Oscarized adaptation based on Lew Wallace's novel with huge production design and wonderful scenarios

Rating: 9/10 (16 March 2014)

This monumental version of renowned story during the time of Christ which was filmed several times, concerning on a wealthy Jewish named Ben-Hur results to be an impressive movie . It is a big budget version by William Wyler that won a record of 11 Oscars and was the most expensive picture of its time , being one of the greatest movies of all history. The story is well known , a rich Jewish nobleman Ben Hur (Charlton Heston in the title role, he was initially offered the role of Messala , though Burt Lancaster was considered) and his confrontation to military Messala (Stephen Boyd , though Robert Ryan was also considered , Boyd and other actors playing Romans wore dark contact lenses, so their eyes appeared brown), though they were childhood friends . When happen a distress , Ben Hur incurs the hostility his previous friend and is condemned to galley slavery , reduced to manning an oar , and his family is sent to prison during several years into a room completely locked . When he's in a galleon as slave rower saves to Quinto Arrio (Jack Hawkins) who subsequently appointed him as a heir . Years later he goes back to seek revenge upon his Roman tormentor . This culminates in a groundbreaking chariot race . As he returns Palestina where his mother Miriam and sister Tizrah (roles performed Martha Scott and Cathy O'Donnell respectively) are prisoned at Antonia fortress . This classic tale is added religious issues about Jesus life , as are described the pilgrimage , Mountain sermon , Passion , crucifixion and resurrection .
Lavishly produced by Sam Zimbalist and uncredited Sol Siegel, the production cost MGM a massive $15 million and was a gamble by the studio to save itself from bankruptcy . Sensational main cast and enjoyable support actors such as Hugh Griffith as Sheik , Sam Jaffe as Simonides , Finlay Currie as Balthasar , John Le Mesurier as Doctor , Frank Thring as Pontius Pilate , Andre Morrel as Sextus and many others . Marvellously staged battle ships and a breathtaking chariot races . As the chariot race required 15,000 extras, on a set constructed on 18 acres of backlot at Cinecitta Studios outside Rome , eighteen chariots were built, with half being used for practice ; the race took five weeks to film and 15,000 extras were used . Three hundred sets, five years of research, and fourteen months of labor were required for the sets . The dialogue , colorful images , majestic set design from Edward Carfagno and William Horning , glamorous photography by Robert Surtees , evocative musical score combine to cast a spellbinding movie . Rousing soundtrack by the classical Miklós Rózsa who wrote the musical score over a period of nearly a year . His first-rate score deservedly won an Academy Award . The motion picture was stunningly realized by director William Wyler who took on the project because he wanted to do a Cecil B. DeMille type picture . Although William Wyler was Jewish, he particularly wanted to make a film that would appeal to all religious faiths . Wyler selected all the camera angles for the chariot race, but left all the details of its actual shooting in the hands of his second-unit directors Andrew Marton and Yakima Canutt . Rating : 9 , extraordinary and awesome , it ranked #2 on the American Film Institute's list of the 10 greatest films in the genre "Epic".
There are numerous renditions based on Lee Wallace's Ben Hur , as stage version , classic MGM's mammoth silent version ¨Ben Hur¨ (1926) by Fred Niblo with Ramon Novarro; and this the remake Ben-Hur (1959) in which Stuntman Cliff Lyons worked as a stuntman/chariot driver in both Ben Hur (1925) and this one . Cartoon version (2003) by Bill Kowalchuk in which a prologue and epilogue narrated by Charlton Heston ; and ¨Ben Hur TV series¨ (2010) by Steven Shill with Joseph Morgan as Judah Ben-Hur , Stephen Campbell Moore as Messala , Emily VanCamp as Esther as Kristin Kreuk as Tirzah , Ben Cross , Simón Andreu , Alex Kingston , James Faulkner , among others .