Sign into an existing account

This is posted in politics because that's the whole point of my review.

First off, the movie is like watching a sick fever dream. Watching it feels like you've had about six too many beers and are fresh out of Count Chocula. If you're not ready to endure three hours of that, I'd recommend holding off. While the plot isn’t exactly stellar, as I watched it, I started thinking: Caligula might have been the Donald Trump of his day.

Now, I think about the Roman Empire as much as any man, but I’m no history expert, so let me apologize in advance if I get anything wrong.

In the movie, Caligula deliberately provokes the Senate, which he sees as a bunch of pushovers:

- He makes his horse a consul.
- He turns the imperial palace into a brothel, forcing senators' wives to participate.
- There’s a fantastic scene where he declares himself God and shouts "aye," prompting the fearful senators to echo him one by one. Once he has them all doing that, he suddenly switches to "bah, bah" (like a sheep), and they sheepishly follow along, completely powerless to stop him.
- He forces senators to grovel publicly.
- And much more.

The film is an artistic take on Caligula’s reign, painting with broad strokes. For all its artistry, though, I think it does a great job capturing the core truths of the Caligula story.

There’s a humorous scene where Caligula sets out to invade Britain but instead has his men attack the waves and collect seashells. This story feels ripe for being taken out of context. It seem reasonable to me that Caligula was trying to make some kind of a statement but the historical recorded reported it as, “Crazy Caligula declares war on Neptune, lol.”

Other scenes show Caligula appealing to the masses over the Senate. For example, he hands out gold coins and hosts water games at the Colosseum. By doing so, he undermines the Senate while building popular support. My guess is that his disdain for the Senate, combined with his efforts to delegitimize and humiliate them, led the Senate to tell terrible stories about him after his death.

This is where I had my epiphany: Caligula, to me, sounds a lot like Donald Trump. He targeted high-level government officials, gained popular support, and yet the official narrative portrays him as a deranged madman.