Bob Guccione, publisher of Penthouse magazine, had set his sights on making a film about Roman Emperor Caligula. Costing between $8m and $14m it was about to make the most expensive (at the time) independently financed film of all time. But the Caligula controversy saw it quickly become notorious.
Guccione had become enormously wealthy off the back of the success of the magazine and decided he wanted to get involved in ‘a new kind of film making’ . Quite what that was was anyone’s guess but he ploughed his own money into making a film of the famously mad Roman Emperor Caligula and assembled a star cast led by Malcolm McDowell in the title role with Peter O’Toole, John Gielgud and Helen Mirren in support. Shooting began in 1976 in Rome’s historic Cinecitta studios where some of the most lavish sets would be built. Scripted by the revered writer was Gore Vidal whose script follows the young, wary Caligula (McDowell), who, shadowed by the murder of his entire family, eliminates his devious adoptive grandfather (O’Toole) and seizes control of the declining Roman Empire – descending into a spiral of depravity, destruction, and madness.
The film would be directed by Tinto Brass who at the time was in middle of a court case trying to get his films Salon Kitty released, a film with his usual sex on screen shenanigans but mixed in with a bit of Nazism too. That alone would seem to be a warning signal and whereas Gore Vidal saw the film as being about the corrupting influence of power whereas for Brass it was about the liberating power of sex. And there would be plenty of that on screen with security having been posted on the studio doors to prevent anyone wandering in a for a gawp. As far as Guccione was concerned there was nowhere near enough sex and he tried to fire Brass but lost. So instead Guccione took his Penthouse pets on to the set at night and shot a load of hardcore sex scenes and as he had final cut of the final he…….um….inserted the scenes into the film.
And then the Caligula controversy begin in earnest. There was outrage and for the next two years legal wranglings kept the film from being released. With Vidal having his name removed from the film and the star names in the cast disowning it…all that is except for Gielgud who revelled in it apparently paying to see it twice in cinemas.
1980 finally saw the film released except every version in various territories had different cuts of the film. A 210 minute version was intended but in the US it was cut to 150 minutes, European versions saw it cut to 160 minutes and fellow pornographer Paul Raymond released an R18 version on his Electric Blue label that was a paltry 79 minutes and made no sense whatsoever. The obscenity laws in the UK saw it impounded by customs and the BBFC were allowed a copy only if it was kept in their offices and anything cut from the film had to remain in their offices too.
Various versions of the film therefore existed for decades with no definitive cut ever really seeing the light of day until art historian Thomas Negovan, 44 years after the original release, found over ninety hours of footage hidden for decades in a dusty warehouse and started an extensive reconstruction, including alternate takes and camera angles, and set about creating 4K scans of the original camera negatives and features the complete film narrative for the very first time, with both McDowell and Mirren’s performances greatly expanded on screen and a new animated expository title sequence is included.
Now released as Caligula The Ultimate Cut it is a far better film than might be expected. McDowell is excellent in the role and Helen Mirren, only a minor character in the 1980 release, now moves forward into a powerful position as the major impetus of the film’s third act that Brass and Vidal always intended.
It is not without its moments of shock. The film still has beheadings and there’s almost continuous nudity throughout but the hardcore has been mercifully dropped and the overarching story of absolute power corrupting absolutely and tis a theme which is to the front and centre.
Despite the Caligula controversy which saw the film described as the most expensive porno movie ever saw it turn a profit from its many versions but Guccione would never see this ultimate version having died in 2010 aged 79 and Gore Vidal would pass away two years later aged 86.
The Caligula controversy means that the film remains as notorious as its many versions but this ultimate version proves that Vidal’s original vision was worth fighting for.
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