A saga of epic proportions..

Rating: 8/10 (12 October 2010)

"Lawrence of Arabia" had been on my must-watch movies list for a long time. There was so much I had heard and read about it. A lot had been written about this epic saga of T.E. Lawrence as being one of the greatest and most influential films of all time, revered by many great directors including Martin Scorsese.
I finally got a chance to see it recently, and considering all the good things I had heard about it, I must admit that my expectations were quite high.
"Lawrence of Arabia" tells the story of Lt. Colonel T.E. Lawrence, focussing on his war experiences in Arabia during World War I. A topic of such vast proportions needed an equally ambitious project to pull it off, and indeed, the filmmakers have put in a lot of efforts in painting this huge canvas and achieving what they'd set out to. Peter O'Toole plays the eponymous T.E. Lawrence. The film starts out with the accidental death of T.E. Lawrence in the present. The film then flashes back to narrate the story of how Lawrence was sent on a mission to evaluate the situation in Arabia, pertaining to Prince Faisal and his revolt against the Ottoman Turks.
Rest of the film then shows Lawrence's own involvement in leading the Arabs in the battle against Turks. So needless to say, you are presented with extravagant battle scenes, and long, never-ending desert treks, Lawrence's new-found friendships, his emotional ups and downs and some difficult choices that he is presented with. The director heavily indulges in showing off the beautifully shot desert landscapes (with the excellent Super Panavision 70 cinematography by Freddie Young).
"Lawrence of Arabia" lived up to my expectations during most of its long running time. In fact a lot more during the first two hours of the film. But something happened in the final act. Somehow the whole film seemed to go a bit awry and disoriented for some reasons which I am finding difficult to put in words. Suffice to say that it wasn't the overwhelming experience I thought it would be. For one, I think the film could have easily been cut short. A lot of time has been spent on desert treks and their long journeys through it. Yes, these scenes do require detail to show the hardships these men must've faced while crossing those perilous desert lands. But I somehow feel the director went too far in his attempt. So much so that the events taking place in the final 30-45 minutes seem too abrupt and disconnected.
There have been films as long as this and longer, but they have enough substance to fill those long hours. There are sufficient examples ('The Godfather Part II', 'Schindler's List', 'Seven Samurai' to name a few). "Lawrence of Arabia" has enough substance, yes, but a running time of 216 minutes, was simply not necessary.
That aside, the film, of course has plenty of plusses: As mentioned earlier, Freddie Young's cinematography is superb, so is Maurice Jarre's inspirational score. David Lean does a great job in directing this script by Robert Bolt and Michael Wilson, but falls a little short of expectations in terms of distribution of the content. Nonetheless, this was in itself a magnificent, ambitious project and a difficult one at that, so it is not fair to nitpick too much.
The cast: Peter O'Toole's performance is widely talked about. For me, frankly it was somewhat inconsistent. Not to take away any merits from the Legendary actor's acting talent. He was, in fact, great in some scenes. But I was slightly put off by the sometimes nervous, sometimes excessively confident behaviour. Then there were some scenes in which he went way over the top in displaying his emotions. Maybe it was the director who wanted O'Toole to act like that and O'Toole gave the director what he wanted.
The supporting cast is great, especially Omar Sharif, Anthony Quinn and Alec Guiness. I had seen Anthony Quinn in Fellini's "La Strada" earlier and it was great to see him display such versatility.
All said, "Lawrence of Arabia" is a great film, but falls a tad short of being a masterpiece in my book.
However, it definitely deserves to be watched at least once by any serious lover of cinema.