The first is the unclear focus. The director seems to want to evenly distribute every minute of the movie to Cleopatra's life. It is true that Cleopatra has had a life full of ups and downs, but the expression that is too streamlined can not make people cheer up.
Then there are too many love scenes. Whether it is Cleopatra, Caesar, or Anthony, they are first and foremost political figures. They are burdened by the two powerful countries and civilizations of Rome and Egypt. Their first consideration must be political factors, not personal relationships between their children. The first half and Caesar were just fine, but the second half fell into a Hollywood-style love model. Of course, the emphasis on love as a work of art cannot always be blamed, but as a more serious historical film, Anthony and Cleopatra's neglect of political factors in the latter half is unforgivable.
The other is that the sense of history and culture is not heavy enough. The period of Cleopatra was the period when the Roman Republic turned to the Roman Empire, the period when Egypt was reduced to a Roman province, and the period when the entire Western civilization shifted from Hellenism to Romanization. How many historical events happened at this time, and how many historical heroes emerged at this time. But the director was stuck in the harem of Alexandria, between Cleopatra’s bed and the bed, the struggle for power over the Roman Senate, the famine and plague in Egypt, and the distribution of power after Caesar’s death only briefly mentioned; this is exactly what I said. The unclear focus and the consequences of overdoing the love scene.
In a word, a historical film that grows in the soil of Hollywood fast food movies, no matter how beautiful and cute it looks, it still bears the fruit of Hollywood taste.
But I have to say that Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra can really make the world surrender under her pomegranate skirt.
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