Spartacus
by TED Cleaver
A German critic likened 300 to an hour and a half long Manowar video clip. Manowar is metal band that fetishizes metal weapons, male physique, and glistening sweat. It’s a good comparison, in essence 300 was all about testosterone; the political undertone is factually incorrect. While some people may – as they are free to – draw moral lessons from this type of flick, to me it is nothing more than entertaining pulp. Spartacus falls in the same category.
I am not even watching the show (yet), but friends of mine subscribed to its primal call. Someone once said that the success of a show or movie in this genre is determined by the balance between sex and violence. Both are supplied plentiful. Men are mostly half-naked, women wear incredibly seductive robes, every punch line involves a reproductive organ (or one that is mistaken as such), and I believe there is some fooling around. The violence aspect is necessary for the plot, Spartacus was of course a slave turned gladiator who eventually leads a rebellion. What I’m interested in is how the actors, more like any actor in this genre, convincingly swing sword and shield around. Those things are heavy, gladiators had to be strong.
Thankfully we have Youtube. Several fitness enthusiasts demonstrate the Spartacus workout for anyone interested. This workout is the exact workout that the actors did in order to get ripped enough to pass for a gladiator. It doesn’t consist of heavy lifting; it is more of a hyper-intense circuit training. Apparently strength is not everything for those brave men who fight with swords in arenas, core fitness and agility are at least equally important. I will do the workout today for the first time and expect to be perfectly beat.
Pulp has its benefits. For one, it can be entertaining. Moreover, the stimulus it provides to your most primal instincts can easily be transformed into a positive result.
I recommend you to not start watching it, for it indeed cultivates your most base desires and does so exuberantly. When you say you’re interested in the sword-swinging practices of the actors, and therefore want to see the show, I must warn you that the graphicality of the scenes, both sexually and pertaining to violence, leaves little to the imagination. I for me find this appeal to the basest of human drives vulgar and repulsive, but was nonetheless hooked to the series and watched all episodes. I think because the relationships between the characters is pretty well established and the storyline has some interesting twists and turns, even set within a so-called historical course of events.
Those two last sentences .. are you sure weren’t hooked because of the sex and violence? Because if romance and plot are the criteria, there are better choices than this show.
I want to write a post about realism, lack of it, and the appeal of fantasy in film. For instance, most people enjoy watching James Bond. It is acceptable for the mainstream because a pretentious layer of high culture sugarcoats the chauvinism and ruthlessness. If that is what people are attracted to, why not go either for flat out realism or for honest fantasy? Post coming up soon, would be interested in your opinion on lack of realism in shows like Sex and the City, for instance.
What got me watching Spartacus is the incredible cruelty, vulgar and otherwise socially destructive behavior people can fall to if there’s no intrinsic boundary to what Nietzsche called the Will to Power. Sex and violence, together with strategic schemes among the more cultivated people, are the means available to people if they wish to increase their influence and enhance their social status. Most of the characters have no regard for human life or the personal relationships binding different people, and the absolute emptiness of existence in those circumstances is something I can learn from.
I recommend you read The reality of the Mass Media by Niklas Luhmann again for insights for your post. Other analyses of popular culture have their basis in Nietzsche’s description of the Tragedy as a form of establishing and securing of public morality. Therefore, stories most often have a happy end.