Review of Ben-Hur (100)

This was a monumental film to kick off a monumental marathon. We officially started our 100 movie quest on Saturday, August 18th, by watching Ben-Hur – not exactly what you would call “easing into it” by any means, as the movie is well over three hours long. 

Plot
Judah Ben-Hur lives as a rich Jewish prince and merchant in Jerusalem at the beginning of the 1st century. Together with the new governor his old friend Messala arrives as commanding officer of the Roman legions. At first they are happy to meet after a long time but their different politic views separate them. During the welcome parade a brick falls down from Judah's house and barely misses the governor. Although Messala knows that they are not guilty he sends Judah to the galleys and throws his mother and sister into prison. But Judah swears to come back and take revenge.

Jason's Thoughts
This is one movie, and I’m sure there will be others, that I would have never watched had it not been for this list.  However, after watching it, I can easily see the reason why this film walked away with 11 Academy Awards as the movie is quite impressive – especially for the fact that it was shot in the 1950's, before the time of computer enhanced special effects.

After viewing it, two parts stuck out in my mind, which were the battle at sea and, of course, the chariot race.  Both were epic and impressive in every sense of the word, however, the rest of the movie seemed to drag on and almost slow down to a standstill at points.  Again, this was made almost 50 years ago and the viewing habits of people have changed since then.  In my opinion, parts of the movie could have been taken out or trimmed up to help move it along in parts without harming the rest of the film, but since it was made long ago I am willing to look past that and still give it 3 out of 5 stars.

Crystal's Thoughts
Getting started with our movie marathon was pretty much a marathon in itself.  Last week though, we walked the Heart Walk for our niece Lainey.  One of Jason's work buddies joined us in this and during the walk one of the topics was our 50 things to do before we die list (look for mine soon).  Somehow it ended with us betting that we would not accomplish the movie marathon feat within two years, which is Jason's goal mind you, not mine.  Of course, this fueled Jason even more so this past weekend we set out to finally watch Ben-Hur, which has been gathering dust on top of our entertainment center for well over a week.  After the 3.5 hours, I regretted putting off this movie for so long! 

While I certainly would not make it a definite, you have to go watch it right away pick, it was way above my expectations.  As Jason noted in his blog, the movie went way beyond technical aspects (or what one would think was possible) of the 50s.  For most of the movie, I did not feel like I was watching a movie made in the 50s, other than the "Overture" and "Intermission" screen shots, though I knew those would be part of it, having seen Gone With the Wind countless times.  The special effects, acting, and dialogue were fascinating to me.  Like Jason, the movie also dragged on a bit too much for me, and I can't imagine how awesome it would have been being about an hour shorter.  I think it would be a much more watched movie. 

One thing I do want to comment on from the movie was my intrigue in how they never showed Jesus' face.  Jason later read online that this was in respect for Jesus.  I found it interesting as this day and age, I think the philosophy is more that it is disrespectful to not show Jesus' face in a movie.  I am not sure; I think I'll add watching The Passion of The Christ to my list now to have today's perspective on it.  For now though, it's off to Toy Story.  What an odd movie to follow up Ben-Hur... 

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