The Sign of the Cross (1932) Reviews

• DeMille At His Most Decadent

  Ron Oliver2000-03-08

  Rome - First Century A. D. Nero, the mad Emperor & Poppaea, his vile Empress, engage in every sort of vice & degradation. Wanton cruelty becomes a spectator sport and virtue & innocence are denigrated. Slowly, however, a new Power is growing. People calling themselves Christians are secretly spreading their Faith ever more widely. They are horribly persecuted, but they continue to multiply. Which will eventually triumph - the might of Imperial Rome, or the gentle ones who follow THE SIGN OF THE CROSS? This Cecil B. DeMille epic is a vivid retelling of the struggles of the first Christians. Paramount gave the film a lavish production and DeMille wrings every drop of piety & puerile interest possible from the plot. Fredric March is stalwart as the Roman official who falls in love with a beautiful Christian girl. While his ultimate conversion wouldn't convince the average modern Baptist, he holds his own in scenes with other performers whom are allowed to behave outrageously. Elissa Landi is sweet as the virtuous Believer, effectively underplaying her role. `Do you want to play the most wicked woman in the world?' DeMille asked Claudette Colbert one day on the studio lot. She did & she does memorably, from her eye-popping milk bath scene to her revenge on her would-be lover. Sniveling, whining and wearing a huge fake nose, Charles Laughton is pure effeminate evil as Nero (notice his catamite), a foul blot on the face of humanity & stealing all his scenes from everyone else. History tells us that Nero eventually murdered Poppaea by stomping her to death... Ian Keith is enjoyable as an unpunished villain. Ferdinand Gottshalk & Vivian Tobin are effectively degraded as Roman bacchants. Film mavens will recognize the voice of John Carradine, calling `We who are about to die, salute you!' out of the arena to Nero; he can later be spotted in the role of a Christian martyr ascending the dungeon stairs to his death. DeMille had just returned to Paramount from a 3-year, 3-picture stint at MGM, where he was remarkably subdued. Back at his home studio he was allowed more license. Wrapping a little sermon up in a lot of sin, he filled this pre-Production Code drama with plenty of the latter. When THE SIGN OF THE CROSS was re-released in 1944, many cuts had to be made. The film now having been restored, it's not difficult to guess which sections those were. The Dance of the Naked Moon & much of the antics in the final arena sequence are beyond the bounds of good taste, but certainly not beyond the bounds of Cecil B. DeMille.

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• One of the very first and one of the very best Roman epics on screen filled with DeMille's splendor!

  marcin_kukuczka2005-04-19

  A comment on the original 1932 version. Pagan Rome, the third night of the great fire. Emperor Nero (Charles Laughton) unjustly condemns Christians of burning the eternal city and sentences many of them to martyrdom. He does not realize that through this deed he unconsciously opens for them a wonderful glory in a better world. The struggle between the sign of the Roman eagle of decadent Nero's times and the sign of the cross begins, this is, symbolically, the endless struggle between those with "delicious debauchery" as the sole aim of life (the lifestyle Nero's times promoted) and those heading for everlasting virtues like love, piety, forgiveness, and purity of heart. Cecil B DeMille's THE SIGN OF THE CROSS, being the first sound biblical epic after his silent KING OF KINGS (1927) is, though more than 70 years old, a great spectacle, still one of the most entertaining Roman epics, except for QUO VADIS (1951), SPARTACUS (1960), and BEN HUR (1959). GREAT CAST: The outstanding cast in the movie are its strongest point. Claudette Colbert's portrayal of wicked, lustful Poppaea is gorgeous. The same can be said about Charles Laughton who portrays Nero as a really decadent emperor, entirely flooded in debauchery and all sorts of sinful lusts. There have been more portrayals of this cruel pair (Poppeae and Nero), but theirs from DeMille's film is real feast for the soul. Therefore, they are even more memorable than Elissa Landi and Fredric March playing the main roles of Mercia and Marcus. Indeed, March as Marcus Superbus does a good job, especially in the way he shows a change of heart from a mocker to a believer. Elissa Landi presents Mercia's innocence and virtues memorably. But they are not that terrific as Colbert and Laughton. As far as performances are concerned, it is also important to mention Joyzelle as "the most wicked and talented woman in Rome", Ancaria. The scene of her seduction is truly well played. The dance of the Naked Moon that Ancaria seduces on Mercia is disturbed by Christians singing in a dungeon. MORAL MESSAGE: That scene clearly expresses the fact I have mentioned at the beginning: the universal struggle between two groups of people with two different aims in life. I think that DeMille also wanted to show this moral in another scene: the meeting of two old Christian men, Favius and Titus sent by Paul to Rome. One of them draws the sign of the cross on the ground, which is later trodden on by many people walking in the square. SIMILARITY TO ANOTHER EPIC: A significant fact is that the content of the movie is strikingly similar to another Roman epic, made almost 20 years later, QUO VADIS (1951) by Mervyn LeRoy. While QUO VADIS is based on the novel by Henryk Sienkiewicz, this film is based on a play by an English playwright, Wilson Barrett. Both films, however, present the 1st century Rome, in particular, spreading Christianity in the cruel times of Nero; both films show the conversion of a Roman soldier Marcus who loves a Christian girl; both films remind us of the secret Christian meetings; both films focus on Poppaea being lustful for Marcus and demanding revenge on Christians because of jealousy (consider the moment Marcus Superbus comes to Nero to ask him to spare the life of Mercia. Nero says: If she would publicly renounce her faith... when Poppaea disturbs radically: "Not even then!") Moreover, both films show Poppaea's beautiful leopards. Finally, THE SIGN OF THE CROSS and QUO VADIS show the arena sequence, however DeMille presents much more of its gore than LeRoy in 1951. ARENA: Alligators feeding with a young Christian woman, elephants treading on people's heads, a gorilla raping a girl tied to a wooden pillar, people crucified and burned, men fighting with bulls, bears, women fighting with dwarfs; yet lions and tigers eating Christians, and many other cruel games to the joy and lust of the viewers. Indeed, it is a film not to be watched by kids even at the beginning of the 21 century, but historically accurate and visually very well made. ONE OF CINEMA'S MOST MEMORABLE MOMENTS: Except for the cruel arena sequence, which is still entertaining in some way, any viewer will be surprised at one scene: Poppaea's famous milk bath. That's a moment that everyone should consider while watching the film. Her sexual bath is one of the best made moments that cinema has ever seen. It is totally filled with desire and sexuality. And all thanks to the great performance by Ms Colbert. No surprise Cecil B DeMille cast her to play Cleopatra two years later, in 1934. It's difficult to express all I feel about this movie in one review. I simply tried my best to encourage everyone to see this movie because it was an unforgettable experience for me, one of the very best Roman epics of all time. If you have already seen QUO VADIS, you will find this movie very similar but, indeed, more DeMillean. The end is very much influenced by the 1930s cinema but very touching and universally true - the absolute victory always comes in the Sign of the Cross... 9/10

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• "We'll only see half as much Christian blood"

  Steffi_P2009-01-28

  1932 – the height of the depression, Paramount studios in financial straits, Hollywood's output limited to small-scale dramas and bedroom comedies – and Cecil B. DeMille decides to make an epic. There are many classics among the "small" pictures of the early-30s, but it's good to see that someone was, against all odds, still carrying the torch for grandeur and spectacle. Of course, Sign of the Cross is still an epic of its poverty-stricken time. There are no stupendous sets or masses of extras, but DeMille always knew how to make our eyes deceive us. A huddle of a dozen people filling the screen looks like a crowd. Five men on horseback shot from a low angle looks like a stampede. In the scene where Titus and Favius first meet, the camera wheels round and backs away at the same time, giving the impression that the street scene is much more than a cramped indoor set. And DeMille's use of lighting (here courtesy of Karl Struss who was Oscar-nominated for his efforts) really pays off, with fuzzy half-light and shadows disguising the lack of lavishness. Better yet, the constrained budget seems to have pushed DeMille to concentrating more on the poetry and beauty of what we see. Unable to dazzle us with scale or special effects, he makes full use of his talent for flowing, dreamlike imagery. Sign of the Cross features some of the smoothest camera-work and carefully choreographed movement of extras of this period. He even makes effective use of slow-motion with the pouring goats milk. DeMille was not the only director to turn to simple camera trickery when money was tight – Rouben Mamoulian's earliest pictures for example are end-to-end cheap tricks. It's just that DeMille is doing it better than almost everyone else – it adds sparkle to the picture without being distracting. But it's not just with the images that DeMille shows his talent. Unlike some directors who were sceptical about the coming of sound and tried to work around it, or some producers who naively thought it automatically made pictures twice as good, DeMille really explores the possibilities of sound. In an early scene, we cut to a close-up Elissa Landi while we hear from off-screen the calls of Romans searching for Christians. We see her reaction to the calls, and this is something that could not be achieved so succinctly in a silent movie. A more obvious example is the torture scene, where we hear the boy's screams, while the camera is pointed elsewhere. The point is, we do not need to see him being tortured because the scream alone has enough impact. However what we do see – the eagle of Rome, a sentry unconcernedly marching back and forth, a flaming torch – adds layers of meaning to the scene. Of course, this being DeMille, and it being the "pre-code" era, he also seeks to dazzle us with a bit of bare flesh and other assorted depravities. It's one of the great ironies of DeMille's work that his pictures often revel in the very "immorality" they seek to preach against. So the poster advertising the attractions at the Colloseum is as much to whet the appetite of the real-world audience as to show the barbaric tastes of the Roman one. DeMille spends ten minutes of screen time (not to mention more precious money on tin-hat manufacture and zoo rental fees) on the promised blood-fest, which can only be for our entertainment since it is inconsequential to the plot. And, in another bit of audio/visual juxtaposition, while the martyrs' chanting drowns out the "Naked Moon" song, it is the notorious Lesbian dance that DeMille shows us, not the Christians outside. The acting in Sign of the Cross is a bit of a mixed bag, although it is of a higher standard than many of the DeMille talkies. Charles Laughton is hammily brilliant, laying down a blueprint for Emperor Nero which Peter Ustinov would follow to a well-deserved Oscar-nomination in Quo Vadis (1951). However Laughton's part is fairly small, and the screenplay makes Claudette Colbert the real villain. Colbert is fantastic, playing the Empress as an ancient world vamp, giving by far the best performance of the bunch. It's almost a shame that It Happened One Night re-invented her as a major romantic lead, because she really was at her best when she played villains. The weakest link in Sign of the Cross, as with many DeMille pictures, is the screenplay. However DeMille's inventiveness, careful construction and strong imagery, not to mention the fact that his pictures are great fun if you don't take them too seriously, transcend the limpness of the script. It was perhaps because DeMille refused to allow his style to be compromised by a limited budget that makes many of his 1930s pictures among his greatest.

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• Wonderful film

  GlLee2004-03-16

  First, this film is high camp. One need only know some of the backstage events to know that all the actors had a great deal of fun in making the film. March tells in his biography that Claudette Colbert spurned his attempts to flirt by chewing several garlic cloves before each close up between the two of them. The famed Chicago World's Fair fan dancer Sally Rand has an uncredited role (according to her family members) as the woman who is about to have her head bitten off by an alligator near the end. There is a close up of Sally's face. With such goings-on, what's not to like here? I found Fredric March as Marcus Superbus (the Prefect of Rome and man upon whom Empress Poppea has her eyes) convincingly full of himself through the first three quarters of the film. He shows a believable change of heart towards the end. Colbert is charmingly over-the-top as Poppea, as is Charles Laughton, who plays Nero. The ingenue Christian girl, Mercia, is played with restraint by Elissa Landi. While this may make her seem to be overshadowed by Colbert, Marcus states that he is "tired" of overpowering patrician women and, thus, Landi's cool understatement entrances him. Despite the violence, which is standard fare in tales about early Christians in Rome, there are moments of good acting, not only by the main characters, but by the bit players. Some of the group scenes and interactions among the Christians as they await the arena are well-played, indeed. There is nothing to dismiss here. At very least, the film is worth a viewing as a landmark epic sporting some of the Hollywood elite of the mid-1930s.

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• There's more here than meets the eye...

  george-stachnik2008-01-10

  I watched Sign of the Cross last night with my church's Bible Study group. This was the third time I've seen this film. It's an interesting movie, if not a great one, but I think it's one of DeMille's most underrated works. There's a lot more to it than first meets the eye. The first thing that surprised me was how long it took for this movie to get rolling. Film-makers of this period liked to let audiences get to know their characters before beginning to rev up the plot. The classic example of this is the 1933 version of King Kong, in which the big monkey doesn't even appear until the third reel. ********* WARNING - SPOILERS FOLLOW ************** The whole first half of the 125-minute "Sign of the Cross" is relatively uneventful, particularly for contemporary audiences that are used to having movies start off with a bang. DeMille uses the first hour to set up a love story between a powerful Roman Prefect named Marcus Superbus (played by Frederic March, who must have had a difficult time keeping a straight face with that name) and an innocent young Christian girl named Mercia (played by Elissa Landi). When they first meet, March is in lust more than in love. He clearly can have any woman in Rome that he wants, including the Emperor's Wife (Claudette Colbert). When he first meets Landi he tries to seduce her. When that doesn't work, he tries to demonstrate his affection for her by convincing one of "Rome's most... er, Talented Women" to seduce her for him, leading to a lesbian dance sequence that drove the censors crazy in 1932. Meanwhile, Landi develops what can best be described as a schoolgirl crush on March. Landi claims to love March, and flirts with him, but then draws away. The first half of the film focuses on these 2-dimensional characters, and the shallow attraction that they have for one other. But their feelings deepen during the second half. When Landi's Christian friends are marched off to the arena to die, she finds herself wanting to do nothing more than join them. March realizes that he loves her, and sacrifices his career by demanding that the emperor (Charles Laughton in his American film debut) spare her life. Laughton agrees, but only if she renounces her faith. March goes to the Coliseum just as she's about to be sacrificed to the lions. He tells her that she can continue to practice Christianity privately if he marries her - she only has to pretend to renounce it publicly. It's a tempting offer, but she refuses. So March, who does not believe in Christianity, and apparently knows next to nothing about it, does something astonishing. He says that *he* will convert - not because he believes in it - but because he cannot imagine living without her. The film ends with the two of them hand in hand climbing the stairs to meet the lions and their maker. On the surface, this seems to be a satisfying ending. The largely-Christian audience for whom the film was made would have cheered an ending with March converting to Christianity and dying for his faith. But that's not exactly what's happening here. Suppose March had converted to Christianity before deciding to die for it (as Richard Burton would do 20 years later in "The Robe"). Then it would be easy to cheer as the two of them marched into the arena to die. But in Sign of the Cross, March agrees to sacrifice his life mostly because of his love for Landi, not Jesus. He accepts Christianity to please her, not because of of any spiritual awakening. Sign of the Cross was marketed as a religious movie. But what DeMille delivered was something else. Landi's faith not only inevitably leads to her martyrdom, it also consumes March because he had the bad luck to fall in love with a Christian. DeMille almost seems to be suggesting that Christianity in those days demanded death from its followers, and from their loved ones, and would not be satisfied with less. This film is hardly a flattering portrait of early Christianity. (Christian readers please hold your email - I'm not espousing this point of view - I'm merely pointing out that it is there in this movie. If you feel the need to respond to these comments, please do so by praying for me, not by writing to me; I promise I'll be grateful.) And speaking of the audience, pay attention to the way DeMille uses the camera during the infamous arena sequences. He's not the least bit squeamish about putting the horror, blood and guts of the Coliseum on the screen, given the limits of his budget and 1930's special effects. But he continually returns his camera to the arena audience. Their reaction to the spectacle ranges from boredom to excitement to sexual arousal. It's a powerful indictment of both audiences - the ones who are watching from the brightly lit benches of the Roman Coliseum, and those of us who are watching from more comfortable seats in the dark.

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