Charlton Heston and Rex Harrison portray two of the Renaissance's most colorful figures in this historical drama based on Irving Stone's best-seller. When Pope Julius II (Harrison) commissions Michelangelo (Heston) to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, the artist initially refuses. Virtually forced to do the job by Julius, Michelangelo later destroys his own work and flees Rome. Nominated for an Oscar for Cinematography and named one of the year's best films by the National Board of Review, The Agony And The Ecstasy is a fascinating dramatization of the battle of wills behind one of the world's artistic masterpieces.

Adapted from Irving Stone's fanciful biography of Michelangelo and starring Charlton Heston as the artist, THE AGONY AND THE ECSTASY focuses on the five years that the artist spent creating the Sistine ceiling and his tumultuous relationship with Pope Julius II (Rex Harrison). The pope is a vain and ambitious sort who has commissioned the painting of the chapel with the intention of having his name preserved for posterity. To this end, he tries to bully and threaten the volatile painter, who is answerable only to his muse.