Ready When You Are, Mr. De Mille

[jdb1]

I'd like to hear some thoughts about last night's The Sign of the Cross.

Frankly, I could hardly stand it, and turned it off near the end, as the beleaguered Christians were waiting in the Coloseum's "green room" to meet the lions.

I thought Frederic March gave the worst performance of his career - "histrionic" doesn't even cover it. A unusually languid performance from Laughton (with a fake Roman nose, yet). Colbert was as she always was, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but even in 1931/2 she already looked like a middle-aged woman. Although I thought in her Poppea getup she sort of looked like a Roman Betty Boop.

The "naked moon" dance was a hoot, though.

I don't think De Mille's style ever really got away from the silents - even his last few movies have the look of silents. This one, in particular, was more like a 19th century stage melodrama -- all it needed was some moustache-twirling and a chorus of boos and catcalls from an audience. This is not to say that his movies aren't very entertaining -- they are, but I find that I groan at De Mille epics more than at most other movies.

And how did you like it?

[movieman1957]

I sat through the whole thing too. My first reaction was where did they get that nose for Laughton? Then there was the height of excess of milking those donkeys to keep Colbert supplied in milk for her bath. (That was fun.) Then an hour and 10 minutes in an intermission, of all things.

I thought the "gay images" made up such a small part of this it hardly qualified. I agree with you on the dance. I was expecting something a little more obvious. The fact that she couldn't sing or dance didn't help. She moved her hips fairly well at times.

Everybody was pretty much over the top. "Marcia" just didn't seem the type to attract a man of March's character's worldliness. I found the "green room" conversion a little hard to take as well.

But, it's a deMille film so there will be SO much of everything.

[moira finnie]

Hi Judith,
I had to laugh about your assessment of Fredric March's over the top, dreadful performance--but then, any movie that compels him to get a permanent wave and wear a really, really short toga is asking for trouble. Odd, isn't it, that one of the best actors of a forty year span in such diverse roles as Death in Death Takes a Holiday, The Best Years of Our Lives, Inherit the Wind and The Iceman Cometh could also give such a laughably bad performance when asked to wear a micro-mini and mouth unbelievable dialogue as he allegedly lusted for the blandly unappealing Elissa Landi. Her mewly-mouthed Mercia doesn't really make Christianity look too appealing. I sort of sympathized with March's comments that Landi's faith had robbed her of her humanity and made her unhealthily morbid---though being a decadent Roman looked pretty tedious (and sweaty) too.

As you mentioned, a lot of the trouble that Fredric March had creating a real person in this movie could probably be laid at the doorstep of that great 19th century director, Cecil B. DeMille. The Sign of the Cross was really enjoyable as an outrageous spectacle, including the often disturbingly weird coliseum sequence that concluded the film. Charles Laughton's bravura performance is way out there, as well, though he never seems to be trying to create a flesh and blood person, but only fulfilling a mythic portrait as Nero. It probably helps that he's not on screen as much as Freddie either. Laughton certainly succeeded in showing Nero as one major squirrel, so in that sense, I guess it was a success. Btw, Laughton was supposedly responsible for insisting on that very odd "Roman" nose that he wore as Nero.

The "Dance of the Naked Moon" sequence and the bizarre and sadistic events depicted in the Colisseum seem par for the course for DeMille--though, I think things may have gotten away from him, just a teensy bit, in the pygmies vs. the amazons part and the mercifully brief scene when the tethered beauty draped in flowers, (allegedly an uncredited Sally Rand the legendary fan dancer), waiting for the alligators to munch on her. I didn't see much "gayness" in any of the scenes, though of course, I guess that babe allegedly trying to seduce Landi was a lesbian. If that's lesbianism, it looks pretty lame.

Historically, the arena sequence in the movie actually shows that DeMille was capable of restraint in recreating the spectacle. In the real Roman arena there could literally be thousands, not hundreds, of animals and people slaughtered in an afternoon, and, interestingly, a performance might also include a reenactment of naval battle as well, thanks to the incredible engineering of the Coliseum. Btw, the Roman historian Tacitus pretty much discredited the idea that Nero actually started the fire of Rome in 64 AD, though he mentions that it was a rumor at the time of the event. The historians who followed Tacitus helped to spread the rumor about Nero's "little urban renewal project" via the fire that engulfed many of the then approximately 80% wooden structures that comprised an overcrowded Rome of that day.

I also can't help but wonder about the broad contemporary reactions across the U.S. to this film in 1932. From what I gathered from the Callow biography of Laughton, it seems that reviewers were pretty sanguine about the lurid episodes depicted within the movie, though there were local censor boards that regarded it as outrageous, adding impetus to the development of the Production Code's imposition on all the studios. I suppose that Mr. DeMille's increased adoption of a rather sanctimonious attitude in subsequent films and press presentations, (even when his "biblical" and "historical" movies only came to life during the scenes depicting decadence), was partly in response to the Production Code that his own excesses helped to create.

[jdb1]

De Mille's silent epics were equally lambasted by critics for their luridness and indecency but, like our predecessors in Rome, that's what we came to see, and those movies kept being made.

There's no question in my mind that C.B. was incredibly skillful in holding all this churning mess together. The opening scenes at the games, with that long tracking shot of the spectators going into the arena, the camera going down and down successive levels of the entrance, was quite impressive - that's cinema. The man knew what he was doing, but sometimes he really did do much too much of it.


If you've seen the PBS TV version of I, Claudius, you know that this whole decadant Roman court business can be done well and realistically. (That was when I knew I was in love with John Hurt [he was a young and beautiful, but very, very disturbed and disturbing Caligula]).

PS - March's perm was beautifully offset by the excess of makeup he wore, dontcha think?

[SSO Admins]

I can't imagine taking a DeMille movie seriously on any level. Lurid excess is the reason this movie was made, and it succeeds beautifully.

[Mr. Arkadin]

Sign of the Cross as I said in the Screened Out thread is more of an exploitation film than any serious look at early Christianity. While I find the film funny ("Now take off your clothes and get in here and tell me all about it!" ), I don't know anyone who could really take this (or any of Demille's Christian speaking films) seriously. The man sold a bill of goods to a public who was willing to buy.

I find it hilarious that some "Christian" people look on his films as accurate views of those times and great cinema. They obviously never read their Bible or saw this film. They also haven't seen many good movies either.

[MikeBSG]

I really loathe "Sign of the Cross." I saw it over a decade ago at the Cleveland Cinematheque. It was a "restored" version, which meant we had to sit through the 1944 reissue opening scene (in which a Catholic USAAF guy has qualms about bombing Rome, only to be assured by the airplane's chaplain that "Rome was ruled by an evil man before.") before the 1932 film proper started.

The arena scenes drove me over the edge, particularly where the tall blonde women fought the little black pygmies. I felt that I was somehow looking into someone's warped subconscious.

I am Christian, by the way, and I detest this movie.

The only DeMille films I like, not that I've seen many, are "The Cheat" and "Union Pacific."

[Lzcutter]

Regarding The Sign of the Cross, there is little I can add to Judith and Moira's insightful writings.

However, I was surprised that the film ended with March and "Marcia" walking up the steps to their doom.

I really wanted to see the expression on Colbert's face when she realized what March was doing.

As for March and the make-up, the only other male character I have seen wear that much eyeliner is Richard, the ageless guy, on Lost.

[traceyk]

I know a lot of local censorship boards cut the "naked Moon" dance (which my 13-year-old daughter thought was hilarious) when this movie was first released--were other scenes cut and maybe destroyed? One of the books I read about the production code (can't remember which one off the top of my head) made a big deal of the relationship between Nero and his male slave, but I only saw the briefest glimpse of the slave. Did I miss something?

Tracey