'I am Spartacus'. 'No, I am Spartacus'. TV has shown this great film so many times that we can all go around quoting the dialogue. These days, the sole surprise about Stanley Kubrick's marvellous epic is that it only won four Oscars. They included awards for Peter Ustinov's clever and finally poignant performance as Batiatus and for Russell Metty's breathtaking colour photography, at its very best in the final tableau of a sea of crosses silhouetted against a sunset. Kubrick's control of the massive battle scenes is commendable. But it is in the observation of human detail, and in many memorable little scenes that the film scores most heavily over other epics, and in which it finds an inner strength. It has at least half a dozen flawless portrayals. Ustinov, Kirk Douglas, Jean Simmons, Curtis and John Ireland do commendably craftsmanlike work. Topping them all is Charles Laughton as the wily old senator Gracchus. With a flicker of the corner of his mouth, or the raising of an eyelid, Laughton conveys more in an instant than others might in an hour.

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