The Roman epic has been a staple of Hollywood since the days of the silent movie but Gladiator is the first in many years to recreate the glory and terror of Ancient Rome back to the big screen. With the success of Jurassic Park, Titanic and Armageddon, the epic souped-up with the latest in special effects have come up trumps at the box office.

Ridley Scott's Gladiator does for the sword and sandal epic of the fifties and sixties what Spielberg did for the dinosaur flick with Jurassic Park. It is ironic, however, that within days of its official opening in the USA, that the original star of these camp classics, and Bear icon, should die before its initial release. Steve Reeves, the American bodybuilder turned movie actor, came to prominence in the late fifties with Hercules and its obligatory sequel, Hercules Unchained. He was the first muscleman to make the leap from the bodybuilding arena onto film. Although the movies he appeared in were very successful, they did not seal his reputation as an actor and he eventually retired to California. Whether he was aware of his iconic status within the gay community is open to question but he always fought shy of interviewers. He probably died not realising how many leather bars across the world had at least one of his movie stills on their walls. Without him, there would probably be no Schwarzenegger, Stallone or Van Damme. Even Sean Connery started his career in entertainment in much the same way as Reeves but it was clearly a stepping stone, rather than a major career move, towards acting.

Besides the death of Reeves, the actual shoot of Gladiator also witnessed the passing of another screen actor whose life and career could not be more diametrically opposed to that of the former Mr Universe: namely, the incomparable Oliver Reed. Although Reed had become somewhat of a joke on the talkshow circuit, becoming the acting equivalent of George Best. Best known to the public for his drunken star turns on television, rather than his work on the big screen, his return to form as the gladiator turned trainer was a welcome finale to his topsy-turvy life. Probably his most fruitful period was in the early to mid nineteen seventies when he worked for Ken Russell and Richard Lester in movies such as The Devils and The Three Musketeers. However, it was in that latter film's equal, as well as its sequel, The Four Musketeers, where his hirsute presence graced the screen with magnificent pathos and humanity.

Reed's presence in the pantheon of Albion Bears is aided by the knowledge that he had made a significant appearance in Ken Russell's adaptation of D H Lawrence's Women in Love. Who could forget the infamous nude wrestling scene with Alan Bates? Its queer credentials are further enhanced by Larry Kramer's name on the credits, who wrote the seminal novel Faggots but who was also one of the early crusaders for AIDS awareness.

Reed plays one of the central roles, Proximo, who almost takes the place of the Emperor, played by that Celtic Bear, Richard Harris. Harris, in common with Reed, also had a reputation for knocking back the booze but unlike his fellow actor recognised what it was doing to his system and pulled back from the precipice. In recent years, after several failed marriages and twice being declared bankrupt, Harris has clawed back the lost ground to become a regular in British and Irish film. A number of which he has sported a beard, such as The Field and To Walk with Lions, the latter where he plays the late George Adamson of Born Free fame, both top notch performances. The role Harris plays in Gladiator is small, but vital, as it is his death that acts as the catalyst to the movie's plot. Which revolves around not only the death of Crowe's wife and child, but also the threat to the Empire by the inexorable rise of Commodus, played by the incredibly slimy, and needless to say clean-shaven, Joaquin Phoenix. This young American actor has definitely laid out his wares and emerged from whatever shadow he had been cast by the death of his late brother, River, who was unique amongst his fellow actors as being vocal in favour on gay rights.

Crowe's third mentor, and Bear of Albion, is Derek Jacobi in the role as Gracchus, a member of the Senate, who is one of the leader's of dissent against Commodus. Jacobi, of course, is a respected film and television actor, having portrayed such real-life characters as Claudius, Francis Bacon and Alan Turing. This is one of the few where he sports a beard, although he had experimented with facial hair in Kenneth Branagh's epic version of Hamlet.

In the wake of Gladiator's success, many in the popular press have recognised Russell Crowe's iconoclastic status. The London Evening Standard's Zoe Williams, in particular, has waxed lyrical about Crowe's performance. As ever, the straight world lags behind the gay community. It was the first to acknowledge this New Zealand-born, Australian-based, actor's screen presence. It was through Romper Stomper, where he played a skinhead that first placed him in the One to Watch category but unlike his fellow Antipodean film star, Mel Gibson, he has played a gay character in another independent Australian production called The Sum of Us. However, his camp credentials are further enhanced by the knowledge that he once appeared in the popular Australian soap opera Neighbours during its heyday, when Jason and Kylie still ruled the ratings.

In a recent poll, published by a popular cinema magazine, Maximus has been voted the sexiest film character of all time. One reader commenting that: 'Maximus is everything a woman could want - strong, noble, intelligent, brave, loyal, devoted to his family and just about sexy enough to light any woman's fire.'

One of the more interesting minor details about Gladiator is that it was sent to Gibson but he turned it down in favour of the even more bloodthirsty War of Independence epic The Patriot. There are a few similarities between the role that brought Gibson to global prominence. Both heroes share the same name, Max or Maximus, and the catalyst for their requisite vengeance is the death of their wife and young son.

Indeed, Scott's epic steals/borrows from a number of movies besides Mad Max including The Fall of the Roman Empire, William Wyler's Ben-Hur and Spartacus, as well as Cleopatra. Through his genius Scott, as one of the great contemporary visionaries of world cinema, he manages to do this with great aplomb. However, his is a much more European interpretation than the typical overblown excesses of Cecil B. DeMille. What saves this particular film is its use of special effects to enhance the plot rather than to replace the story, plus the use of quality character actors and a lead grasping a role of lifetime. Some reviewers have been remarkably sniffy about the plot, which pilfers liberally from the aforesaid films. But hey, if you're going to steal, at least steal from the best.

If there is one thing most Hollywood epics share is their depiction of early Christians. Whether it is Spartacus or The Robe. Gladiator is almost unique in that there is no reference to Jesus or his followers. In one early scene, it is made quite clear that Maximus is a pagan and a believer in the gods, rather than God. This is also a feature of the sword and sandal, or pepla, epics that spewed forth from European studios after the transatlantic success of Hercules, which, despite taking liberties with the mythology is a refreshing antidote to the easy sentimentality of Hollywood.

Where Gladiator really bears comparison with the sword and sandal is its unacknowledged homoeroticism, especially in regards to its hirsute protagonists. In a clear reversal of Hollywood lore, the heroes are almost all bearded whereas the villains are almost all clean-shaven. Could this have anything to do with the fact that, for a number of years, Ridley Scott has sported a beard? Special mention must be made, however, concerning David Hemmings, for sporting the best comedy eyebrows in a major motion picture for some years.

Yet, what of the real gladiators? Did they attract the same kind of worship from men, as well as women? Were they admired, not simply because of their abilities, but also their looks? Apparently, yes.

In Michael Grant's seminal work, Gladiators, recently reprinted in paperback by Penguin, in response to the success of the film, he does more than allude to the homoerotic appeal of the gladiator.

There is sometimes, a hint or analogy of homosexual exhibition; and in this connection it may be remarked that some gladiators assumed the names of famous pretty boys of mythology, Hylas, Narcissus and Hyacinthus, and that some of the admiring inscriptions of gladiators seem to refer to male passions.

And further on, he mentions:

Epigraphic references to amatores [fans] echo the suggestion of the poets that there was an element of homosexuality in some of this admiration; and there is a horoscope of a youth born on 6th April AD 113, Antigonus of Nicaea, who was 'erotic and fond of gladiator'.

In fact, in Roman society, gladiators were on a par with male prostitutes! Yet, one has to remember that this was also a world where homophobia, as we know it, was unheard of.

Male prostitutes were not looked down upon because of their sexuality, rather more their innate effeminacy. They were bottoms, as opposed to tops. This is still a trait common amongst Mediterranean men even now. One can have sex with a man, so long as you are the dominant partner. Morality as we know it, however, was not a problem. One's position in society was what counted and gladiators, much as actors used to be, were somehow feted and reviled in equal measure.

Even at the height of their popularity, gladiators had their critics, such as Juvenal. He considered the use of female gladiators especially scandalous. They fought under assumed names such as Achilla and Amazon. Dwarves were also employed, probably more for light relief, and were sometimes pitted against these female combatants. Sea battles were even created and special arenas built to accommodate this imperial excess, besides the legendary throwing to the lions of Christians.

Although this, as with another of Hollywood's myth making achievements, has some basis in reality, they have been rather elastic with historical fact.

Christians did have encounters with wild beasts within the arena but they were not an unqualified success. In one recorded case, the animals were not in the least bit interested, and one prospective martyr had to open the beast's jaws, insert his head, close his eyes and think of the Holy Land!

One official, based in Gaul, during the time of Marcus Aurelius, accused the early Christian martyrs of being hysterical exhibitionists and considered it his duty to persecute them.

Even after the Emperor Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire, it did not stop the death and depravity of gladiatorial combat. Indeed, if anything, it was the encroachment of the so-called barbarians in the last days of Rome that saw an end to the Coliseum and its attendant bloodshed.

(c) Howard Watson 2000