I Claudius - Parts 3 And 4

Herbert Wise, who had previously directed part of Elizabeth R (1971), and who would helm the BBC Television Shakespeare Julius Caesar (1979), concludes his study of the ruthless conflicts of Rome's First Family. Events become increasingly frenzied as Caligula bloodily slaughters his way to power, making a senator of his favourite horse along the way. Fresh from The Naked Civil Servant (1975), John Hurt plays the tyrant with psychotic fury, a role reworked for the big screen by Malcolm McDowell in the world's first, and last, hardcore pornographic epic, Caligula (1979). This is fortunately more subtle, with the drama seeing Claudius effectively age from youth to old age, eventually becoming Emperor. Derek Jacobi is simply magnificent in the intensely moving finale, which is not to overlook the rest of a fine cast, including George Baker, Ian Ogilvy, Christopher Guard, Stratford Johns, John Rhys-Davies and Bernard Hepton. Patrick Stewart meanwhile moves through the ages, from the murderous Praetorian Guard Captain Sejanus, to the rather more heroic Captain Picard of Star Trek: The Next Generation (1986-93). I Claudius was abortively filmed in 1937 by Charles Laughton, and it might be supposed the original novels at least partly inspired Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast, serialised by the BBC in 2000. --Gary S. Dalkin