The majority of Roman history films used spectacle to attract audiences and in the more intimate scenes they used eroticised copies of wall-paintings to add sexual innuendo (fig.1&2). The cultural plundering that film-set designers engaged in contributed to the de-signification of ancient wall-painting. As a result it became Roman style wall-paper based upon a pastiche aesthetic, which was churned out by the metre. Film directors, on the other hand, were more concerned with getting the lead actresses' ‘pointy-bra’ in profile, than with the clichéd film sets that framed her (fig.3). Given the way in which narrative underpins film, the separation between fact, faction and fiction may always remain blurred. At the same time it must surely be a cause for concern, especially amongst those who advocate that we should tread carefully in history’s foreign land, that more and more Hollywood film clips seem to be showing up on Television in so-called history programmes.

History as Spectacle

In the nineteen-fifties Hollywood attempted to counter the increasing popularity of television by producing ever more epic and spectacular films. Many of these used the quintessential ‘exotic otherness’ of ancient history to create worlds in which audiences were mesmerised by a potent mixture of truth and fantasy. Fantasy in the end won out over truth. The movie industry's desire to survive the increasing dominance of television forced it to combine cinematic innovation with ever increasing levels of historical invention. As a result invented histories such as Ben Hur and Quo Vadis? were recreated in CinemaScope, Eastman Color, and Surround Sound in order to create uniquely cinematic experiences, that could not be emulated by Television. (see Michael Wood, 1975, America in the Movies: Or "Santa Maria, it had Slipped my Mind." :173,166-67.) In the mid-twentieth century fictionalised Roman history films created a ubiquitous filter through which Roman culture is still viewed to this day. In so doing it directly and indirectly shaped the way we look at Roman wall-painting. Toga movies staged intimate encounters in interiors made up of pseudo Roman wall-painting, which then caused the original paintings to become linked to the complex meta-narratives associated with epic blockbuster movies. Even more problematical was the fact that audiences often viewed these films in cinemas that were themselves pastiche versions of the Neoclassical style, with names such the Odeon or Coliseum (fig.4). Off and on screen images merged into a confusing mixture of highly mediated Roman signifiers. To what extent these fictionalised simulations of Roman wall-painting affected popular and even scholarly attitudes to the originals is extremely difficult to quantify. What is certain, however, is that their appropriated film presence constituted yet another nail in the conceptual coffin of Roman wall-painting.