Part graphic horror, part cheesy romance, part sex film, this low budget sequel to CALIGULA is happy to rehash the same basic plot, only changing the characters and emphasising the violence and sex. The latter comes as no surprise when you realise that Joe D'Amato (hiding under the name of David Hills), directed and co-wrote (with George Eastman) this movie and his typical extremities are here explored to the fullest. Bloody, sadistic violence is interspersed with sweaty hardcore sex scenes (D'Amato later became a full-time porn director) and typical D'Amato perversions involving a horse. You won't have seen anything like it but it's not exactly what I call entertainment. Between the incident the film largely drags, hampered by a script in which nothing much happens to the characters and dragged down by poor acting from the supporting cast. The endless dream sequences are confusing as well as being dull and only serve to slow the film down further.
David Brandon (STAGE FRIGHT) takes over from Malcolm McDowell as the Emperor Caligula. Although I do like Brandon as an actor he simply can't repeat McDowell's disturbing portrayal of the insane tyrant, instead he plays it shouty and over-the-top as only he knows and the result is less impressive. Saying this, he still gives the best performance I've seen in a D'Amato flick and is miles ahead of the rest of the cast, so maybe that gives you some impression of what else is in store. D'Amato stalwart Laura Gemser (whose appearance almost turns the film into a kind-of Emanuelle in Ancient Rome, what with all the sex going on) appears as an oft-naked slave girl who begins a torrid romance with Caligula.
It's pretty hard to spot familiar faces in the cast, what with all the porn actors appearing, but there are a few. Fans of Alberto Cavallone's cannibal-caveman epic MASTER OF THE WORLD may spot Sasha D'Arc as Caligula's personal guard, then there's Euro-stalwart Gabriele Tinti as the deeply unlucky Marcellus Agrippa and Michele Soavi as an unlucky poet who gets the tendons in his arms and legs cut and his tongue sliced off in extra-graphic detail! Speaking of gore, D'Amato is in his element with bloody gladiator battles, a guy having a sword shoved somewhere extremely painful, decapitations, a baby being thrown to its death and the old gag of a scene where Caligula is dying and a senator says "I would offer my life in place of his" at which instant Caligula recovers and has said senator killed - this was previously used in the first CALIGULA. This one is for graphic exploitation freaks only.
David Brandon (STAGE FRIGHT) takes over from Malcolm McDowell as the Emperor Caligula. Although I do like Brandon as an actor he simply can't repeat McDowell's disturbing portrayal of the insane tyrant, instead he plays it shouty and over-the-top as only he knows and the result is less impressive. Saying this, he still gives the best performance I've seen in a D'Amato flick and is miles ahead of the rest of the cast, so maybe that gives you some impression of what else is in store. D'Amato stalwart Laura Gemser (whose appearance almost turns the film into a kind-of Emanuelle in Ancient Rome, what with all the sex going on) appears as an oft-naked slave girl who begins a torrid romance with Caligula.
It's pretty hard to spot familiar faces in the cast, what with all the porn actors appearing, but there are a few. Fans of Alberto Cavallone's cannibal-caveman epic MASTER OF THE WORLD may spot Sasha D'Arc as Caligula's personal guard, then there's Euro-stalwart Gabriele Tinti as the deeply unlucky Marcellus Agrippa and Michele Soavi as an unlucky poet who gets the tendons in his arms and legs cut and his tongue sliced off in extra-graphic detail! Speaking of gore, D'Amato is in his element with bloody gladiator battles, a guy having a sword shoved somewhere extremely painful, decapitations, a baby being thrown to its death and the old gag of a scene where Caligula is dying and a senator says "I would offer my life in place of his" at which instant Caligula recovers and has said senator killed - this was previously used in the first CALIGULA. This one is for graphic exploitation freaks only.