Movies In History: Quo Vadis

I was recently forced to spend some semi idle time in front of the television.  For reasons, I can't really explain, if I'm sick or injured, I don't read much.  I will listen to things like podcasts, and I'll watch television, but I don't do much reading.

Anyhow, during that period, I watched this 1951 "epic".  The plot surrounds a returning Roman general, Marcus, during Nero's reign who comes back from a long extended campaign just in time to experience, over a few weeks, the arrival in Rome of St. Peter and the great fire of Rome.

Condensing years of history into a few weeks, the plot is frankly improbable.  Marcus returns from campaign and stays at the house of a retired Roman general who has converted to Christianity.  He meets St. Paul there, but doesn't appreciate who he is.  He also meets Lygia, a captive in the household who was raised by her captors as their adoptive daughter, who is also a Christian.  In a matter of seeming hours, Marcus falls deeply in love with Lygia and vice versa, which leads to some drama.  Marcus is present when St. Peter preaches, having just arrived in Rome, but remains unconvinced.  Nero has Rome torched when he's at his out of the city estate, and Marcus races back, ending up being thrown in confinement with the Christians blamed for the fire. He saves Lygia and causes a Roman army to revolt against Nero.

This film was well regarded in 1951, but it's really just too thin on plot now.  Indeed, darned near any Roman epic save for Ben Hur really suffers in viewing.

Usually, I review these films for historical accuracy and material details. I really can't do that in regard with Roman material details, as I don't know enough about ancient Rome of this period to do so.  In terms of historic accuracy, Rome did suffer near destruction in a fire during Nero's reign, and he was blamed for it.  The Christians were too.  It was frankly most likely just a fire that spread by accident that was inevitable, given the conditions of the city at the time.  Nero, who became Emperor at an absurdly young age was emblematic of what was wrong with Rome at the time, but he was probably not as weird as portrayed in the film by Peter Ustinov, who really does steal the show with his depiction.  Christians were persecuted under Nero, but Nero's demise didn't come about in this fashion.

St. Peter did suffer execution, it is more than worth noting, following the great fire in 64.  The title of the film comes from St. Peter's encounter with Jesus outside of Rome, as he fled persecution there, with his encountering the risen Christ and, in the Latin translation, asking "Quo vadis?", to which Jessu replied "Romam eo iterum crucifigī", or "Where are you going", and "I am going to Rome to be crucified again".  This caussed Peter to return to Rome.

A much better film could have been made out of all of this, but at the time this one was highly regarded.  One thing of note is that it would be hard to make a Hollywood blockbuster of this type now, as this film was 100% Christian in outlook.

Sunday, September 6, 1942. Positioning

Irish Army recruiting poster.  By this point, the Irish Army could really have needed a hand, given that so many military age men had entered the British Army that Ireland was effectively incapable of defending itself, and was relying on overage, and underage, men in the Home Guard.

On this day in 1942, the German U-375 stopped the Egyptian sailboat Turkian and sank her with 13 rounds from a deck gun.

All 19 crewmen were allowed to abandon ship.

British coast artillery replied, but to no effect.

A spectacular example of poor marksmanship on both sides and pointless destruction.

The Germans captured Novorossiysk.

Two policemen were shot dead in Belfast in day two of rising tensions in Ireland.

Arvid and Midlread Harnack, nee Fish, of the Red Orchestra were arrested.

East German postage stamp commemorating the Harnack's.

Mildred was American born and had moved to Germany as an academic in the 1920s.  Her husband Arvid Harnack was a German Communist and a lawyer.  Their arrest effectively brought about the end of the Red Orchestra.

Dorothy Dandridge, the first African American actress to be nominated for an Academy Award, married Harold Nicholas in Hollywood.  They would divroce in 1951.

Thursday, January 22, 1942. Japanese murders, Russian evacuations.

The Japanese shot, bayoneted, and beheaded withe swords 110 Australian and 40 Indian wounded prisoners and their medics in Malaya, the Parit Sulong Massacre.

The Japanese Imperial Guards commander, General Takuma Nishimura was tried after the war for war crimes due to this, and was hanged on June 11, 1951, although there is some doubt about his culpability for the actions of the troops.

It ought to be noted that actions like this by the Japanese were completely common during World War Two, and seem to have become common in the Japanese military no later than the 1930s.  This had not been the case earlier, as for example in the Russo Japanese War.

The Soviets advanced in their Winter offensive, the Afrika Korps advanced in theirs.

The Soviets also started evacuating residents of Leningrad over Lake Ladoga, which was frozen.

Six Allied merchant ships went down due to submarines in Operation Drumbeat.

September 16, 1951. Tragedy

 The crash of a F2H-2 Banshee off of Korean, September 16, 1952.  Seven lives losts.

June 11, 1970. Leaving Libya

F100 Super Saber taking off from Wheelus Air Force Base, Libya.

On this day in 1970 the American military presence in Libya came to an end when the U.S. Air Force turned Wheelus Air Force Base over to the North African country.

Few people today would even be aware that the USAF had a base in Libya, but it first started having a presence at Wheelus during World War Two when it took over the former Italian air field in 1943 after it was captured by the British.  It occupied the air field steadily until this date in 1970. During much of that time the US had friendly relations with the country's monarch, King Idris I.

King Idris I of Libya, who reigned from 1951 until 1969. The former king would live out his life in exile in Egypt.

Idris was overthrown in a military coup led by Muammar Gaddafi, who subsequently ruled the "republic" from that point until is his violent death at the hands of a revolutionary crowd in 2011.  During Idris' reign the nation went from being one of the poorest in the world to being one of the richest, due to the discovery of oil, and at the same time the purpose of the USAF presence in the country declined to the point of irrelevance.  Gaddafi wanted the US out and the US, for its part, was glad to leave.

Wheelus was soon used by the Soviet Air Forces as a base and as a Libyan air force base.  It was hit  in 1986 by the U.S. during it raid on Libya during the Reagan administration.

USAF FB-111 landing after air strike in Libya in 1986.

The air strip is an airport today.

On the same day William Bentvena was shot by Tommy DeSimone, an event, mostly recalled from the movie Goodfellas.  Bentvena was a "made man" of the Gambino crime family and DeSimone would disappear in 1979.