Lawrence Ad Nauseam

Rating: 4/10 (28 April 2009)

Paul Theroux and Jorge Luis Borges once discussed T.E. Lawrence's book SEVEN PILLARS OF WISDOM. Theroux, in response to Borges' praise of it, said a clever thing: "How can a book about Arabs not be funny?" True. SEVEN PILLARS, while wonderful in many respects, is a relentlessly grim chronicle of disillusionment. In this respect, LAWRENCE OF ARABIA is true to its source material. But this does not deserve reverence. To repeat a mistake is to commit an even greater folly.
Grandiose does not equal grand, and spectacle is not of itself spectacular. Yes, this movie looks great, and it is one of the most auspicious and audacious entrances an actor has ever made onto the world stage. But man, is it dull. Anyone not bored by multiple offerings of five minutes' empty pageantry - a thousand camels marching off to battle (which never is satisfactorily joined) - is more easily amused than I.
I liked this movie when I was a kid. Now I do not like this movie. It is too long, for one thing, not that long is bad per se, but long and incoherent is very bad. I've finally noticed that what's really wrong with this picture, aside from being directed by the most overrated A-lister in the history of the tenth art, is its inability to tell a story. What is going on at any given point after the first couple of hours - in the campaign, in T.E.'s head, in the battle - is obviously of inferior importance to how it looks.
Now, this is a major achievement. To be incoherent in a travelogue-depth 4-hour yawnathon of pedantic phrasemaking is not only to defeat the purpose of a travelogue (which is to make clear for adults what was possibly too confusing for children), it is to complicate the logic of simplicity by means cunning and nefarious, for no apparent gain or purpose. I am amazed that it could be done. But then David Lean is the thinking man's Roland Emmerich - if the thinking man doesn't mind being made to think the same thing over and over. Other giants of the epic travelogue - John Sturges, Lawrence Kasdan, Richard Attenborough, Mel Gibson, Ridley Scott, Peter Jackson - while boring and/or insulting me much of the time, at least usually manage to get the ideas across in a shot or two, abetted by dialog best presented on T-shirts. If Noel Coward had been the director, instead of just a third unit helpmate to his old partner, it would have made sense and it would have been two hours shorter and it would have been better. In fact it would have been good.
I have to admit that while no less bad, most of Lean's other gigantic pieces of shite, like BRIDGE ON THE RIVER WHY? and DOCTOR ZZZZZZ, do not confuse me. They are good traditional travelogues in the Old Hollywood vein: say it early, say it often, say it again if in doubt. Funny, 'cause I kind of like his GREAT EXPECTATIONS, a much more watchable film (and certainly not small in scope) than the book is readable. But going back that far I believe he was still under the influence of his benign Svengali, Coward.