A True Masterpiece

Rating: 10/10 (25 July 2002)

A sprawling epic of a film, Lawrence of Arabia is a one of a kind film. A true masterpiece of the art form, it is. There will be no other film like it, EVER! I say this with much enthusiasm, and alas no heaviness of heart. The days of the potential movies like Lawrence of Arabia are behind us. These are things that we as moviegoers must come to grip with. There will be other great films, but no film will be great for the reasons that Lawrence of Arabia stands apart from the crowd.
Director David Lean's Lawrence of Arabia arguably contains the most beautiful cinematography in the history of film. The scale of this picture is grand and the scope is the same. From stunning shots of Turkish by-planes attacking an Arab camp to the Arab forces sacking the Turkish controlled city of Arabak, every shot is carefully and masterfully constructed. Steven Spielberg adds comment to the DVD version of the film. In this commentary, he raves of the editing. In retrospect, this is what makes this film so lovely. The shots are wonderful. Yet, in addition, these shots are wonderfully arranged.
In today's cinema, Lawrence of Arabia would have been perhaps 2 to 2 ½ hours long - had it been greenlighted at all. Today's audiences, and moreover producers, do not have the patience for the mood of a film to be slowly captured between main plot development (notice the box office failure of Magnolia or Meet Joe Black). Sure we can sit through a 3+-hour film - think Titanic - but there was always action, the story continued to thrust forward. Lawrence had about 2 ½ hours of deliberate forward moving story - the other hour is mood, atmosphere, and the soul of the story. Titanic had three hours and fifteen minutes of story to tell - or close to it.
Besides our reluctance to accept the long unfolding of a story. Lawrence of Arabia would not have been produced the way it was for technical reasons. Lean uses pan shots to capture the vast desert as seen from far away mountains. Today much of this would have been computer generated. The countless number of extras used in battle sequences would have also been created using digital trickery.
Now, none of this is pointed out to bash modern cinema -- I love today's filmmaking. No, this more of a comment on the way movies are made today. While Battleship Potemkin (1925) is a visual splendor and breakthrough of a film, it still would not be told that way today - or even in the day of Lawrence of Arabia. Why should it be? We have sound today. Likewise Lawrence's grand scenes would not be told the same way anymore. Why should they be? We have digital animation.
Lawrence of Arabia, the film and the man, is a one of a kind. Peter O' Toole captures this stunning historical figure with much style. Alec Guinness, Anthony Quinn, and Omar Shariff are equally splendid in supporting roles. Lawrence's character traits are well examined through O' Toole's portrayal and the others' reactions to him.
Apparently, the script took some liberties with history, which would have also worked against it today. I say nonsense though. Historical dramas are just that - drama. Liberties will be taken and these liberties can serve as a launch point for intellectual discussion on the historical topic. Otherwise, it is the filmmaker's tale to tell. The only time when historical inaccuracies are particularly deplorable is when the film is touted as good history.
Lawrence of Arabia is a true masterpiece in every sense of the word. A technical and visual tour de force. It is a good story that is well told and well acted. And like all true masterpieces of the cinema, it could not be captured again the same way.