The First King

 

Another foreign-made historical film about Rome, and yet this one is actually pretty good.  The First King (known in Italian as Il Primo Re and variously billed as The First King: Birth of an Empire and Romulus and Remus: The First King) is an attempt to give the legend of the founding of Rome the serious treatment.  Rather than treat this as pure legend, the film is a gritty, dirty, bloody epic that tries to realistically depict life in Italy in the 8th Century BCE.

The story opens with two brothers tending their sheep, and right away we see the essential difference between them, as Romulus is the gentler, more spiritual brother, while Remus is tougher and more practical, and yet he is willing to go to any lengths to protect his sibling.  The move then hits with a bang as the two are washed away by a massive flood that shows off the generally high production values this movie has, as the effects look spectacular.

Washed ashore along with many others, they are enslaved by the people of Alba Longa.  In myth, the brothers were hidden heirs of the bloodline of the kings of Alba, and thus were said to be descended from Aeneas of Troy, but here there is no mention of that.  The brothers and the other slaves are made to fight each other to the death, but they start a riot and escape.

The violence in the film is brutally direct, with no flinching away from the blood or gore.  People are impaled on spears, stabbed, gutted, shot with arrows and beheaded.  All the weapons are good, period designs from the iron age, and the swords in particular are well-done for a change.  The armor and clothing look very primitive, and I think they may have gone a bit overboard on that, as it often makes the movie look closer to Paleolithic than it maybe should, but we have very little solid information about what people of the time wore, as textiles don’t survive very long.

Romulus is wounded in the battle, and so Remus drags him along, refusing to let him die, even when the other escapees want to kill him, fearing he is cursed by the gods.  I think it’s a bit of a misstep having Romulus out of action for so much of the second act, as it lessens the conflict between them later.  But it does show us how far Remus is willing to go to protect his brother.

After they escape they wander through the forest and defeat another tribe, taking their village and people as their own.  Here things do drag some, as Remus is supposed to be having a kind of existential crisis, denying the hand of the gods in his life and claiming to be the master of his own fate.  It’s meant to draw him as opposite of his brother, who is much more spiritual, but mostly it seems like he is just being a dick.

When Romulus recovers, then the schism between the two brothers can really get going, with Remus demanding obeisance as king, casting down religious symbols, and enforcing his will with the threat of violence, while Romulus reaches out to the conquered tribe, helps build trust, and shows his devotion to the will of the gods.  In so many Greco-Roman stories the gods are very present and very much real, but here we are seeing Roman mystisicm in its primitive infancy, with bloody rites and sacred flames, men living in genuine fear of offending the gods and willing to kill over it without hesitation.

All of it builds to a final battle and the final showdown between the brothers and their differing viewpoints, and we know Romulus founded Rome, so it’s not like it’s a spoiler who wins.  Overall the movie is very well-made, with some good acting and excellent cinematography.  The effects and practical gore are solid, and the fight choreography is exciting and varied without being too fancy, preserving a raw-edged, savage feel.

This is a pretty slow-paced movie, with much more a focus on drama than action, but the action is good, and the brooding, iron age world is forbidding and primal.  The gods are a mysterious, bloody power to be appeased, and there is very little in the way of right or wrong, just power and resistance to it.  It’s in Latin, but a reconstructed version that is meant to sound more like the ancient language of the time, worked out by scholars.  Everything about this movie speaks of care and an earnest desire to tell an uncompromising story.  This is on Prime Video and is definitely worth your time.