Descended from Hercules: Biopolitics and the Muscled Male Body on Screen

Muscles, six—pack abs, skin, and sweat fill the screen in the tawdry and tantalizing peplum films associated with epic Italian cinema of the 1950s and 1960s. Using techniques like slow motion and stopped time, these films instill the hero's vitality with timeless admiration and immerse the hero's body in a world that is lavishly eroticized but without sexual desire. These "sword and sandal" films represent a century—long cinematic biopolitical intervention that offers the spectator an imagi...