I am going to watch the AFI Top 100 films from 100 to 1 and review (a term I use loosely) each and every one of them. After I decided to do this, I requested Ben Hur (number 100) from Netflix. They said I had a short wait. Then the short wait devolved into a long wait, then back to a short wait, and finally I got the Blu Ray. It only took three months. That'll teach me to request Christian movies around Easter time.
So here's the thing. Ben Hur is weird. And tedious. And glorious. And boring. And fascinating.
Released in 1959 and... hang on a sec. 1959?! I was minus eleven years old when this came out! Ugh. Anyway, it stars Charlton Heston and a bunch of other people who dress in bed sheets, have no electricity, and are constantly surrounded by matte paintings. Before the movie even starts however, there's five minutes of an overture. Snooooze. Like before we even see the MGM lion logo. And when the lion shows up, he just stares into space. THE MGM LION DOES NOT ROAR.
The movie is billed as Ben Hur: A Tale of the Christ. Strangely, Christ is rarely depicted in this overlong film. When he does show, it's from the back, or from a distance with a shadow (the only shadow in the shot) over his face, or (my favorite) only his hands are shown. When this happened it reminded me of the Seinfeld 'Man Hands' episode because I will always be thirteen years old.
And this film really showcases the problems Hollywood had in casting people of ethnicity. Midwesterner WASP Heston plays Judah Ben Hur, a Jewish prince. I suppose it's still better than when Heston played Mike Vargas, a Mexican, in 1958's A Touch of Evil.
Probably the most heinous example of White Guy Portraying a Person of Color is this:
Welsh born actor Hugh Griffith playing Sheik Ilderim...
whose brown makeup changed shade from scene to scene. A Middle Eastern actress was, shockingly, cast to play (gasp!) a non-white person, Esther. Palestinian born Hara Harareet, plays Heston's girlfriend and Hollywood made darn sure that she's a light-skinned Palestinian so that she's as non-threatening as possible.
Anyhoo, Ben Hur rambled this way, then ambled that way, then took a nap under a fig tree, then, hey it's time for the signature moment, the great chariot race! Except it was kinda not exciting. As set pieces go, I've rarely seen a more ambitious piece, but I just gotta say, meh. Sure there was some drama, sure there were some awesome stunts, but the editing was like that helium balloon from that party that has lost most of its buoyancy and is now drifting behind my couch: back then it was nice, but today, mostly limp. And, AND!, they did the thing I hate most about older movies when they're trying to convey urgency, THEY SPED UP THE FILM! Like we wouldn't notice or something. Blegh.
Simply put, there was not enough good to outweigh the bad.
In my humble yet stupid opinion, this is not the 100th best movie ever made. If this film is a harbinger of what I'm getting myself into, I may have to fall on my sword long before I ever reach Citizen Kane at number one.
Next up: AFI 99 Toy Story
Ben Hur can suck a fuck.
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