This is it: Rome 79 AD, never seen with such luxury. However, Those About to Die, the grand debut by Peacock drama is set in Ancient Rome, never really achieves greatness. However, it is not that we should look away from the extraordinary work here by the creator Robert Rodat and the famous director Roland Emmerich. Go ahead, embrace it. It’s extraordinarily difficult not to appreciate the tremendous scope of such a series that took us 230 shooting days. A series like Game of thrones has star points when it comes to interesting world creation. It’s just that there’s way too many pieces moving around here and over the period of time, you feel rather lost in the brilliant glamour of it all. (Like how you feel when playing Catan the board game.)
Rodat and Emmerich are also executive producers of the project, and needless to say they have enough power to attract Anthony Hopkins to such an extravagant project. In a most of his own performances, here too the ‘actor’ gets lost in the drama which often is adventurous bordering on audacity but most of the time is rather bloated than fun. But it is also one of the best and most extravagant, as all the soap operas ever made.
The ambitious ‘Those About to Die’ has enough plot twists, subplots, people to invest in, as well as many musical climaxes and a barrage of special effects to interest any moviegoer. It is eye candy to enjoy. It is also sometimes tiring. However, we do not see such brash and assured Netflix release everyday. Those About to Die will target the audience of all embraced and adored Emmerich’s blockbusters about alien invasions in the likes of, say, Independence Day, and will feed them plenty over the course of 10 episodes. Have patience. It would take a while for the head to register all the important names.
Coming to the score of the many players and let us turn our attention to Anthony Hopkins. He portrays the Emperor Vespasian and feels that the Roman operettas or should I say empire are reaching towards a sunset. He is getting rather old. Up until that time, he has to prepare and pick one of the two sons for the Imperial throne. And the guys could not be more different. Titus Flavanius (Tom Hughes) is all work. Brother Domitian (Jojo Macari offering a fine turn) on the other hand is smarmy, careless, and is inclined to The Male Favorite. There early on those story plays out very nicely in this family relations. As the series moves on, you tend to appreciate the very life that Hopkins brings to the piece whether he is physically present or absent.
At the same time, let’s analyze the rest of the more rapid developments that have been advancing. All in all, for some time there, Rome has witnessed tranquility. However, there is wiggly down that there is a very interesting nexus that involves social forces of sports, politics and family dynasties. There are players in this dark, criminal, betting or fixing world, and one of the most prominent of them is an ambitious mobster Tenax (Iwan Rheon), a political crime lord whose waist-deep scheming leads to no good. These include Scorpus (Dimitri Leonidas), a top chariot racer albeit a rather inexperienced one and Viggo (Johannes Johannesson) a heavily built Norse gladiator who befriends Kwame (Moe Hashim) during gladiator training.
Kwame turns out to be one of the interesting characters, in fact, and his storyline creates a bigger catastrophe that his mother, Cala (Sara Martins), has to find a way to avert — Cala has three children, Kwame, Aura (Kyshan Wilson) and Jula (Alicia Edogamhe), who were sold, the last two as slaves. Even in this arc of the series, you will like the storytelling aspect, as Martins, et al. are able to portray their complicated family well. Other actors come into play, but begin to write down important information.
The Corsi sibs rush in with a terrific spin – as absurd yet attention-seeking Spanish horse dealers-cum-immigrants from Spain who fly to Rome in hopes of selling horses that were needed for chariot racing. Within no time, they are further drawn into racing control by a reasonable force which is Tenax. As if that is not enough: The ruling class, in this case The Patricians. Think of them as a groups of families who possess four teams of horse and chariot racing teams. They’re influential and totally merciless, able as they are ingenious — Carmen Gina makes her presence count in the form of Antonia (Gabriella Pession) and Rupert Penry-Jones as the durable husband, Marsus. Some of the things that work: I loved the special relationship in brotherhood-brotherhood conflict between Titus and Jojo, and though. I mean I am quite cynical when it comes to battles of this kind in families – surprise, surprise – twist in the end. He was more efficient than dramatic in terms of scenes. Of course, in addition to kwamme, tenax, cala, viggo and viggo – are most interested the Corsi Brothers merit l0jas — if the last character is a widow, our attention plate. What about Hopkins? Do not expect a dazzling series of clips with the remarkable actor’s face. This is, however, Hopkins so when he is present in the film it is impossible to ignore his energy and seriousness which he submits into his portrayal of Emperor Vespasian.
Based on the 1958 novel Those About to Die by Daniel P. Mannix, the setting of Ancient Rome is just amazing. We all must give credit to Gianni Casalnuovo who is the costume designer since she gets the look of all the different classes in this era. Breathe takers from Production designers Johannes Muecke and Laura Pozzaglio, who must have spent countless hours doing brainstorming for the feel of this undertaking. And how about that of Visual Effects Supervisor Peter Travers, who apparently also used a very big LED wall for some of the battles and chariot race scenes. Amazing, all of that. Self-sought more of those scenes ought to be there, as the temptation is there, and their execution is well managed.
He is the writer/creator to Robert Rodat, who created works including The Patriot, one of the memorable works by Roland Emmerich, with Mel Gibson in the lead role. Here too, he employs the same style of casting, using extras, taking long takes, and usando large sets. The scenes are lively, and so is the whole performance of the actors, as it now is. But, we must say, it is the gladiatorial shows which win you over the most in this one, although this is not totally surprising. This is, after all, the reason why we are all here in the first place. Or rather, the reason why a lot of us are probably going a bit crazy, looking forward to Gladiator II.
There are some who might dismiss Those About to Die as too narrative-rich and crowded with characters. The fact sure is a factor here, still, the series is alluring, nevertheless. What’s a bit more lacking is the bloodshed itself – dismemberments, cremations, stabbings and other brutal stuff. It’s so exectuted with jarring realism, given the setting. One must highlight fast-moving and chasing scenes, as well as all the fighting scenes. Bravo. And even though the series is clearly missing a few narrative major players, Emmerich and co. still manage to present something that is grand and worth our attention.
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