Epic masterpiece of a man struggling with his identity

Rating: 10/10 (2 May 2006)

The movie begins with the overture playing over a black screen. In reality, it is an important start to the movie- we are faced with a wavy, dreamy piece full of different undertones that relate specifically to the main character of Lawrence, alluding to the different forces in his mind and allowing the viewer to imagine, if not dream, of expectations of things to come. We have a man who grapples with his identity: he has a deep interest in the desert and in the beginning tries hard to fit in with a culture and peoples he feels are his own. He has an illusion of what he would like to be, an idea already mapped out in his mind, of what the arab peoples are, and how he, too, can hopefully become one, assimilate himself where he feels at home. The rigid constructs, however, of this illusion begin to fall apart as he fails to understand or admit to certain aspects of the culture he cannot deal or cope with: constant violence, the ever-present idea of death, and the lack of the peoples to come together and progress as a nation. He slowly begins to change, as little by little he becomes frustrated with the way things are, a way completely different than what he would like to be, a way that in the end lead him to take a pessimistic view on life, a hateful anger that he turns to the world because things have failed to go the way he chooses. The open desert, the beautiful landscapes, are all the setting for the freedom to do what one dreams to do- so long as he believes he can do it. But as he soon learns, there are things that he cannot change, and his character, his own sense of self, deteriorates.
He wishes at one point in the movie to be "ordinary". This comes about from his inability to cope with not being able to have things the way he wants them to. Ordinary people are happy because they accept the way things are, they are subservient to tradition. Lawrence is a man who believes nothing is written- he believes a man can do anything so long as he puts his mind to the task. The movie is a constant struggle between realizing things are not always as one would like them to be, his innermost desire to be something that doesn't exist- his idea of an "arab", is only an illusion he has created. He is an Englishman, who had wanted to be what he thought of in his mind of a man of the desert, and learns the hard way that it is not all beautiful camel rides and the people do not have the same ideas for progress as he does. After realizing he is an alien in what he felt was his home, he begins to undergo serious repercussions and isolates himself from the world, from his friends, and most importantly from himself. He treads on with the conviction that maybe things will change, but realizes every time that they will not, it is beyond his control, so he must leave.
Everyone has an idea of what they would like themselves to be, or an idea of how they imagine things to turn out, but as always, one can only write his own terms so far- we must yield to forces beyond our control. Amazing film. Amazing cinematography. Amazing acting. Amazing character developments. Watch it in one sitting, on a large screen.