You were the people's one true god, for a moment.

Ben-Hur

(1959)

(SPOILERS) Ben-Hur has the fairly unchallenged virtue of being a biblical epic that, if not quite as astounding as its unparalleled 11 Oscars would suggest, is actually really good. The number of kids foisted into watching it during a Religious Studies class only to be very pleasantly surprised (I can’t say my response was similar when Pink Floyd: The Wall got an unlikely airing), and its status as a Bank Holiday weekend fixture, has given it a well-earned reputation, even if nothing in the rest of its 3 hours 32 minutes comes close to matching the nine-minute chariot race.

Notably, like Titanic (which isn’t nearly as good, but also gleaned 11 statuettes), Ben-Hur failed to bag snag the Best Screenplay, but at least it was nominated in the first place (unlike Jimbo’s doomed romance). Karl Tunberg took the final credit, but there were a number of cooks involved, including Gore Vidal, very vocal in later years about how he persuaded Stephen Boyd to play Messala as the spurned lover of Chuck’s Judah Ben-Hur. How true this anecdote is is a source of debate, particularly given Vidal seemed to be (successfully) attempting to wind up Charlton Heston as much as anything, but there’s no denying the unbridled joy Judah takes in seeing his old pal again (“We were friends as boys. We were like brothers”).

Boyd didn’t get nominated, although he deserves credit for attempting to infuse Messala’s Machiavellian machinations with a touch of substance beyond mere villainy – he might have been lent more of a hand by the writers, as in the telling there’s usually too much of the polar opposites to make the dynamic between Judah and Messala really interesting; we aren’t really buying Judah being accused by Esther (Haya Harareet) of becoming just like him, and Heston’s rock of rectitude is a little too impermeable to express anything very deep, certainly to the extent of deserving the Best Actor Oscar. I mean, he’s fine, and he does what’s required of him, which is to bring star wattage to an epic, something that’s no small feat in itself – others have been much more disparaging, including director William Wyler – but it takes a different class of actor to add layers to such a basic outline (this may be a thinking person’s epic, but that only stretches so far). Like Russell Crowe in Gladiator, for instance, which riffs on Ben-Hur shamelessly, and also attained Oscar glory as a consequence.

As personified by Chuck, Judah is just your everyday, blonde(-ish) haired, blue-eyed Aryan Jew, and it’s difficult not to see America’s support of the recently-established State of Israel in his pronouncements and resistance to Roman rule. There’s also a light veneer of McCarthyism critique during the early stages (“Tell me the name of the criminals” demands Messala, asking his old friend to inform on his countrymen; which is about when Messala is required to start twirling his moustache – “What do the lives of a few Jews mean to you?”)

Wyler proudly declared that it took a Jew to make a decent film about Christ, but I’m not sure it’s quite that. The Jesus episodes are closer to Forrest Gump-encounters with Judah, who just happens to stumble by at divine moments (a cup of water here, a Sermon on the Mount there), and the picture very significantly reduces the impact of Ben-Hur’s conversion. He never actually pronounces himself as a Christian, but rather confesses “And I felt his voice take the sword out of my hand”, much preferable to the cold dead ones Heston intoned to the NRA that time as well as being an implicit rejection of the wrathful Old Testament God.

Generally, there’s a sense of stuffiness and earnest, classical Hollywood reverence to the “Tale of the Christ” parts, superbly mimicked by the Coen Brothers and George Clooney in Hail, Caesar!, that has you longing to get back to a slave galley or the arena. Of the former, jolly Jack Warner does offer some comparative theology (“Your God has forsaken you. He has no more power than the images I pray to”). Of course, Arrius only goes and adopts Judah, putting a spoke in what is turning into a Job story. Arrius is the exception to the general disdain shown towards the hissable Romans, which takes in Judah’s audience with Pilate (the superbly surnamed Frank Thring).

There’s a warm view given to the Arab of the piece, albeit a blacked-up Arab in the shape of Sheikh Ilderim (Welshman Hugh Griffith, who won Best Supporting Actor), showing solidarity with the Jew and backing him against Messala. That scene, as Messala, surrounded by fellow Roman soldiers, insults him, finds Ilderim in the mode of marvellously casual sarcasm: “Bravely spoken”.

The chariot race needs no commentary. If the Christ passages are old Hollywood, this is the ushering in of the new; it remains an enthralling piece of filmmaking, a clear influence on the likes of Spielberg (Raiders of the Lost Ark) and Lucas (The Phantom Menace), with Miklos Rozsa’s otherwise marbled score (John Williams evidently picked up a few cues from him) dropping away to allow for the furore of hooves and whips and Messala’s death-dealing “Greek chariot” (presumably all that nation’s chariots chopped the wheels from under you that season). Wyler really didn’t like widescreen, finding it next to impossible to fill the expanse of image, or exclude elements from it, but you wouldn’t know it from his and cinematographer’s Robert Surtees’ staggering efforts.

The trouble is, after the chariot race is over, and Messala’s toast (John Le Mesurier can’t save him) there’s still more than forty minutes to go, and interminable attempt by Chuck to bring relief to his leprosy-ravaged mother and sister. Very fortunately, it appears everyone within a twenty-mile radius received healing when Jesus died, something I didn’t read about in The Bible.

Despite this inflexibility when it counts, Ben-Hur generally makes the whole sword-and-sandals/ religious epic thing look easy, deceptively so when so much in the genre is such indigestible stodge that there’s no chance of replicating it as formula (look what happened to Ridley Scott when he tried to go back to the well, twice). If you needed convincing, another remake would be along in almost sixty years to prove the point…

Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.

Comments

Mondo bizarro. No offence man, but you’re in way over your head.

The X-Files 8.7: Via Negativa I wasn’t as down on the last couple of seasons of The X-Files as most seemed to be. For me, the mythology arc walked off a cliff somewhere around the first movie, with only the occasional glimmer of something worthwhile after that. So the fact that the show was tripping over itself with super soldiers and Mulder’s abduction/his and Scully’s baby (although we all now know it wasn’t, sheesh ), anything to stretch itself beyond breaking point in the vain hope viewers would carry on dangling, didn’t really make much odds. Of course, it finally snapped with the wretched main arc when the show returned, although the writing was truly on the wall with Season 9 finale The Truth . For the most part, though, I found 8 and 9 more watchable than, say 5 or 7. They came up with their fair share of engaging standalones, one of which I remembered to be Via Negativa .

Isn’t it true, it’s easier to be a holy man on the top of a mountain?

The Razor’s Edge (1984) (SPOILERS) I’d hadn’t so much a hankering as an idle interest in finally getting round to seeing Bill Murray’s passion project. Partly because it seemed like such an odd fit. And partly because passion isn’t something you tend to associate with any Murray movie project, involving as it usually does laidback deadpan. Murray, at nigh-on peak fame – only cemented by the movie he agreed to make to make this movie – embarks on a serious-acting-chops dramatic project, an adaptation of W Somerset Maugham’s story of one man’s journey of spiritual self-discovery. It should at least be interesting, shouldn’t it? A real curio? Alas, not. The Razor’s Edge is desperately turgid.

You have done well to keep so much hair, when so many’s after it.

Jeremiah Johnson (1972) (SPOILERS) Hitherto, I was most familiar with Jeremiah Johnson in the form of a popular animated gif of beardy Robert Redford smiling and nodding in slow zoom close up (a moment that is every bit as cheesy in the film as it is in the gif). For whatever reason, I hadn’t mustered the enthusiasm to check out the 1970s’ The Revenant until now (well, beard-wise, at any rate). It’s easy to distinguish the different personalities at work in the movie. The John Milius one – the (mythic) man against the mythic landscape; the likeably accentuated, semi-poetic dialogue – versus the more naturalistic approach favoured by director Sydney Pollack and star Redford. The fusion of the two makes for a very watchable, if undeniably languorous picture. It was evidently an influence on Dances with Wolves in some respects, although that Best Picture Oscar winner is at greater pains to summon a more sensitive portrayal of Native Americans (and thus, perversely, at times a more patr

Schnell, you stinkers! Come on, raus!

Private’s Progress (1956) (SPOILERS) Truth be told, there’s good reason sequel I’m Alright Jack reaps the raves – it is, after all, razor sharp and entirely focussed in its satire – but Private’s Progress is no slouch either. In some respects, it makes for an easy bedfellow with such wartime larks as Norman Wisdom’s The Square Peg (one of the slapstick funny man’s better vehicles). But it’s also, typically of the Boulting Brothers’ unsentimental disposition, utterly remorseless in rebuffing any notions of romantic wartime heroism, nobility and fighting the good fight. Everyone in the British Army is entirely cynical, or terrified, or an idiot.

It’s not as if she were a… maniac, a raving thing.

Psycho (1960) (SPOILERS) One of cinema’s most feted and most studied texts, and for good reason. Even if the worthier and more literate psycho movie of that year is Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom . One effectively ended a prolific director’s career and the other made its maker more in demand than ever, even if he too would discover he had peaked with his populist fear flick. Pretty much all the criticism and praise of Psycho is entirely valid. It remains a marvellously effective low-budget shocker, one peppered with superb performances and masterful staging. It’s also fairly rudimentary in tone, character and psychology. But those negative elements remain irrelevant to its overall power.

My Doggett would have called that crazy.

The X-Files 9.4: 4-D I get the impression no one much liked Agent Monica Reyes (Annabeth Gish), but I felt, for all the sub-Counsellor Troi, empath twiddling that dogged her characterisation, she was a mostly positive addition to the series’ last two years (of its main run). Undoubtedly, pairing her with Doggett, in anticipation of Gillian Anderson exiting just as David Duchovny had – you rewatch these seasons and you wonder where her head was at in hanging on – made for aggressively facile gender-swapped conflict positions on any given assignment. And generally, I’d have been more interested in seeing how two individuals sympathetic to the cause – her and Mulder – might have got on. Nevertheless, in an episode like 4-D you get her character, and Doggett’s, at probably their best mutual showing.

You’re a disgrace, sir... Weren’t you at Harrow?

Our Man in Marrakesh aka Bang! Bang! You’re Dead (1966) (SPOILERS) I hadn’t seen this one in more than three decades, and I had in mind that it was a decent spy spoof, well populated with a selection of stalwart British character actors in supporting roles. Well, I had the last bit right. I wasn’t aware this came from the stable of producer Harry Alan Towers, less still of his pedigree, or lack thereof, as a sort of British Roger Corman (he tried his hand at Star Wars with The Shape of Things to Come and Conan the Barbarian with Gor , for example). More legitimately, if you wish to call it that, he was responsible for the Christopher Lee Fu Manchu flicks. Our Man in Marrakesh – riffing overtly on Graham Greene’s Our Man in Havana in title – seems to have in mind the then popular spy genre and its burgeoning spoofs, but it’s unsure which it is; too lightweight to work as a thriller and too light on laughs to elicit a chuckle.

I tell you, it saw me! The hanged man’s asphyx saw me!

The Asphyx (1972) (SPOILERS) There was such a welter of British horror from the mid 60s to mid 70s, even leaving aside the Hammers and Amicuses, that it’s easy to lose track of them in the shuffle. This one, the sole directorial effort of Peter Newbrook (a cameraman for David Lean, then a cinematographer), has a strong premise and a decent cast, but it stumbles somewhat when it comes to taking that premise any place interesting. On the plus side, it largely eschews the grue. On the minus, directing clearly wasn’t Newbrook’s forte, and even aided by industry stalwart cinematographer Freddie Young (also a go-to for Lean), The Aspyhx is stylistically rather flat.

The best thing in the world for the inside of a man or a woman is the outside of a horse.

Marnie (1964) (SPOILERS) Hitch in a creative ditch. If you’ve read my Vertigo review, you’ll know I admired rather than really liked the picture many fete as his greatest work. Marnie is, in many ways, a redux, in the way De Palma kept repeating himself in the early 80s only significantly less delirious and… well, compelling. While Marnie succeeds in commanding the attention fitfully, it’s usually for the wrong reasons. And Hitch, digging his heels in as he strives to fashion a star against public disinterest – he failed to persuade Grace Kelly out of retirement for Marnie Rutland – comes entirely adrift with his leads.

You know what I sometimes wish? I sometimes wish I were ordinary like you. Ordinary and dead like all the others.

Séance on a Wet Afternoon (1964) (SPOILERS) Bryan Forbes’ adaptation of Mark McShane’s 1961’s novel has been much acclaimed. It boasts a distinctive storyline and effective performances from its leads, accompanied by effective black-and-white cinematography from Gerry Turpin and a suitably atmospheric score from John Barry. I’m not sure Forbes makes the most of the material, however, as he underlines Séance on a Wet Afternoon ’s inherently theatrical qualities at the expense of its filmic potential.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

Search This Blog