Cleopatra, 1963: What's Love Got To Do With It?

It’s February. A month that conjures up Valentine’s Day, Black History Month and NBA All Star Weekend. In this blog, I’ll probably deal more with the first two and probably not at all with the last one. Unless we can count Semi Pro as a classic film. Wait, what about Space Jam? Anyway, I’d like to start by talking about one of the great love stories that gets retold time and time again: Caesar and Cleopatra. And Antony, poor guy. The 1963 Cleopatra is known for two things: it cost a lot of money and Taylor and Burton hooked up while making it. In light of the fact, that it started off their on-again/off-again and finally off-again relationship, I would like to point out that not all love stories end well. Especially this one.
We start the movie and join up with Julius Caesar and his armies at Pharsalus, where Caesar defeated Pompey and start Caesar’s pals want him to return to Rome and start sorting out that whole mess. Instead, Caesar puts Antony in charge and decides to go to Egypt and stop the civil war between young King Ptolemy and his sister- some chick named Cleopatra, so that the grain supply isn’t disrupted. Oh, foreign affairs in the Middle East. It never goes well. So, off to Alexandria. Where it’s market day and Ptolemy has set up shop to watch how Caesar is going to handle shoppers. Actually, I work retail and I would like to see how Caesar and his legions would handle throngs of barbarous shoppers. I’d buy tickets to that, but on this occasion it turns out to be a huge letdown because Caesar is going to shop his way through the market to Ptolemy. WHAT?! I’d also like to point out that Caesar’s body slave is mute, which is why I’m guessing he doesn’t tell Caesar stay the hell away from Cleopatra. This is when Caesar finds out that Ptolemy had Pompey killed shows him his head in a jar, which upsets Caesar for reasons that the film doesn’t bother to understand. While Caesar hangs out in his room in the palace, Apollodorus shows up with a rug that contains Maggie the Cat! No, just Cleopatra. They mostly argue and he has a seizure and at some point we’re meant to believe that they fall in love. Anyone else find that difficult to believe? Anyone? Bueller?
Cleopatra comes to warn Caesar about her brother’s troops, he’s not really worried. Later, she finds out that’s because he’s already burning down the city, including the Library of Alexandria. My favorite line here is when Cleopatra rattles off the contents and her tutor, Sosigenes, adds “the testament of the Hebrew God.” Like the 1963 audience would go, “Oh, crap! He just burned the Bible!” Now Cleopatra is going to go yell at Caesar some more. There will be boring battle scenes. Eventually, Caesar installs Cleopatra as Queen of Egypt. This isn’t enough for our Cleo, though, she wants to be wife of Caesar and rule the world as Alexander would have wanted it. Cleopatra gives birth to Caesar’s son, Caesarion and has her handmaidens present him to Caesar by laying him on the ground and getting Caesar to pick him up in front of the other Romans, thus legally recognizing the child as his. I personally think there’s a way out of this, like Caesar could probably just say he was going to trip on the kid, so he just as soon picked him up. Back in Rome, they apparently take this sort of thing seriously because all the senators are on the Senate steps gossiping about it. Octavian, Caesar’s legal heir, played by Roddy McDowell does not seem thrilled. Oh, also, Caesar’s wife is trying to act like it doesn’t bother her when Mark Antony visits her. I’m thinking she’s just trying to not look at Antony’s ridiculously short toga. Short to the point of distraction. Like, really.
Caesar has to go home and he promises to send for Cleopatra when, you know, he’s totally lost his mind. So, we’re going to skip over the last few years of the Roman Civil War and go back to Rome, where Caesar is pissed off that nobody will just fall in line. Sounds like a good time to have Cleopatra visit. Cleopatra arrives with a racially insensitive dance crew, some rhythmic gymnasts and a giant Sphinx. Really? The streets of Rome are wide enough that a giant gold Sphinx can go through it unimpeded? I really don’t want to harp on historical stuff so much, but come on. Caesar keeps getting pissed off by no one doing what he says, Cleopatra gets pissed off since no one will do what Caesar says, since I guess Caesar does whatever she wants him to do, so it’s really like they’re disobeying her. How dare they not want to obey the lady who just ran over Rome with her giant Sphinx float! Anyway, the Senators decide to tell Caesar that they’ll make him Emperor of Rome on the Ides of March. Nobody wants Caesar to go, but he’s going to go. And get shanked. A lot.
Cleopatra decides to leave town even though Antony wants to hit on her. He and Octavian are going to go kill Caesar’s killers, mostly Antony. Unfortunately for Antony this is pretty much the peak of his career, he’s going to blow all of his money and go begging Cleopatra for some. Now, he’s going to be pathetic and ask for money, plead for Cleopatra’s affections and generally make an ass of himself. You would think his pal, Rufio, would try to save him from himself, but instead Rufio is going to set the two of them up on a date. Since everything is going to hell in Rome for Antony, Cleopatra is going to send him back to make peace with Octavian. So, Octavian is going to marry off his sister to him. Cleopatra is going to stab her mattress and hang on to the grain supply. Do you think the Romans knew their food supply was dependent on how pissed off Cleopatra was? So, Antony has to come begging… AGAIN. You would think this guy would learn. She makes him divorce Octavia and marry her. This plays into Octavian’s plans and pisses off the Romans, so Octavian throws an arrow at Cleopatra’s tutor and we have to all go to a naval battle. Antony seems to be doing okay for a while, he’s apparently better at fighting than holding his own with women. Then Cleopatra thinks Antony’s ship is burning so she decides a good time to head home. Antony sees Cleopatra leaving and well, makes an ass of himself. He jumps ship to follow Cleopatra and arrives on her ship to be put on suicide watch once he figures out he made an ass of himself. Now, I love Burton in this part, personally. Cleopatra finds him hanging out in Caesar’s tombs and demands that he speak to her. Oh, my God, lady, leave the guy alone already. Haven’t you done enough? Antony loses it; he finally realizes he’s made an ass of himself and generally ruined his life over a chick. Not cool. He screams and rails with such anger that I would not want to be around when those two argued in real life. Maybe a little, like you see a couple across the way in a restaurant.
So, Cleopatra arranges for Antony to go die in battle. Only his troops abandon him which is probably a smart move on their part. She sends away her kid and locks herself in her tomb. Antony returns home to find Apollodorus the last one in the palace. He lets Antony think Cleopatra’s dead and helps Antony shank himself. Then tells him that Cleopatra’s not dead, so he can go make an ass of himself one more time. Super. I’m thrilled. He dies just before Octavian shows up with Caesarion’s ring, so now he’s dead, so Cleopatra decides this is as good a time as any to get poisoned, thus thwarting his plans to drag her through the streets of Rome, presumably not on a golden Sphinx. Does anyone else think it’s odd she never hit on Octavian?
Overall, I think the film is bombastic. Four credited screenwriters. There’s a hint. I never buy the love story for a minute. I think maybe Caesar got stupid and Antony got really stupid. Then again, love can be stupid. For fun, you can watch the 1937 Cleopatra with Claudette Colbert in the title role. It’s ancient Rome/Egypt with Howard Hawks-esque dialogue. They should have gotten Cary Grant to be in it. If you have even more time to spare, I would also recommend the excellent HBO series Rome, with Ciaran Hinds and James Purefoy playing Caesar and Antony, respectively. Purefoy wears a significantly longer toga than Burton, though he sometimes wears much less. Enough said.

Cleopatra on IMDB: