BEN HUR

Movie Review #944

 BEN HUR

Another remake, this time of the swords-and-sandals epic from 1959 that had Charlton Heston in the role of Jewish prince hard done by & ending up as a Roman slave before coming good & finally living happily ever after.

The difficulty with remakes is that there is always a yardstick to measure against & even though the original was executed with a certain amount of cheesy 50s panache, it still rates as one of the most successful movies of all time, which is a pretty hard act to follow. This one doesn't do too badly however. It follows the original storyline reasonably closely albeit with a few little tweaks. The original story ran parallel with and was actually written to intertwine with the crucifixion of Jesus although in this count, the latest offering is a bit lame. The message of redemption does get a bit lost but the rest of the outplay is pretty engrossing.

 Seeing Morgan Freeman in long grey deadlocks is a sight to behold. It’s all as epic as epic is gonna be in this day and age of CGI trickery with the legendary chariot race as gripping as the original. Although there are no real star performances as such, the dreadlocked Mr Freeman does stand head and shoulders above the rest.

Interestingly enough the original novel was written by Lew Wallace who amongst other things was a Union Army General in the Civil War and later became Governor of New Mexico, crossing paths with none other than Billy the Kid. It was also turned into a silent movie in 1925 so this effort is actually version trios.

Overall  7.5/10.