Still, Kubrick’s famously fertile filmmaker’s mind adapted itself to the vast production’s scope.

( Spartacus was produced by Douglas’ own production company, Bryna Productions, in association with Universal Studios.) Everything about Spartacus was different, more complex, bigger than that first Douglas-Kubrick pairing. The film’s eponymous star, Kirk Douglas, had teamed with Kubrick a few years earlier, in 1957, on one of the most powerful anti-war movies ever made the lean masterpiece, Paths of Glory. TIME magazine called it “a new kind of Hollywood movie: a super-spectacle with spiritual vitality and moral force.” The New York Times‘ long-time film critic, meanwhile, dismissed the movie as “heroic humbug.” Over the years, most reviewers and movie fans, alike, have come around to the view that, while the film has its problems its pacing alone drives some viewers to distraction Spartacus remains one the most successful admixtures of action-flick and high-minded drama ever attempted. Eyerman, who, along with writer David Zeitlin, spent time chronicling behind-the-scenes action on the massive, $12 million production.Ĭritics were sharply divided over Spartacus when it was first released.

Here, presents rare and unpublished photos from the Spartacus set by LIFE’s J.R. Directed by a 32-year-old Kubrick with only two feature films under his belt, produced by and starring mid-century superstar Kirk Douglas and featuring a galaxy of acting luminaries, the 1960 blockbuster has been exalted, imitated and parodied honored, derided and dissected and after all these years, it still achieves what most three-hour, big-budget historical dramas can only dream of: it’s entertaining as hell.

Instead, the strange, flawed, enthralling sword-and-sandal epic long ago entered that thorny realm where unclassifiable cinematic touchstones ( Vertigo, Night of the Hunter, Brazil, et al.) reside. Decades after its 1960 debut, Spartacus is no longer a mere movie.

I Am Spartacus! by Kirk Douglas