B-Movie Enema has existed from the morning of the world, and it shall exist until the last star falls from the night. Although I have taken the form of the Enema Man, I am all men as I am no man and therefore, I am a God… of buttholes.

Ah yes… This was bound to happen, wasn’t it? There are infamous movies, and there is 1979’s Caligula. Known as the gigantic budget sex film produced by Bob Guccione and Penthouse Films International. Guccione was the founder of Penthouse Magazine. Penthouse, as per my reckoning, as a guy who once had a subscription to both that and Playboy in my younger years, was known for two things. The first was the Penthouse Forum, in which people supposedly wrote letters that sounded a little more like erotic fiction than anything else. The second was the fact that the women in the magazine, at least when I had the subscription, tended to be more of the adult actress type of models, and therefore, unlike Playboy, which specialized in girls-next-door types, the Penthouse Pets tended to be a little raunchier in their pictorials. Playboy was more artful. Penthouse was more sexual. Hustler was dirty.

But what people don’t really know is that Penthouse was involved in funding for films for a long time. They chipped in funding for studio pictures like Chinatown and The Day of the Locust. Guccione never produced his own film. So he decided he wanted to not just produce a movie of his own, but make a grand spectacle about a time in which spectacle was sexy as fuck. So he said that Caligula would be the guy he’d make his movie about. He started working with an Italian producer, Franco Rossellini, whose uncle, Roberto, was one of the most prominent Italian filmmakers. He then eventually hired author Gore Vidal as his screenwriter.

Vidal’s script was epic, but there was a problem… There was a lot of gay stuff in it. Guccione needed that to be toned down, largely for a wider audience. In fact, the only straight sex scene in the movie was incestual between Caligula and his sister Drusilla. But once that got a fresh coat of rewrite, it was time to build the elaborate Roman sets with the intention of being a landmark in cinematic history. You know… Like Citizen Kane, but a sexier Citizen Kane. After seeing scenes from the movie Salon Kitty, Guccione decided to bring in Mr. I Never Saw a Butthole I Didn’t Want to Film himself, Tinto Brass.

This is where things started to get a bit wonky… and the production had only just begun. Brass was known to be a bit difficult to work with on set. What’s more, Gore Vidal didn’t care much for directors. He felt the true author of a film was the screenwriter. This led to a lot of fighting between the director and the writer. That led to Brass wanting Vidal removed from the set, which Guccione agreed to do. But then Vidal and Guccione got into a spat over payment. The original script was set to have the movie titled Gore Vidal’s Caligula, but his name was removed from the title. Vidal called Brass a megalomaniac, and Brass threatened to publish the original script if he ever got really mad at Vidal. Vidal’s name was only in the credits as “adapted from a screenplay by Gore Vidal,” thus stripping him of full writing credit.

So behind the scenes was a bit of a mess, but what about in front of the cameras?

Well, Guccione really did intend for this to be a movie to be taken very seriously, and the casting certainly supports that. As Caligula, we have Malcolm McDowell, who is going all in on this performance. Of course, he was best known at the time for movies like A Clockwork Orange and If… You have Sir John Gielgud and the great Peter O’Toole. Helen Mirren shows up for a significant role in the movie. It’s a big cast full of well-established actors. Guccione wanted to cast Orson Welles as Tiberius, but, despite a $1 million offer, he turned it down based on moral grounds after he took a look at the script. So that was when O’Toole was brought in as Tiberius, the Roman Caesar before Caligula. I should also mention that Helen Mirren always defended the movie as being an “irresistible mix of art and genitals.”

Damn, girl, that comment rules.

Speaking of the man himself, Gaius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, was named after Gaius Julius Caesar, but got the name “Caligula” from his father’s soldiers. The name is translated to “little boot.” After Caligula’s father, Germanicus, died, he was ultimately adopted by Emperor Tiberius, Caligula’s biological uncle. When Tiberius died in AD 37, Caligula took the throne.

This was not a good choice for a leader, if there even was a choice to be had, because Caligula was a guy full of character flaws. He was self-indulgent, cruel, sadistic, perverted, and ultimately became an insane murderer. He was assassinated in AD 41 at the age of 28. He ruled only for about three and a half years.

So he was maybe the right type of character to feature in your big-budget sex flick. I’m being a little facetious with that description. But this is a movie that has a ton of stories behind it. I called it infamous, and it really is. At one point, footage was sent over from Italy, but it was seized by U.S. customs. They claimed the film to be obscene, and it was not declared as such when Guccione needed to declare this. Penthouse ultimately won a lawsuit, which got the film declared not to be obscene. The film’s release was met with exceptionally negative reviews, including a 0-star review from Roger Ebert. Variety called it a “moral holocaust.”

However, over the years, it did start to gain a cult audience. It’s later been reappraised. Leonardo DiCaprio cited the film as an influence on his performance in The Wolf of Wall Street. More recently, Coppola’s Megalopolis was compared to Caligula. The Cinema Snob, aka Brad Jones, named Caligula his favorite movie ever. This ultimately led to the Ultimate Cut getting put into production in 2023. This restored and reconstructed a version of the film that is closer to Gore Vidal’s original script. That’s the version we’re going to be reviewing, as it received fairly positive reviews from critics.

Since this version of the movie I’m reviewing is almost exactly three hours long, we gotta get to put the work in starting now…

This “Ultimate Cut” explains to us a few things. First, it shows something I’m not sure has ever been seen here at B-Movie Enema – a label stating that this was an official selection of the 2023 Cannes Film Festival. Reviewing an adult film, talking about Tinto Brass, a movie that features Malcolm McDowell? All of that is old business. An official Cannes Film Festival participant? I’m pretty sure that’s brand new.

The other thing the Ultimate Cut wants to set the stage is some of the stuff I mentioned earlier. Guccione financed an incredibly expensive film that he thought would blend high-brow filmmaking, art, and sex in brand new ways, but the whole damn thing was a disaster during production. The budget ballooned, people wanted their names removed from credits, Brass was fired, Vidal wanted his name removed, etc. But fear not, Enemaniacs! This Ultimate Cut is going to right the ship and present a much truer vision for the movie, and that’s what we’re about to experience.

An opening scroll of text tells us about how beloved Emperor Germanicus died in 19 A.D. under somewhat suspicious circumstances. Thus, Caligula arose. As I mentioned earlier, he was beloved by his father’s army and a natural successor to his father’s rule. And that’s especially after Caligula’s immediate family also all suddenly began dying of equally suspicious circumstances. Once the bloodline of Germanicus was whittled down to just Caligula and his sister Drusilla, it was clear who the next Caesar must be. That doesn’t stop Caligula from having haunting dreams and nightmares of his potential murder.

Now, there is one person whom Caligula trusts above all others – his sister Drusilla (Teresa Ann Savoy). Despite her being married (and, well, siblings), the siblings are lovers. She has no doubt that her brother will become the next Caesar. She does not fear that their great-uncle Tiberius will kill Caligula, as Caligula fears Tiberius (Peter O’Toole) murdered the rest of their family. As they share in pillow talk about this, an ominous blackbird flies into Caligula’s bed chambers, frightening the young prince, who sees this as bad luck. These negative feelings don’t get any better when the head of the Praetorian Guard, Naevus Sutorius Marco, a fiercely loyal friend of Caligula’s, arrives with a summons from Tiberius. The Emperor wants to see Caligula.

Upon arrival, we meet Tiberius’s closest friend and confidant, Nerva (Sir John Gielgud), Caligula’s uncle Claudius, whom Caligula and Drusilla described earlier as an idiot, and Caligula’s cousin, and likely the most fit to be named the new Emperor, Gemelius. Tiberius is in a bad way. He’s grown old, he’s a little kooky, and he’s starting to show some pretty significant sores and lesions on his face, which, combined with his erratic behavior, are pretty obvious signs of venereal disease eating away at him. Most believe Tiberius knows he’s nearing the end of his life and is ready to select his successor.

Right away, Tiberius demands that Caligula do his “little dance” he did for Germanicus’s army that endeared them so to him. It’s a bit of a demeaning request, but it entertains Claudius while Tiberius swims in his pool with naked men and women. After the silly dance he demanded, Tiberius asks Caligula why he speaks ill of him in Rome. He hears that Caligula speaks openly about how much he’d like his great-uncle to die, even when Tiberius protected Caligula so that he might live to become Caesar.

Peter O’Toole is goddamn menacing in this. Never mind the makeup that shows his ailment from V.D. There’s a sinister gleam in his eye. He doesn’t ask people to do things for him. He demands it. He barks commands. He shouts rebuttals. He refuses to hear people, even Caligula, speak of him as a God. He also knows that others believe his father and grandfather to be better Caesars than he ever could be. He’s basically the way he is because he has cruel ambition that’s fading now, and he no longer has to worry about consequences for any actions he’s ever taken. It makes him dangerous and kind of frightening. He’s a dead man walking but he’s not afraid to take others with him.

Plus, that smile makes him look like a comic book villain straight out of Gotham City.

After his swim, Tiberius goes to his next favorite thing to do… watch people having crazy ass sex. And yeah, there are naked people EVERYWHERE. They’re jerking themselves and each other off. They are fucking. They are sucking. It’s an orgy that sometimes includes animals. Chickens are being choked and beans are definitely getting flicked that day. Also, there’s a juggler just doing his thing in a sea of depravity.

I bet that room smelled awful.

Also, Peter O’Toole is there. I can kind of envision Malcom McDowell being in a room like this. He is Alex DeLarge after all. But Peter O’Toole? Was he used to being in a room with 50 naked men and women? How did those production meetings go? Did Tinto Brass want to film his butthole? The topic of putting buttholes on film had to have come up. That’s definitely something I found to be a particular interest of Brass’s during that month I covered a bunch of his movies. There’s not a butthole he doesn’t want to preserve on celluloid.

Tiberius tells Caligula his views of Roman history and his place in it as a Caesar. He talks of being destined to be a ruler of swine, but as he grows older, he realizes he’s not much more than a swine herder. You think he’s preparing Caligula to be the next Caesar by telling him how they rule over slaves, and the populace must always be seen as such. He shows how he makes decrees that are effectively created by others in his inner circle of advisors. He also condemns several Senators to death for treason by simply saying that “every Senator sees himself as a Caesar,” and that alone makes them traitors. This especially sticks with Caligula as we’ll see later.

It ultimately becomes clear that Tiberius does not see Caligula as his rightful heir. It’s obvious he is going to pass this to Gemelius, his young, blood-related, non-adopted grandson. In fact, Tiberius offers a cup of poisoned wine to Caligula. Caligula is no Claudius. He offers the wine to his young cousin. Tiberius takes the poisoned wine from his grandson and gives it to an unsuspecting naked servant girl, who drinks it and dies, as Tiberius explains to Gemelius that after he dies, Caligula will kill the young Emperor. Then, someone will kill Caligula. That’s the way of the Caesars.

Seeing the score now, Caligula has even more desire to take control of his own destiny to become Caesar.

As Praetorian Macro’s wife, who often gets shared with Caligula, gives him some words of encouragement to rid himself of Tiberius, commotion is heard in the palace. Nerva has slit his wrists in his bath. He tells Tiberius that he would have been killed anyway by Macro once Tiberius dies. Besides, he didn’t want to live alongside Caligula, whom he refers to as a reptile. So, he took it upon himself to check out of this shitty, rat-infested motel known as “life.”

This does not suit Tiberius. He especially does not like Caligula now that he feels that he’s taken his only friend and most trusted advisor from him. It’s probably a good idea for him to hop to and get rid of his “great”-uncle. But first… He must put on his high-rise diaper and see-through robe!

Tiberius falls ill and is given a year (or much, much less) to live. When the room is cleared after the doctor believes the Emperor has died, Caligula is surprised to find Tiberius still lives. He decides this is his chance to finally kill the Emperor and take his place as Caesar, but he ultimately cannot bring himself to do it. Luckily, Macro is a hell of a pal. He finishes Tiberius off, as Gemelius watches.

At one point, Malcolm McDowell is trying to pry the Emperor’s ring off what Caligula believes is Tiberius’s cold, dead hands, in what can best be described as a micro-miniskirt and thong. That’s pretty damn close to fulfilling the time-honored tradition of Tinto Brass filming buttholes. It’s also kind of embarrassing because I didn’t realize McDowell and I would be wearing the same outfit to this watch party.

So, there you have it. Caligula has fully ascended. Sure, Gemelius witnessed Caligula first steal Tiberius’s ring, then saw Macro kill the Emperor, but hey… Whatcha gonna do? Caligula has that bitchin’ ring now. Are you going to say he didn’t get possession of that in a legal manner? What are you, some sort of Senator who believes yourself to be Caesar? Off with your head!

Gemelius makes it easy for him to continue to draw breath by bowing to Caligula before things can get a little messy between cousins.

Speaking of things being messy between family members, Caligula names his hot-ass sister Drusilla as his equal. That sickens the Senate, but when Caligula discovers the people of Rome pretty much hated Tiberius, Caligula recalls all who have been exiled from Rome as part of a grand general amnesty.

Caligula gets pretty mad with power pretty damn quick. First, the whole appointment of Drusilla as his equal is questionable. Even Drusilla thinks it was a bit risky. He then decides to rid himself of Macro, the very man who made it possible for Caligula to become Caesar, by forcing Gemelius to name him as Tiberius’s murderer. Then, to win the guards to his side so they will arrest Macro, he gives them all a big raise in pay. He is playing fast and hard with the budget of the government, he betrays his friend and his wife, and he plans to marry his own sister, which is mega-illegal in Rome. To solve for this, Caligula intends to move the government of Rome to Egypt, where it would then be legal for him to marry his own sister. She says that won’t be possible. The Senate will stop him. Instead, she plans a party for Caligula to choose among the proper class of women who could become his wife.

And by party, I mean a lesbian orgy.

Caligula chooses exceptionally well. He spots Helen Mirren, playing Caesonia, from across the room and is like, “Yup, that’s the one.” At first, Drusilla protests. Caesonia might be super hot, but she’s also the most promiscuous girl in Rome. That’s right the fuck up Caligula’s alley.

Now, if you think blood rituals are just something more recently made up by whack-a-doos online, no, it’s not. Caligula has Drusilla bring him Caesonia. He uses a blade to make a small cut on her neck to lick it off before going doggy-style on her in a temple, you know, like some serious Deep State business. You don’t even want to know what goes on in the basement of Cometonius Pizzarius.

Anyway, I have not given any lip service at all to the way this film is designed and shot. Most contemporary reviews for the film that came out mostly talked about how morally depraved it was, or how there was this anger over the high-level actors who were involved in the production. No one ever really seemed to talk about how the film was actually made. The bloated budget does not lead to a mystery of where it was spent. It is ALL on screen. There’s a look to this movie that almost comes across as unbelievable that it could have been built. The picture above is an excellent example of these marvelous designs and cinematography.

What is happening is that Macro is getting executed for treason. He’s buried in the ground up to his neck so that the people of Rome can throw tomatoes at him. Then, a giant red wall full of mostly naked people and people in little red underoos slowly moves toward him. At the bottom of this wall are spinning blades like giant lawnmower blades. It will decapitate the people buried in the ground in front of the wall. It’s massive. It’s decorated all to hell. It’s elaborate. I don’t care if this was something that actually existed in Roman times. I couldn’t give two fucks if this is all made up. It’s gorgeous.

Other scenes are similarly beautiful. Whether it is what adorns the walls of Caligula’s palace bedroom or the elaborate fuck pool that Tiberius swam around in and caught a bad case of all the VD, there was significant artistry going on in the production design. The film was shot by Silvano Ippoliti, who was Tinto Brass’s frequent collaborator. He’s seen so many buttholes. The production design was done by Danilo Donati, who often worked with Fellini, Franco Zeffirelli, and Roberto Benigni. Donati was also the costume designer for the film. He was an Oscar winner for costume design for Fellini’s Casanova and Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet. So, yeah, this movie had a significant pedigree when it came to the behind-the-scenes business.

Speaking of artistry, I don’t think I can go much longer without stating the obvious jealousy any red-blooded man should have for Malcolm McDowell. Jeepers. Whenever I have a nightmare about someone in my family coming to murder me to take my place as Emperor of Rome, I don’t have Helen Mirren and Teresa Ann Savoy running out into the rain and hurriedly removing their togas to dry me off. Then, like, all of us doing a naked thing together.

Caligula might be eating well at home with two stone cold baddies in his bed at the same time (yes, I know one of them is his sister, but I choose to just think happier, less gross, thoughts), but he’s a bit all over the place in terms of how he conducts the business of being the Emporer of the people. He arrives with Caesonia and Drusilla at the wedding of a young couple. As his wedding gift to the bride and groom, he fucks the bride and makes the groom watch while she cries. What makes it especially egregious is that the bride was a virgin.

When he’s done with the bride, he fists the groom in the butt just because he’s Caesar and, in his approximation, he can do anything he wants.

The second half of the movie starts with, what else, an orgy. Caligula rides into his palace on a horse. You know, normal Caligula shit. Caligula ponders to Claudius if he should declare himself King of Rome. Claudius asks if Rome is not a republic, thus making it a moot point. Caligula says maybe he should just declare himself King of the Republic.

He shifts his attention to Gemelius. He wants him to eat some of the food here, but notices he has a peculiar smell about him. It seems he took an antidote just in case Caligula attempted ot poison him. Irritated that he would do such a thing, Caligula has Gemelius arrested for treason. Drusilla expresses concern for Caligula for how he treats his own adopted son, so Caligula decides to have Gemelius put to death.

Caligula learns that Caesonia is pregnant. I cannot imagine how he didn’t realize that because Caesonia is, like, quite pregnant. She’s got the belly and everything. Either way, Caligula comes down with a pretty nasty fever, which only worsens his nightmares of someone trying to kill him. While Drusilla nurses the ailing Caligula, eventually helping him return to health, Caesonia overhears a discussion that makes it seem like Senator Chaerea, whom Caligula appointed as the leader of his Praetorian Guard, and Caligula’s personal assistant and adviser, Longinus, would be more than happy to see Caligula submit to his fever. Claudius prays that he would gladly give his life if Jupiter would restore Caligula’s health. Caligula, speaking for Jupiter, accepts the trade and has his uncle executed, which is actually just a prank. But, you know what? Caligula’s fever breaks, and he returns to full health.

Returning to work, Caligula gets a little mischievous and wants to do something big to avoid being known for being dull. So, he orders a war. One that he can concoct out of thin air to serve his needs to be remembered as a great leader. So he decides to bomb Iran… Er… I mean he decides to start marshalling a war effort against the Anglos.

Caesonia gives birth to a daughter, Julia Drusilla. This is graphically depicted on screen too. I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen a narrative movie actually portray a birth with the camera directly pointed between the woman’s legs. Caligula, believing he is being given a male heir, immediately marries Caesonia. When Drucilla reveals that Caesonia gave birth to a girl, she also has to tell her brother that there will be other children and more opportunities to have a son. During the celebrations, tragedy strikes.

Unfortunately, after not heeding the orders of Caligula’s doctor, Drucilla’s insistence to nurse Caligula by holding him in his bed transferred the fever to her. After seeing another blackbird flying into his bedroom, Caligula worries again that another bad omen is coming into his life. He visits the deathly ill Drucilla, but she ultimately succumbs to the fever.

The loss of Drucilla sends Caligula into a spiraling mental breakdown.

In his breakdown, Caligula becomes depressed and wanders through the streets of Rome disguised as a beggar. He disappears long enough for Caesonia to continuously ask Longinus for updates. Many reports suggest he went to a number of different places, from Greece to Gaul to Egypt, and many more. She believes he is still in Rome and hiding.

That’s partially true. He is arrested for causing a bit of a disturbance on the streets when he sees people mocking his sexual relationship with his sister. The prison is more like a coed dungeon. That leads to a bunch of rape, beatings, and even, potentially, murders. When the jailer sees his big fancy Emperor ring, all the inmates soon realize they are in the presence of Caesar Caligula.

He’s released and returns to the Senate, where he declares himself a God with his most famous line from the movie: “I have existed from the morning of the world, and I shall exist until the last star falls from the night. Although I have taken the form of Gaius Caligula, I am all men as I am no man and therefore I am a God.” He then demands that the Senate unanimously vote to declare him as such. Those who already believed Caligula to be a tyrant only see that he needs to be dealt with as he belittles the Senate to bah like sheep.

Caligula underestimates Longinus, Chaerea, and the Senate. Caesonia doesn’t trust anyone and believes there could come a time when Caligula could be killed, but he just sees them as sheep. He only trusts the jailer who freed him from prison. Caligua’s desire to be seen as a God goes so far as to have the heads of the statues of the Gods replaced with a sculpture of his own head.

With the period of mourning for his sister now declared over, he plots his strike against the Senators. He plans to destroy them by forcing their wives into prostitution. He then even launches that “invasion” of Britain, but it’s just for show. You see, Longinus says they can’t afford an invasion of Britain. So, Caligula comes up with an idea. Senators make the most money in Rome. Their wives are, as he puts it, the most lascivious whores in Rome. Ultimate answer to the budget issue? The Imperial Brothel. For five gold coins, you can fuck a Senator’s wife. This is popular, and he’s ready to set sail for Britain.

Also, the deaf-mute jailor is holding a giant gold dick.

The days of Gaius Caligula, the Mad Emperor of Rome, are coming to an end. Longinus and Chaerea are disgusted by the cruelty and wild demeanor of their Caesar. If nothing is done, he’ll likely ruin Rome. Their plotting of an assassination goes into overdrive. It doesn’t help that they have only marched a few hours away from Rome, and Caligula is demanding his army fight and conquer a non-existent enemy in a land that is not even Britain.

Caligula returns to Rome as a conquering hero of a fake war with only 100,000 stalks of papyrus as proof that he conquered a far-off country. Caesonia says that they will hate him now. He doesn’t care if they hate him as long as they fear him. While playing a somewhat perverted (not in that way) game of Simon Says, he breaks down and shouts, “I HATE THEM!” and reveals that those who didn’t play his game well enough will have their property confiscated and be arrested. This is all to further his plans to destroy the Senatorial class, recalling how his great-uncle Tiberius saw the Senators as enemies and traitors. Caesonia warns Caligula to watch Chaerea. When Caligula suggests that the general wants to kill him, Caligula and Caesonia laugh it off.

As yet another mockery of the Senate, Caligula names his beloved horse as Consort. The horse then takes a shit on the floor of the Senate. Chaerea and Longinus have had enough of this asshole. Caligula’s madness continues to grow. One last blackbird is seen in his bedroom, but it only frightens Caesonia. Caligula seems to be at peace seeing it this time.

While Caligula and Caesonia are distracted by dancers performing for them, Longinus and Chaerea get into position. Caligula does the dance that he did for his father’s soldiers for Caesonia and the jailer. He is stopped by two guards, and Chaerea asks for a “password” to continue on. When he does not provide the correct one, whatever it was to be, Chaerea cuts down Caligula with his sword. Caesonia rushes to her husband, only to be stabbed by the guard. He then decapitates the jailer, before finally stabbing Caligula a few more times to put him on the floor so the other guards can stab him over and over with their spears. Another conspirator takes Julia Drusilla, only one year old at the time, and kills her by smashing her against the steps of the imperial palace. While grieving for his cousin, Claudius is immediately made Caesar by Chaerea and Longinus, and a new age for Rome begins.

Caligula is truly an epic of the old school Hollywood variety. It was conceived by a madman. It was shot by a madman. It stars a madman. I cannot deny that there is an absolute beauty to this movie. I commented on that earlier that every shot is gorgeous. Each and every set, and all that makes up any scene on a visual level, is next-level in terms of quality.

I struggle a tiny bit to actually say exactly how good the movie is. I’ve not seen all the cuts of this movie. I’ve long been aware of Caligula. I’m fairly certain it has kind of floated around my life on cable or in terms of film examination or possibly that I know my father saw it when it came out. Despite its bad reviews upon release, it was a much-talked-about film. If you were of a certain age and of a certain taste in certain men’s magazines, you would not have been able to avoid finding out about this extraordinarily high-budget adult film.

That said, I never saw the previous edits of the film. I do own a version of it, but I held off watching it, knowing that I would eventually be doing this review. This Ultimate Cut, though, is decadent, yes, quite depraved, yes, and very hard to watch at times, oh my, yes. But I can’t say it isn’t an actual attempt to be extremely artful. This wasn’t made by a Bruno Mattei or a Joe D’Amato. This was Tinto Brass at the height of his artistic adult film powers. As I mentioned earlier, every penny of this bloated budget is on the screen. It stars Academy Award-nominated actors. Those actors are acting their balls off.

And that’s where I think this movie excels. This is a hell of a character study of a Roman Emperor whom many don’t really know that much about. All Caesars seemed to end up dead. The one we all know about is Julius Caesar. We know about Augustus because it was his name from which we got the month of August. But as a character study of how someone can lust for power, obtain it by any means necessary, and be driven insane by it, this is a manic masterpiece.

In the first 45 minutes, we have a powerfully unsettling performance by the great Peter O’Toole. He looks like a monster and says things and gives facial expressions that, yeah, pretty much reveal he is very much a monster. He’s leading the wanting Caligula into a song and dance that he hopes will make this power hungry little turd drink that poisoned wine. At the same time, he might see himself in this guy and hopes he proves himself to be the murderous Caesar they all are. Of course, he may be, in some ways, very subtly, cursing Caligula to be driven mad by his desire.

Then, for the rest of the movie, we’re with Malcolm McDowell, who, himself, is often an unsettling presence in movies, and growing more and more wild and unpredictable. The only things we can count on from one line to the next, from one scene to the next, are that he will say and do something off the wall, and, if unchecked, he will destroy Rome by being completely off the wall. He’s brilliant in this. We can see him losing touch with his sanity as the movie carries on. He’s got the power, and like the dog that finally catches that car, he has no idea how to possess the power he craved.

He has these wonderful moments with Teresa Ann Savoy’s Drusilla. Honestly, if he never craved being Emperor, and could just constantly fuck his sister (as creepy as that is), he’d probably be happy and content to live a long life (as creepy as that would be). When she effectively pushes him into a marriage for “the good of Rome,” he really begins to spiral at that point. It may not be directly designed to be that way in terms of this plot, but there’s a change in him the moment she rejects any possibility of them being married.

But that brings in this other character, Caesonia, who is also just as interesting as the mad Caligula. Helen Mirren is so good in a much more understated way. She seems to crave not really the power, but the proximity to power. She is able to see the big picture better than Caligula, but when they are together in front of other people, she is just as spoiled and bratty as Caligula is. She will tell him, “Hey, don’t you think you being this way or doing this thing will get you killed?” But then, when they are in front of the people she explicitly doesn’t trust, she plays along with Caligula’s lunatic behavior and practically laughs in the faces of those people she claims to distrust. It’s like she becomes subsumed by Caligula’s behavior and reflects it like a mirror. It’s actually quite brilliant. Both Mirren and McDowell play off each other perfectly.

So all that said, I’m not sure if Caligula is a great epic in terms of its story, or if it’s actually a better character study of a historical figure who makes for a good debauched film. The epic has all those gorgeous visuals (and I’m not just talking about Savoy and Mirren), but the character story has those Oscar-worthy big swings from O’Toole and, most importantly, McDowell. I can probably guess, without seeing it, that any of the previous versions of this film that had the Guccione insert scenes of, well, hardcore sex (insertion) probably hurt that version of the film. It would probably distract from the film’s goal of telling this story about a mad emperor. It would certainly fuck up the flow of the movie by having everything stop dead in its tracks to focus on a hardcore sex scene.

If you think you might want to see this movie, do the Ultimate Cut. View the full three-hour version. It’s a real movie with a real desire to be a historical epic of some high quality. Whether or not it fully succeeds is up for debate. I will say you should be quite entertained by the manic performance of Malcolm McDowell.

Next week, we pack our bags for summer camp! Yes, all through June, July, AND August, I’m reviewing a different movie that takes place at a summer camp. It’s an entire theme season I’m calling Camp Crappabuttawipe! We get things started with the return to a horror franchise that leans a little more into comedy in the first two sequels, but totally keeps that slasher mindset. We’re looking at 1988’s Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers.

I promise you this, my Enemaniacs… You will not be unhappy campers with what I have planned for this summer at Camp Crappabuttawipe!