Year of Release: 1945Country of Origin: UK
Director: Gabriel Pascal
Cast: Claude Rains, Vivien Leigh, Stewart Granger, Flora Robson
Plot outline: Julius Caesar gives the famed Egyptian queen lessons in government (IMDb).
Caesar and Cleopatra is a little part history, a considerable part George Bernard Shaw, and a big part Claude Rains and Vivien Leigh. Rains is Shaw's vision of Julius Caesar: wise but jocular, clear-eyed even though amused by Cleopatra's transparent maneuvers and lies, and eager to avoid shedding any more blood than is necessary to secure control of Egypt (a major source of grain for imperial Rome). "Murder begets murder," Shaw's Caesar points out to the impetuous Egyptian queen. (The historical Caesar recurrently offered clemency - at least to Romans who had fought against him.) Leigh is Shaw's vision of Cleopatra: kittenish and uninhibited, especially not inhibited by any commitment to telling the truth. Rains is delightful as Caesar, manifesting with arch and polished grace all of the humour and tolerance and understanding that Shaw saw in the man. He also handles with sympathy and moving delicacy the poignant and fleeting intimations of a middle-aged man's yearn toward youth. Leigh gives what must be termed a perfect picture of the youthful Egyptian queen - at least, as Shaw perceived her. She is timid and electric as a girl and drenched with a hot, aggressive nature as the woman whom Caesar inspires. Slim and elastic in rare costumes, she looks every bit the one to catch the fateful fancy of a man with a cultivated taste. Fine, too, are other performances. Basil Sydney is robust and blunt as Rufio, Caesar's old lieutenant; Stewart Granger is handsome and suave as the dandy, Apollodorous, and Flora Robson is dour and hard as Cleopatra's maid. Francis L. Sullivan and Raymond Lovell play court intriguers with shrewd finesse and Cecil Parker gets much sly amusement out of Shaw's satirized British slave. (SM, BC)
My judgment: *** out of 4 stars
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