section_path: In popular culture
section_name: In popular culture
paragraph_text: In popular culture
  
  A large number of films made after World War II made the Roman salute a visual stereotype of a proto-fascist ancient Roman society. In the 1951 film Quo Vadis, Nero 's repeated use of the salute at mass rallies explicitly presents the Roman Empire as a fascist military state. The movie provided other filmmakers of the time a model, with notable examples including Ben-Hur, Spartacus, Cleopatra, and Caligula. Not until Gladiator did the Roman epic return to the cinema. In this movie, the salute is notably absent in most scenes, for example when Commodus enters Rome or when the Senate salutes the Emperor by head-bowing.
  
  Variations on the salute also appear in neo-fascist contexts. For example, The Christian Falangist Party, founded in 1985, uses a " pectoral salute ", in which the right arm, bent at the elbow, is extended from the heart, palm down. This gesture was used in François Truffaut 's 1966 film Fahrenheit 451. The film portrays a futuristic totalitarian society modeled after the fascist state, including black uniforms, book burnings, and thought control. In the Star Trek episode " Mirror, Mirror ", the salute begins with the right fist being placed over the heart, as in a pectoral salute, and then the arm is stretched out (usually up) before the body, open palm down, as in a traditional Roman salute. In the episode, Captain Kirk and members of his crew are transported to a parallel universe in which the United Federation of Planets has been replaced by an empire characterized by sadistic violence and torture, genocide, and unquestioning obedience to authority. A modified Roman salute is commonly used in the British-American series Rome. Here the salute avoids similarity to the Fascist salute, as the series seeks not to depict these Romans as stereotypical conquerors. Therefore, the salute is not the familiar straight arm salute but rather resembles a pectoral salute, with the right hand placed over the heart and then extended to the front of the body.
  
  A large number of films made after World War II made the Roman salute a visual stereotype of a proto-fascist ancient Roman society. In the 1951 film Quo Vadis, Nero 's repeated use of the salute at mass rallies explicitly presents the Roman Empire as a fascist military state. The movie provided other filmmakers of the time a model, with notable examples including Ben-Hur, Spartacus, Cleopatra, and Caligula. Not until Gladiator did the Roman epic return to the cinema. In this movie, the salute is notably absent in most scenes, for example when Commodus enters Rome or when the Senate salutes the Emperor by head-bowing.
  
  Variations on the salute also appear in neo-fascist contexts. For example, The Christian Falangist Party, founded in 1985, uses a " pectoral salute ", in which the right arm, bent at the elbow, is extended from the heart, palm down. This gesture was used in François Truffaut 's 1966 film Fahrenheit 451. The film portrays a futuristic totalitarian society modeled after the fascist state, including black uniforms, book burnings, and thought control. In the Star Trek episode " Mirror, Mirror ", the salute begins with the right fist being placed over the heart, as in a pectoral salute, and then the arm is stretched out (usually up) before the body, open palm down, as in a traditional Roman salute. In the episode, Captain Kirk and members of his crew are transported to a parallel universe in which the United Federation of Planets has been replaced by an empire characterized by sadistic violence and torture, genocide, and unquestioning obedience to authority. A modified Roman salute is commonly used in the British-American series Rome. Here the salute avoids similarity to the Fascist salute, as the series seeks not to depict these Romans as stereotypical conquerors. Therefore, the salute is not the familiar straight arm salute but rather resembles a pectoral salute, with the right hand placed over the heart and then extended to the front of the body.