Ben-Hur

While not my favorite movie ever, currently it resides at #6 on my all time list, this is a movie where I find myself (and Singin' in the Rain and Gone With the Wind) just completely in love with the Old Hollywood movie making magic that's on screen. I can only imagine seeing the premiere of this at Mann's Chinese Theater, or Radio City Music Hall. My mother, who got me started doing one of my movie geek obsessions, writing down the name of every movie I see in theaters, with the date, location, and principal actors, has this as the first movie in her first book....EVER. Ben-Hur! She was nine years old. My first movie, at a comparable age is An American Tail 2: Fievel Goes West. Terrible! This is why I needed to be born years before I was. But anyway, the movie! While films like "The Ten Commandments" and "Cleopatra" might be more extravagent, none of the period epics of the time were better than MGM's "Ben-Hur". Already filmed once before by the studio in 1925, as a silent spectacle the film is still quite impressive, the 1959 version gets the full epic treatment. A gaudy 212 minute running time, a large international cast, incredible sets, luscious Technicolor, all captured in brilliant MGM patented 65mm film. Producer Sam Zimbalist spared no expense (was any expense ever spared during the bigger is better 1950's studio filmmaking days?), setting up shop at the Cinecetta Studios in Rome, which to that point, had been used primarily as the home of Neo-realism filmmakers such as Federico Fellini and Vittorio de Sicca. Everything got big when Hollywood arrived however, and MGM's gamble to avoid bankruptcy (it would later succumb twice however) paid off with the first film to capture eleven Academy Awards: "Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ".

Charlton Heston, who can be pretty cardboard sometimes, is dynamic. His clenched jawed passion and often times silly melodramatic tone are perfect here as the disgraced Jewish prince Judah Ben-Hur. Messala, Judah's boyhood friend, now a Roman tribune, unjustly wrongs him and his family, forcing Judah into bondage in a Roman slave galley and imprisoning his mother and sister in the dungeons. After Judah refused to help Messala identify "enemies of Rome", or "patriots" as Judah refers to them in a great back and forth between the two men early on, Messala does not flinch when his word would clear Judah and his family's name of the alleged indiscretion. Thus, Judah devotes the rest of his life to exacting revenge. This being the 1950's, we see more of his "the rest of his life" than you would think. About 150 minutes later (after becoming a Roman citizen thanks to saving the life of a Roman general, Quintus Arrius, in a spectacular naval battle scene) Judah makes his way back to Jersusalem and takes part in, for my money, the best and most exciting action scene in cinematic history: the chariot race sequence. For years, this scene would switch from full frame to wide screen on both dvd and vhs (I believe the 4 disc edition has the entire movie in wide screen) and it is worth it! The sequence is captivating, and knowing little things about it make it even more intense, like the legendary Yakima Canutt's son actually going head over heels as Charlton Heston's stunt double, although rumors of a stunt man, specifically Stephen Boyd's double, being trampled to death in this scene I believe is the stuff of urban legend.

After this knockout sequence, in which Ben-Hur wins and Messala is killed, the story shifts back to a more somber tone: Christ's crucifixion. Earlier in the film, while in a Roman chain gang, Jesus encounters Judah and gives him water, a favor Judah returns while Christ carries his cross to Calvary. I always remember the line "I know this man" from this scene. Intercut during Christ being raised onto the cross is Judah finding his mother and sister, long since exiled to the leper community, and helping them through the crashing thunder and lightning. Finally, as Christ hangs from the cross, He grants Judah one final favor, healing his mother and sister. Film and religion scholars have debated whether or not this signifies a religious "cop-out", with the Jewish Judah undergoing a "Christian" reinvention. While there is definitely a strong subtext running throughout this scene, I think the point William Wyler is trying to hammer home here is one of faith. Judah's realization of the magnitude of his situation contrasted with that of Christ leads to his ultimate salvation: not beating Messala in the chariot race, but a reunion with his family. He had devoted his entire life to killing Messala, and while his mother and sister had never faded from his memory, he suspected them long dead and thus was able to concentrate solely on destroying Messala. However upon acheiving his goal he realizes that revenge is not as sweet as anticipated, even going so far as to pay his respects to the dying Messala, who perhaps saves his tortured soul by telling Judah that his mother and sister still live. With this news, Judah remembers compassion and love, and it is this that Christ rewards. Scholars can debate this all they want though, the fact still remains: "Ben-Hur" is the best epic film of its type, ever.