Barbarians at the Gate [1993] (REGION 1) (NTSC)

Amazon.co.uk Review

The Pax Romana was never optional, it was always imposed. The Roman army both disseminated and enforced Roman civilisation on its Empire, first subjugating recalcitrant peoples, then turning them into good Roman citizens ripe for recruitment into the army. At its height, the Roman army never numbered more than 400,000 soldiers, but with these troops it controlled a region stretching from Scotland to Arabia. It was the world's first professional army, with a formal administrative structure, officer corps, regular pay and, most importantly, thorough training, making it the model for the armies of all modern nation states. The legendary discipline of the Legions enabled them to conquer unruly barbarian hordes and impose the Roman peace throughout the Empire. The Roman army, albeit in a drastically modified form, continued under the Eastern (Byzantine) Empire until the fall of Constantinople in 1453, making it, at nearly 2,000 years old, one of the longest-lived and most conspicuously successful institutions in history.

The Roman War Machine consists of four 50-minute documentaries made for The History Channel in 1999 and spread across two tapes. They chart the rise and development of the army in an absorbing if fairly standard documentary format, with plenty of academic talking heads wheeled out to fill in narrative details. Most interesting are the demonstrations of Roman equipment and battle tactics by re-enactors such as the Ermine Street Guard (although made for the History Channel with an American narration, most participants are British). The computer-animated sequences are distinctly minimalist.

Following on from the first tape, Tape 2 opens with "Roman Seige Warfare" and some fascinating demonstrations of siege equipment, including devastatingly deadly bolt-firing catapults and stone-throwing ballistae. The famous sieges of Jerusalem (in 66 AD) and Masada in Judea are described, then the programme settles down to describe the life of a soldier in a typical Roman fort, such as Vindolanda on Hadrian's wall, illustrating the change in the army from an offensive to a defensive force. In the final episode, "Barbarians at the Gate", the steady decline of the Empire is sketched, the military reforms of Diocletian and Constantine are touched upon, as is the process of barbarisation of the army, before the collapse of the Western Empire in the fifth century. Mark Walker

Customer Reviews:

I could watch this movie OVER and over again........2004-02-01

Who knew you could make a comedy about a Leveraged Buyout (LBO)? James Garner, in a brilliant performance, plays F. Ross Johnson, the CEO of RJR Nabisco who wants to buy out the company. He learns about LBOs from the cool slick Henry Kravis, the then-master of the buyout (played by Jonathan Pryce). When Ross takes Kravis' advice and goes out on his own, Henry gets MAD and fires his own salvo. This was a time when people threw figures like "$25 billion" around and thought nothing of it. The technicals of the deal are explained with enough detail that non-financiers can easily follow what's going on. Nice satirical touches like Ross' wife's manicurist explaining the art of the deal to her. A lot of cussing; after all, this was the ultimate boys' game. Fine fun movie.

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