This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

SERIOUSLY. This is what the crap Hollywood still puts out?

People are voting emotionally.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

"Rome" is a costume, period drama from BBC television that explores the life of ancient Roman dictators. The most memorable being that of emperor Nero, played by actor Michael Sheen. Sheen's portrayal of the demented dictator paints a disturbing portrait of a psychopath. I wasn't able to tear myself away from the screen.

This series is of interest only for the few brief and historically accurate voice overs in each episode. The rest is terribly written and acted drivel, highly romanticized with very little relation to known events. Take for instance the episode about Constantine. An undue prominence is given to Constantine's sister Constantia and her arranged marriage to Licinius. This is written in an extremely melodramatic way and Constantia has very modern attitudes to marriage. After a lot more melodrama and inaccurate events, Constantine is seen to arranged the murder of Licinius to take place at the exact moment he is reciting the Nicean creed, an effect lifted from the Godfather.

My wife and I bought the DVD because we couldn't find anything for this price and we had to spend a voucher. But the series was over our expectations! Hollywood made a lot of historically unauthentic movies with a lot of monumental scenes,and unrealistic characters (e.g. Gladiator) so I was a bit suspicious, but the good old BBC quality can't make you disappointed. The sets and costumes are perfect however the storyline and the characters are in focus. Battle scenes were smartly made to keep the budget lower. I was glad to see Gracchus, the Jewish rebels and Constantine besides Nero and Caesar. The quality is very even throughout the episodes, I found only Rebellion a bit worse. The theme itself (based upon Flavius's book) was not too popular with screenwriters and the fact that they made an attempt at it is OK, though the plot of this episode doesn't really have a point as a drama. And nor Flavius, nor the zealots, neither Titus, nor Vespasianus were real heroes. The writers couldn't really grasp their personalities. After all, it's a must see for every lover of historical movies!

(Edited)It was frankly overall pretty awful.But their was a couple of decent episodes with some merit that I watched with actual enjoyment, the Vespasian and Titus one (Rebellion) it was decently acted and portrayed with nice little battle scenes and had some respect for actual historical fact. Also the (Revolution) episode about Tiberius Gracchus was watchable (despite the obvious lack of his historically vital younger brother Gaius). However, as to the other 4 'episodes', they are for the most part awfully acted, full of garbage characterizations, the scripts are repetitive and weak, the characters vacuous and the show is teaming with inaccuracies and anachronistic behaviour.Both J.Caesar and Nero are total charades of their actual characters, Caesar, for example, comes across as a creepy effeminate thug who I wouldn't follow into a bar for a free pint never mind against the Roman Republic. I was not keen on Sean Pertwees characterisation of him, he portrayed him as neurotic, unhinged and desperately brutal, (what the hell was the decimation scene all about? this is not historical, Caesar did not decimate a legion), they omitted a LOT of his character and missed out on the charm, clemency and his famous dignitas. It is a shame as I really like Pertwee as an actor otherwise. Ciaran Hines as Caesar (from hbos ROME) was much closer to the mark.Nero did not kick his wife to death in front of anyone. After coming home drunk, by himself, an argument started up and in the midst of this he lashed out at her and she miscarried and died. He was grief stricken for the rest of his life, he had just lost his beloved Wife and only HEIR. He also did NOT castrate a slave in public to look like his dead wife, (there is a scandalous report of a private (unseen) castration, 'make him a woman' my hole!). He was a thug and he was brutal, but he was not a camp psychopath. Much of this series has dredged the gossip and vicious rumours of the Ancient world without for one minute questioning the source. And all the while they discount any other dissenting Ancient voice in order to make this show as shocking as they can. I believe the prime time slot on bbc1 is to blame for this, the dumbing down of dialog and ham-fisted characterizations, in order to appeal to the 'talent show'/soap opera loving crowd, because a soap opera is what many of the episodes resemble.Essentially I was really disappointed with it, after all that it promised. Plain terrible at times, the only thing going for 4 of the episodes was the decent looking battle set pieces but even these are all show and don't even try to keep your interest beyond the start of the battles.And they said it would be historically sound? peh. :(If you haven't seen this series, fear not, you missed little. (just go and watch the Rebellion and Revolution episodes on youtube and ignore the rest).On a episode rating I would give: Rebellion:8 Revolution:7 Caesar:4 Constantine:4 Nero:3 Fall:5