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Rating:  - Greatest Epic ever!!
This is undoubtable my favourite epic film of all time. Charlton Heston is fantastic in the film and I was saddened to heard that he had died just a few days ago.
Rating: - Great Video
This video covers the period of history when Christ was on the earth. It is told through the eyes of a family who lived through the time and their ability to forgive their enemies through the teachings from the young Rabbi of Nazareth. The story ends with the crucifixtion of Christ and the new birth of this family from unforgivenss to forgiveness.
Rating: - Buy the 4 DIsc Collector's Edition
Buy the 4 DIsc Collector's Edition becuase at the price Amazon is offering it at, its a bargain. It is worth every penny. The first 2 DVDs are the fully reestored movie in Camera 65, 2.76:1 aspect radio. Extremely sharp with vibrant colors. Incredible sound quality. Also included on the 3rd disc is the 1925 version and the 4th disc contains 2 documentaries about Ben Hur and how the movie was made. If you have any interest at all in owning this movie, buy it now becuase you never know when stuff like this goes out of print. This is the way all movies should look on DVD. I see a lot of newer films that don't have the transfer quality this one does.
Rating:  - Do I look like a young Charlton Heston?
We watched Ben-Hur a few weeks ago, and I was struck by a few things...how men in film today do not often allow for themselves to often show the same range of emotion as Heston showed in this film, how usually these days such long films with meandering plots don't often get made, and how I look, at least a little, like Heston in this time frame...when I'm not wearing glasses, that is.
The film itself was OK, though the plot (as I said) tends to wander around, and the conversion of faith that Ben-Hur experiences at the end is not handled well. When I was in high school, I took a class on writing, and the one thing that has stuck with me from that class is how a story should show, and not tell, of the inner workings of the characters. Ben-Hur doesn't come off at the end so well, because it tells us of the conversion in faith, rather than showing Ben-Hur work through his internal conflicts, and thus convert through epiphany. That chariot race was pretty impressive (and I was reminded of The Phantom Menace by it), and the effort put into a detailed recreation of Roman and Judaic life is impressive. I guess I wasn't as struck by the film as I was by the Ten Commandments, is all.
Rating: - Better Quality Transfer
I had the older one disk version of this and after I got a Video Projector, I was surprised to realize the poor quality of the transfer, so I was very pleased to find this newer version. The picture is the best I've seen on this title for now anyway. I'll never understand why any company would take one of these great old films, often filmed in 65 or 70mm and then transfer it without even cleaning the transfer print sometimes. It's about time we got decent versions of some of these classics. I was also glad to get a good DVD version of the Silent 1925 Ben Hur. Also a great film that deserves a great presentation. If your DVD player can slow it down a bit, try it. It looks much better at a more natural speed. Fortunately for me, my DVD player also adjusts the sound pitch so the Carl Davis Score doesn't sound too bad slightly slowed down. One thing I noticed, but was not sure of is Chuck Heston's Narration seems to be chopped up and some other guy, T. Gene Hatcher, added to it. On the other disk I had, it was just Chuck talking I think and I think he had more to say. This seems to be edited together with this new younger historian guy's comments. I also couldn't find some out take footage from the Silent Version were you could see a car driving onto the set. I don't remember now however, where I saw that footage. It may have been on one of the earlier Laser Disk Versions of the Silent or Sound version. I have the Laser of the Silent Version and it has no Chapter Stops, so that alone was a terrific reason to pick up this 4 disk set.
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