When this movie appeared two long decades ago it caused as many feathers to be unruffled as any release one could possibly think of. In fact many of those feathers remain unruffled to this day with warring parties firmly entrenched in their respective positions.

Prior to its release, rumours of the worst kind of rancor and dissatisfaction had already emerged with various actors stating publicly that they were disassociating themselves from the dreaded final product. Tough luck, because all these much touted names are indeed very much a part of the movie and once their work was 'in the can' there was no going back however much they wish that they had - they are, as everyone who has seen the spectacle very much a part of events of screen.

I remember taking the opportunity to watch the movie on a trip from 'pious', censorship worshiping Britain to the US where Caligula was packing 'em in - albeit in cinemas normally reserved for adult fare. Penthouse, the financiers of the film, had apparently 'spruced and spiced' things up a touch by adding considerable footage of hard core porn - they had done this due to a number of reasons, but the most overt was that they were so unsure of what they had created that the producers felt compelled to 'guarantee' an audience by adding hefty amounts of porn. Secondly, the producers realized that they had the most horrendous dud on their hands and felt that the only way to recover their considerable production costs was to go porno !

I arrived at the cinema which was jam packed to capacity with what seemed like a sea of faceless men wearing the obligatory 'dirty old man's black anorak. It wasn't long before a naïve young cinema goer bred on the rigid censorship policies of conservative and 'propah' Britain was to be shocked by what began to unfurl on screen.

Shocked, repelled, sickened and ultimately disgusted. If you set side the hard-core on display and consider the rest of the film - it is a totally shambolic affair and even that is being quite generous. Shorn of any semblance of cinematic style, the film is a laborious series of situations depicted to shock repel and titillate. But all they succeed in doing is repelling, and ultimately all the pumping and thrusting and fingering gets thoroughly repetitive and singularly uninteresting.

Malcolm MacDowell, forever Alex from Clockwork Orange is in the title role and tries hard but emerges as farcical high camp - his two step is one of the few highlights of this desperately gutter level affair. MacDowell tries in vein to infuse some of the spark of madness that glinted in Alex's eyes to the role of Caligula, but try as he might he just cant rise above the unspeakably awful script.

Luminaries such as Sir John Geilgud make sorry but mercifully brief appearances. Peter O'Toole plays a Tiberius ravaged by VD sores and scabs and was reportedly too drunk to see straight during filming even if his semi comatose state seems in keeping with the rest of the garbage on screen. The film fails miserable in any pretension it may have had as a historical transcript - with history being bent liberally to accommodate Guccione's sordid fantasy.

Now lets try to recall the shockers that this film lines up to treat the audiences to :

1. the infamous lesbian scene treating us to close ups of various tongues going here and there and everywhere - besides objects being inserted into various orifices.
2. Lurid male on male sex acts
3. Bestiality and incest
4. Necrophilia
5. Fist through anus
6. Loads of vomiting and retching
7. Disembowelments and beheadings
8. Hacking off of organs and feeding them to the dogs !
9. Clinical shots of ejaculations

The list could go on had my memory not failed me…. Caligula ultimately comes across as a sub John Waters imitation without any of the humour and joie de vivre that Waters and Divine and company displayed while embracing similarly dubious activities. With Waters, the grotesqueness is equally shocking but done with such gleeful relish and madcap, demented style. Here it is as exciting and attractive as watching a medical school film on sexual deviance and perversion. Just the absolute dregs - but certainly a 'one of a kind' and continues to enjoy and build on its notoriety and sheer awfulness.