You've heard the term relative to Romans persecuting Christians - 'throw them to the lions'. Well, not only are they thrown to the lions in this picture, but to a tiger, a bear, an elephant, a gorilla!, and in an intensely riveting scene, to a contingent of crocodiles! You can say all you want about the gore and violence in modern day movies, but just the suggestion of what's about to happen to the unfortunate victims in the Roman arena is of gruesome consequence. You really can't believe someone can be that brutal and sadistic to another human being, much less enjoy the spectacle as a spectator. Those scenes are just horrifying to the imagination, even if you never actually see anyone get torn apart by the carnivorous beasts.

The story takes place in 64A.D., right during the burning of Rome under the auspices of the Emperor Nero. Charles Laughton is decadently wonderful as Nero Caesar, plotting to blame the destruction of the city on Christians, and demanding they be rounded up for sport in the arena. You really have to catch him in that scene where he's imperially stretched out and relishing his 'delicious debauchery'; it's quite the sketch. Eventually, Nero is called upon to provide the old 'thumbs down' on the Christians who have been rounded up for his personal pleasure and that of the Roman citizens.

The central story involves Roman prefect Marcus Superbus (Frederic March) and the Christian woman Mercia (Elissa Landi) he falls in love with. Palace intrigue and military backstabbing eventually force Marcus into an untenable position. What the story demonstrates above all is the abiding faith Christians had in their religion and their savior, Jesus Christ. Such solemn devotion to an idea in the face of death is hard to imagine today and is seldom ever encountered. Even more hard to imagine is how director DeMille got this picture made way back in 1932, as much of the subject matter borders on a cultish preference for lecherous debauchery. Had he waited only about another year or so, he would have been stopped in his tracks by the infamous Hollywood Code.

A lot of Cecil B. DeMille's films haven't aged well and this was indeed one of them. Perhaps we've grown a bit too sophisticated for something like the Sign of the Cross. It certainly couldn't be made today.

This in fact was a key film in DeMille's career. He had left Paramount in the mid twenties and first had his own production company and then did some films at MGM which didn't do so well and he was let go. DeMille was considered washed up when Paramount took him back and he had to have a hit.

He chose to make a second movie of a Victorian morality play about early Christian martyrs by Wilson Barrett who was a famous English stage manager/actor/playwright entitled The Sign of the Cross. The title refers to the cross the early Christians made as a sign of recognition in the Roman Empire. In the early years of Anno Domini discretion was certainly in order.

The Sign of the Cross was the sort of stuff DeMille grew up with at the end of the 19th century. At the same time he knew that sex sold movie tickets. So in his silent film period he perfected a formula to glorify the religious but also show the sins of the world they were trying to fight.

DeMille as a young actor and budding playwright before he turned to film was also heavily influenced by David Belasco who wrote a lot of morality type plays which would be laughed off the stage today. But Belasco also given the limits of the stage tried to produce the kind of eye catching spectacle that DeMille perfected on screen.

This is the background DeMille brought to his films and it's never more obvious on the screen than in The Sign of the Cross. The plot is that young Marcus Superbas, prefect of Rome and general debauchee, finds a young discreet Christian girl named Mercia. Fredric March as Marcus is quite taken with her, Mercia as played by Elissa Landi has a purity and a sweetness that he doesn't usually find with the crowd he hangs out with.

Later on she's taken in a general round up of Christians and March intervenes for her. That displeases Empress Poppaea played by Claudette Colbert who Marcus has been a favorite of. She influences Emperor Nero to execute her in the arena with the rest of the Christians.

In his autobiography DeMille took some bows for discovering Charles Laughton who played Nero and got his first real notice in America with this film. What he doesn't tell you is that DeMille and Laughton fought like crazy over the actor's interpretation of Nero. Laughton, a closeted gay man himself, played him as an effeminate gay fop and it was his interpretation that we see today. Probably Laughton's own homosexuality brought a dimension to the part that another actor could never have achieved. His performance holds up today if the film itself doesn't.

In DeMille style the film goes back and forth from the debauchery of Rome to the purity of the Christians. One scene I guarantee that will send a revival audience rolling up the aisles is the one where March brings Landi to his villa where the weekly orgy is in progress. He tries unsuccessfully to seduce her and figuring she's not into guys has a woman try to seduce her with some lesbian siren song. Her song and vamp dance are drowned out by the Christians outside, singing hymns on the way to the arena. It's an absolute and positive hoot, but I'm sure 1932 audiences were titillated. I'm also sure it wasn't in the original play.

Actually homosexuality runs pretty rampant in this film. During the arena scene you see Laughton being waited on by what looks to be his boy toy. And earlier in the film young Tommy Conlan gives up the Christian meeting place through torture. We don't actually see the torture, but there's definitely a look of lust in the eyes of the torturers.

Add to that Claudette Colbert looking quite seductive indeed in her milk bath. No wonder she got to play Cleopatra later on for DeMille. This was all pre-Code and you could get away with a lot.

The Sign of the Cross made a ton of money for Paramount, justifying the expensive outlay for them during the Depression. It put DeMille back on top and he stayed at the top and with Paramount for the rest of his life. But for today's audiences the film is horribly dated.

My above comment, while strange, isn't exactly facetious, as this Biblical epic from the king of sacrilege, Cecil B. DeMille, is chock full of sex and violence. In fact, had the film been made just a few years later, the Hays Code surely would have forced MASSIVE re-editing in order to get the film approved. Believe it or not, this Biblical epic is a film that most likely would have been avoided or even picketed by evangelicals! Why DeMille has a reputation of making "classic" Bible stories is beyond me--especially when this film includes brief and intentional glimpses of Claudette Colbert's nipples, has MANY scantily-clad victims of the Roman persecution waiting to be ravaged, features a lesbian dance meant to entice a nice Christian woman to a famous prostitute's allures, an implied rape of a woman by a gorilla and some of the more amazing but disturbing scenes of Christians and gladiators dying!!! I doubt if the Catholic Legion of Decency, Pat Boone or Baptists would recommend this flick because of all this salacious material.

So if the film is such an extreme example of pre-Code excess, then who exactly is the audience? After all, Atheists and Agnostics probably wouldn't be interested in a film about the early Christian church and many Christians would probably be offended--even today. Well, the only REAL audience would be lovers of the pre-Code films and perhaps historians. Actually, as far as historical content goes, this is a pretty interesting film, as it doesn't show Nero quite as one-dimensional and evil as he is shown in many later films. Compared to his wife, Poppea (who he murdered in real life in a fit of rage),he seems like a pretty decent guy in the film--aside from the weird prosthetic nose worn by Charles Laughton. And, while possibly disturbing, the sequences in the arena and in the dungeon with those awaiting the arena are superbly done and very moving.

So what do we have left if we ignore all the sex and violence? Well, for the most part it's a typical "love at first sight" type of plot (which are very clichéd),but it also has lots of amazing and eye-catching DeMille-inspired sets. In addition, the milk bath scene where you see Colbert's beautiful body is actually an amazing and memorable scene--not just because of her breasts. Excessive,...sure,...but a very memorable moment from the silver screen--probably the one almost everyone remembers who saw the film (unless they saw an edited version). Also, while I didn't like all the melodrama, I thought the end actually worked pretty well. So as you can guess, I felt it was a very, very mixed bag and not the sort of film I would rush out to see. I cannot understand how anyone could give this mess of a film a score of 10, but at least it was better than THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (another VERY overrated DeMille epic).

If you are inclined to see another similar film, you might try QUO VADIS. It's pretty much the same exact stilted and kind of dull film, but without the boobs and blood.