it wasn't yeah there's

just a large

island in a kitchen with a blanket over

it

and uh he takes the bride in there and

rapes her

and then he turns around and the

according to the script was supposed to

rape the husband too

but malcolm mcdowell's like yeah i'm not

gonna we're not gonna do that

seeing so and they were like okay well

what if you do this other thing where

you lube up your entire arm

and then do something terrible to the

husband and so he does that instead

which was a real thing that caligula did

to couples that would get married and it

was called primonocta

and ironman makes a joke about it in age

of ultron

it's physics physics all right so what

if i lift it i

then rule asgard yes of course i will be

reinstituting

prima nocta

[Music]

it's kind of a off-color joke for a

disney movie

but yeah i guess uh i guess it's fine

um and then he finds out or maybe before

the wedding finds out that cizonia is

actually pregnant

and carrying a child he learns that from

his sister

right drusilla tells him that yeah

um and so he they have to like

rush the marriage so that but they

didn't they didn't rush it too much

[Laughter]

yeah not not as much as tr is tradition

but uh enough that he says his vows and

the baby is

literally born a woman gave birth on

stage of this movie

several women yeah there were three

women that they had that were

nine months pregnant and they though you

literally see a head coming out of a

woman like

crowning on set and it's a real baby

being born

um don't like it boggles my mind how you

could

you know possibly time that i mean like

i get that there were three women

potentially ready to give birth on the

day of shooting but like film schedules

are hard enough to figure out and

predict all the things like

how could you trust that within your

film that today somebody was going to

give birth

they must have just been around all the

time

like they had the second they have this

whole room set and they literally needed

i think there's only one shot of the

actual birth taking place

so really there could have been i don't

know like offhand if there were any

other main actors in the shot it could

have literally just been like

whenever you feel like you're ready get

up on that ladder

and we're gonna shoot this one shot real

quick and then we're gonna splice it

into the next scene of the movie

where is that kid now i wonder the

caligula kid

like i like that nickname the caligula

kid

it's like the weirdest western ever i

was like look look kids that's me i'm

being born there

because he'd be our age yeah

you're older than me that's creepy and

weird

i can't look kids that's me being born

and the kids are like is that

grandma's vagina that's

it that's it kids

yes i saw it there first

um but yeah so she has the baby

right as they're saying their vows and

then they realize

this is not a son this is a daughter or

is it yeah but i just like that callig

is like oh maybe i

maybe i spoke too soon like should have

waited

this marriage real quick because i

thought that thing had a penis and it

doesn't so

uh let's not be married but it's too

late so he just decides that it does

have a penis yeah so

drusilla's like well there's gonna be

more kids and he's like well it doesn't

matter because i already have this son

yeah and they're like but that's your

okay oh okay that

that's your son then we'll just yeah

okay i i like the reference of these

simpsons when i believe it was

i can't remember who was lisa or maggie

and he must have been lisa it was

it's a boy and what a boy

that's the umbilical cord it's a girl

[Music]

don't they name the kid like drusilla

junior or something like that yeah

julia drusilla julia drusilla

the most manly name you can make his

name clearly named after his

his uh great grandfather julius

presumably uh so did we mention that he

had a fever

for a while that seemed like a weird

plot point that didn't go anywhere

yeah like he got sick and then he got

better well no it does go somewhere

i think it's going it's going somewhere

to say like hey there's this

fever going around that's so bad it's

killing people

and that's when he goes crazy and does

his little like

stomping little boots dance outside in

the rain yeah

uh is that before or after i guess

that's that's they're in the fever

yeah i think it's during his fever

because he's losing it and he thinks

that everyone's trying to kill him

because he's like in the depths of this

insane fever

but um we haven't really gone into it

but caligula means little boots

um that's not his actual like birth name

that's his nickname

and uh he he says something about little

boots when he's being like

sworn in and they end up swearing him in

as caligula

and it seems like for a second he's

upset about it but then he's just like

whatever i don't even really care

but it's funny every time they say

little boots it reminds me of despicable

me 3.

that's what i was thinking i was like

what animated film do they call somebody

little boots in because is that a

reference to this because if it is it's

disturbing

i don't think it's an intentional

reference but maybe it is because

you know they're they're obviously

making references to the the marx

brothers movies with

the whole island of fredonia where gru's

brother drew lives

yeah drew being his sister's name and

caligula

um but uh drew uh

lives in fredonia and they have this

cheese festival every year and there's a

little kid

who's wearing these like clogs or

something yeah and he has to do a dance

and then ask a girl to to eat his cheese

and uh kristen wiig just calls the

character little boots for the rest of

the movie and

every time they say it in this movie

remembering

maybe caligula was referencing

despicable me 3.

did you ever consider that yeah

is definitely a conspiracy theory we

should we should chase pursue

uh remember little boots so he has this

this fever and he's dancing and stomping

around naked doing his little boots

dance

um and then the fever breaks and like

you said it doesn't really play into it

other than

just maybe maybe establishing that there

is a fever

but then obviously he had this terrible

fever and he hangs out with his wife

that just gave birth and so she gets the

fever

i know drew silicone the drusilla gets

the fever but either way she probably

got it from him

is that that's what the doctor wanted oh

yeah yeah um

because she was like holding him in his

time of you know distress

right um and she ends up succumbing to

the fever despite his screaming at isis

to save her he's and throwing statues

around

well even claudius at this point says

like oh i'd give my life to save you

or to to give my life for isis to save

you or something like that and

and he's just like done and you know

columbia is like take him away

yeah i think i was just going what oh oh

he's just like so upset it's like

sacrifice this guy

thank you buddy uh but it doesn't work

um and drusilla dies and he just drags

her naked body all around the house

yeah um yeah i'm actually impressed by

the actress's ability to just be

floppy a floppy rag doll for all of

these scenes where he's

dragging her around and then that just

one last quick zoom in in this

yeah just screaming into the camera um

and then he just sort of like drunkenly

depressed wanders out into the streets

which is the stuff that leads up to that

is the

like f i'm sorry i didn't mean interrupt

i got

i'm getting so excited for this new

character to come in yeah

because he gets drunk and like trying to

stop a play of himself

without mocking his relationship with

yes they have a stage in there

and they have a fake caligula and a fake

drusilla and he kills like four people

by knocking them off like a three-story

building yeah

but it's very game of thronesy that like

everyone in the whole

the whole land knows that this brother

and sister have been

having sex and they're just like oh no

we just make fun of you guys all the

time for doing that

it's like it's not it's not a well-kept

secret at all but while he's having his

little

jasmine's day out situation he he

sees this going on and is it is thrown

basically in like a jail like literally

a throne apparently they just have a

shoot that goes down into the jail and

they like drop them down this laundry

chute that lands in a bunch of

mattresses yeah where people are

performing

uh close-up magic yeah and and there's

this one because they're performing

other things like this yeah yeah yeah uh

yeah close up something else

[Laughter]

uh but there's this one guy who i think

has no lines

he throughout the whole movie the

bearded guy yeah yeah he reminds me of

the guy that uh

will ferrell makes friends with in the

mail room and elf

just like totally yeah it's that kind of

a situation he basically rode and then

shoot down to the basement of the

building and and

so he wants caligula's ring because it's

probably valuable

yeah and caligula performs like a magic

trick where it seems to pull out of

out of the bearded guy's own crotch yeah

and he's so

impressed with it yeah but he still

wants the ring but somehow but it's like

straight up like dad magic just like uh

yeah

i'm literally just gonna move it from

one hand to the other hand

and that's the extent of the trick and

the guy i guess

recognizes the ring at some point and

realizes oh my gosh this is the emperor

yeah

and not only is the emperor but he's the

coolest guy i've ever met

and i want to be best friends with this

man yeah and caligula is like yes

you and i are now best friends come with

me

come with me to the palace and so this

guy

is just hanging out with him now yeah so

it's such a great

he's just like a new employee he's like

you and me are gonna be best friends

so yeah he he decides that now

he's going to go back and not only is he

the ruler

he's going to have everyone vote that

he's a god

not vote to see if he's a god just

everyone vote that i'm a god

it just is going to declare him god

because what caesar's

gods when they died was like what they

had but he was like

traditionally been true yeah he's just

like nope i'm a god now

yeah so he uh he everyone votes that

he's a god and

the the other people in the senate are

just like great he's a god now that's

wonderful

and he just goes around destroying all

the other like religious figurines that

they have he's just like no

i'm the i'm the god now thanks so much

and that's when he goes and does another

one of the actual historical

caligula things and he sets up a chair

on a beach

and is like go kill the kill the piracy

the papyrus

well yeah he was it was supposed to be a

war on britain but yeah like

he had all this money set aside for a

war on britain and he's like

people are stupid they don't know the

difference between britain and papyrus

just go

go get kill all the papyrus and give it

to me which is like

pretty true like caligula like literally

told people to just

go defeat the ocean and then he goes

back to the palace and he's like

hey we took over britain and to prove it

here's like hundreds of thousands of

papyrus reads

well plus britain was already

part of the empire right uh

everything south of hadrian's wall that

is but um

what could um i i skipped over because i

was so i i wanted to talk about it

earlier

when he was missing and drunk in the

drunk tank

uh uh his wife halamir goes to the map

room to talk to

talk to longinus about where could he be

he's like well we have all these reports

coming

and there's the giant map it could be

here or here or

it's just like chalkboards full of like

these reports and stuff that he's

pointed at is like it could be this one

or

it could be this one but there's just

like these people in togas rushing in

with like scrolls and parchment and

putting them in little envelopes and

other people at desks like

frantically taking them like these are

coded messages coming in from all over

the realm

this is where the magic happens people

that in that same room actually earlier

in the film i forgot to mention when

you're still

still alive uh these people come in and

they're like we need you to

to come to a ruling on this court

decision and he's like all right give me

all the

documents i demand the documents and

they put a bunch of books in one hand

and a scroll on the other hand

and he's like these books weigh a lot

more than this scroll

guilty if he doesn't look at any of the

stuff they handed him

he just hands it back to the people and

they're like oh thank you so much

and then drusilla just starts cracking

up because it's just hilarious to them

that he probably just got some guy

killed

uh there's a similar scene where he has

to like sign all this paperwork but he

has to

sail this right before he can stamp it

yeah and he just gets faster i'm i'm

really impressed with how malcolm

mcdowell was able to

stay faster faster and faster and faster

i caligula caesar come on in the name of

the senate the people of rome

i caligula senator come out and they

will send people around actually

likely to see come on in the name of

sending people heights

like with all their power invested in me

by the holy number

just keeps stamping he's looking at he

starts looking at the stack of how many

more he has yeah and then he like hands

the stamp to longinus he's like

i'm done yeah you do the rest of this

bye

and and longinus is the i guess the head

of the treasury

yeah but he ends up being like the new

macro kind of

yeah he's like the head conspirator

after macros just ahead

uh because caligula comes up with a plan

to balance the budget

because the he's like wait

we got these two problems that are going

to solve themselves first of all what do

people like

having sex who's good at sex

senator's wife

so we'll charge people to have sex with

the senator's wives which will

humiliate the senate the people will

love me more because they hate

because i'm humiliating the senate this

would work right now we could solve the

deficit issue if we just

took all of congress's spouses and sold

them to the public

i do not endorse this thing so that's

when they build this giant boat

the love boat

[Music]

there's a lot of bob guccione directing

on this boat yeah there is

there's a lot of stuff going on

[Laughter]

what the is it me do the wives seem into

it

oh yeah that's what they were saying

though they were saying that the the

senators wives were promiscuous yeah

that's why they are the senator's wives

like he wasn't joking when he was like

who's good at sex like that was the

whole point is that the senators like

all wanted to marry the like helen

mirren type you know

all the people who were who were

professionals

in that manner um

but yeah so we just have a really long

uh orgy

as all the senators are being humiliated

by really long

too long and uh

basically this is like the last straw

for most of the senate yeah

well the one of one of them said didn't

you say like it's it's a good thing it

wasn't the army

oh i don't remember that yeah somebody

had that line like like if it had been

the arm like one of the one of the guys

from the armies like if it had been the

army like essentially they would have

like revolted and turned against him but

you know implying that the senate was

essentially like

spineless powerless and but not totally

powerless

because the next scene we basically have

them like

him and his family are acting out some

play

on a stage and nobody cares what's

happening and nobody knows their lines

and they're just kind of like

half-assedly performing a play

well i'm assuming that the play since

it's an egyptian play

has something that would do about

marrying his sister right yeah

he's acting out what didn't happen uh

but he just but we get another bird

yeah we got another bird the day before

he we get we see a bird in his room and

he's and he's like freaking out about it

helen marin's like what it's just a bird

and finally the he

i can't remember why the guard wouldn't

let him pass he says he asked what the

password is

yeah and he's all screwed him and he's

like yeah

well that's all i needed to hear stab

him up

yeah and and so they start killing him

bearded bearded friend comes rushing in

and just with one swipe gets his head

cut off yeah they just cleave him right

into the head

he was so loyal yeah and then helen

mirren gets

gets stabbed

yeah they like holding on to her legs

swinging her head down

stairs and then throw her body down the

stairs so now the the whole family the

three of them

are just like draped across the stairs

and they're just

dumping water to wash all the blood off

of the marble staircase

and and they quick make claudius

claudius thinks he's about to get

murdered like he's next to like oh

they're just cleansing the whole family

line

and they drop a crown on his head and

he's like huh what what

[ __ ] uh i don't want this job after

i can see why uh gilgood just killed

himself in a tub

so it wasn't claudius that they took

away during the fever thing it was

somebody else

no i think it was somebody else yeah

okay because claudius is actually who

uh took up the crown after caligula in

history

um but that's basically the end of the

movie is these three corpses on the

stairs

and uh caligula's upside down bloodied

face staring into the camera for a

freeze frame

uh so what do you guys think is that a

must watch

i'd say yes uh it's as much as i

had a lot of crazy things in a movie

that i talked up a lot because i thought

it was really crazy

it's going to be a no yeah i'm going to

know this is a hard yes for me

uh yeah pun intended

no but this is this is a must watch for

for

any malcolm mcdowell fan as far as i'm

concerned it's just something you gotta

do

um the the guy who adapted

the screenplay um masolini d'amico

he also adapted some shakespeare stuff

for

uh franco zepharelli because he he wrote

the script for the olivia hussey

okay romeo julia and he also wrote um

an adaptation of othello that starred

placido domingo

interestingly um malcolm mcdonald

obviously

everybody knows from this or from uh

clockwork orange probably

he was also in h.g wells or he was in he

was h.g wells in

time after yeah time after time which is

where he met mary steinberg and i think

they were married for a short time were

they really i think so

i didn't know that uh and then she went

to ted danson interesting

interesting mix um

i know we're not talking about time

after time but uh

i really like that movie it's really

crazy uh

but uh was that 1980 or 81

yeah so they were married for 10 years

oh milk mcdowell

i did not know that um

malcolm also played himself in altman's

the player which is a really funny movie

have you seen

the player i haven't seen that okay it's

good stuff and he was also dr

loomis in uh rob zombie's halloween

movies taking up the donald pleasance

role about star trek generations

star trek generations that's true he was

in one of the movies

and uh we met him once he uh

he was at the best buy in camarillo what

on black friday black friday he was

buying a television with him he was like

it's a great granddaughter

yeah yeah and he was in line in front of

us and i was like

i think that's michael mcdowell and

andrea was like is it and she walked

away from the line to look at it from

the side she's like yeah that's totally

him and i was like excuse me mr mcdonald

i'm really sorry to bother you i just

wanted to say i'm a huge fan of

clockwork orange

he's like oh thank you so much that

means a lot and he like tried

it seemed like he was trying to end the

conversation really quickly because he

didn't want a bunch of people to start

talking to him

but it was just like he was he was very

polite about it um

so because because he looks so different

like from his youth to his adulthood and

i'm not saying he aged badly

he just changed physically yeah like he

looks totally completely different yeah

but he plays a lot of like really

interesting characters now

like he does a lot of voices his voices

that's true yeah he does a lot of voice

work but he

i think at the time this might have been

right after he did a pretty long run on

heroes

um he was playing like the guy who was i

don't know

some important character on on the show

heroes um

but yeah teresa ann savoy who plays

drusilla had worked previously with the

director on the salon kitty movie

from uh the year before and has done

mostly italian movies since then

john gilgood who played nerva we said

was hobson already

he was also in sydney lumet's murder on

the orient express with albert finney

um peter o'toole is obviously lawrence

of arabia lion and winter the stuntman

an uncredited scottish piper in the

1967 casino royale the terrible one

oh that's not surprising because there

was just like a lot of people yeah there

was a lot of random cameos

in there um it's just funny that he

would show up for a day of that

um helen mirren had been in a lucky man

with malcolm mcdowell already

um she will be back later this year for

the fiendish plot of dr fumanchu

and the long good friday she was morgana

in

borman's excalibur yeah um and she was a

cosmonaut in 2010 the year we make

contact

um and she plays jason statham's mom and

the fast and furious universe

so she'll be appearing next in uh fast

and furious nine

after her appearance in hobbs and shaw

where does uh caligula land on your

letterboxed

list uh it's at the bottom it's at the

bottom

it's at the bottom oh my gosh really but

here so

so here's how i'm doing my list

essentially like

it's not it's not about like

how good i thought the performances were

it's not

about like you know the artistic value

of them

it's would i want to watch this movie

again

and i don't think i'll ever want to

watch this movie again

at least i'd want to watch pretty much

any movie

instead of this movie interesting

richard bottom of the list

you guys are blowing my mind i i also

never want to i usually watch these

movies at least more than once to get

some

like that's what's too too difficult i

was just like i i watched

just tell me what you want twice as much

as i watched

caligula and i

i appreciate what caligula is it's like

yeah that was a thing that i saw

and that was a pretty crazy movie i

can't recommend it to anybody

yeah a single person except

the people in this room

[Laughter]

i'm putting it between my brilliant

career and

midnight madness which makes it third

place for once

that is mindful it's the only movie that

we've watched so far that i

that i know for a fact that i will watch

again it's the only movie on the list so

far

what okay wow

well i uh well yeah okay

that's where i'm putting it um and we

already did our ups or downs

on this one so you guys are not not the

fan of this film that i am

um all right i think that's everything

for this one

if you have any thoughts you'd like to

share we are vintagevideopod on twitter

facebook instagram and letterbox

where as i've said before you can find

each of our full movie rankings for the

year

please consider rating us on itunes to

help people find the show

and if you find the time to leave us a

review we will thank you personally in

an upcoming episode

if you're feeling especially generous

you can support the show through patreon

at patreon.com

vintage video podcast thank you so much

for listening and i hope you'll join us

next week

when we'll be discussing cruising change

of pace

uh which wikipedia describes as a 1980

american erotica crime thriller film

written and directed by william friedkin

starring al pacino

paul cervino and karen allen it is

loosely based on the novel of the same

name by new york times reporter

gerald walker about a serial killer

targeting gay men

particularly those men associated with

the leather scene in the 1970s

thank you for listening and we leave you

now with the trailer

for cruising

[Music]

how would you like to disappear

disappear

go undercover you know this man

who's here

these victims are all the same physical

type what about him skip

late 20s 140 150 pounds

dark hair dark eyes have you ever seen

him before

i want to send you out there to see if

you can attract this guy

[Music]

how

a new york city detective in search of a

killer

is about to disappear

into the night is it dangerous

i can't talk about it how do you know

you're gonna end up the same person when

it's over

an odyssey to the edge of city life

bartenders are starting to give me some

information

there's this uh name keeps popping up

all the time

there he is the one with the hat is that

the one that followed you

yeah why didn't you go with him i don't

know

i think you should check him

if you want to play i'll play he's the

wrong guy

prince don't match

what he sees

who's here

what he feels i don't think i can do the

job captain

i don't think i can handle it

[Music]

it's just stuff going down i don't think

i can

i can deal with it yes

[Music]

yes

[Music]

what he experiences

[Music]

what he discovers will change his life

forever

[Music]

al pacino

who's

[Music]

[Music]

cruising