The “bad” Ben-Hur (Paramount, 8.19) had its world premiere last night (8.1) inside the Cinepolis JK in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Not Rio de Janeiro, where the 2016 Olympics will begin on Friday, 8.5 and where thousands of major-media types are congregated, but in corporate Sao Paulo. (Why?) I can’t find any Twitter reactions to Timur Bekmambetov‘s Christian-angled remake, but one can at least compared the musical scores between the two films to get a sense of things.
Miklos Rosza composed the Oscar-winning score to William Wyler’s 1959 film. To my ears Rosza’s music was a character, a voice, a force unto itself. The newbie’s score, obviously a lesser thing, was written by Marco Beltrami (3:10 to Yuma, The Hurt Locker, Hellboy, The Wolverine).
Above is a passage from Beltrami’s Ben-Hur channellings — a mildly dreamy, keyboard-synth thing. The main-title section of Rosza’s score, performed in 2013 by the John Wilson Orchestra inside London’s Royal Albert Hall, is below. A second Rosza composition (“Parade of the Charioteers”, performed by an all-brass band conducted by André Rieu) is after the jump, followed by a special Ben-Hur related performance of “Ceasefire,” performed by For King & Country, a Christian pop duo composed of Australian-American brothers Joel and Luke Smallbone. Please compare and assess.
With the “bad” Ben-Hur opening three weeks hence on 8.19, you’d think there’d be interest in the Aero or the American Cinematheque screening a DCP of the “good” 1959 version…no? Anyone can high-def stream the Wyler version at the drop of a hat, but I’ve never seen it projected with a full 2.76:1 aspect ratio. (The two or three times I’ve seen it in a theatre it’s always been shown at 2.55:1.) I suspect that the ’59 film hasn’t been screened because original rights holder MGM is a producing partner of the Timur Bekmambetov version, and fresh impressions of the Wyler (which is far from a great film but is (a) lucid and sturdy in a stodgy sort of way and (b) has a chariot-race sequence second to none) aren’t going to do the newbie any favors.
I’m told, by the way, that so far the new Ben-Hur isn’t tracking all that well.
Uh-oh…Jack Huston‘s Judah Ben-Hur is back to identifying himself as “Ben-Hur” when Morgan Freeman asks his name. He used the two-syllable moniker in an early teaser, and then broadened it to include “Judah” in a subsequent trailer. Now, for the benefit of those ticket-buyers who might be confused or challenged by four syllables, it’s been shortened again to just “Ben-Hur.” If I’d cut this trailer I would have shortened it further. Freeman: “What’s your name?” Huston: “Ben.” Freeman: “Ben? What’s your family name? What is your house?” Huston: “I am not my family or my house. I’m just me. I stand alone. Just call me Ben.” This joke of a remake opens three weeks hence.
One thing you’ll never see explored or even mentioned in any historical film is the level of hygiene available to the main characters. I realize that nobody wants to hear this stuff, but can I at least write one short article about it? We’re all so accustomed to living in total hygienic splendor (huge bathrooms, dynamic showers, soaps, deodorants, perfumes, facial cremes, hair gels) that we tend to forget or ignore how unclean and smelly things were in the old days, especially before the 19th Century.
It follows that historical films, none of which have ever been captured or projected with Aromarama-like technology, have never gotten into this. Until fairly recently (i.e., before intensely realistic pics like The New World and The Revenant) everyone in every historical film from whatever century has always been presented as looking relatively clean and well-groomed, and by inference agreeable smelling. But the fact is that most people stunk like animals in centuries past.
By our standards almost everyone except the wealthiest ancient Romans almost certainly had odor issues to varying degrees. The other day while sitting in an outdoor food court I noticed that a young guy sitting nearby (I’m not allowed to mention his ethnic heritage) smelled pretty gamey, and so I moved four or five tables away. If I was time-machined back to ancient Rome or Judea the stench would probably give me a heart attack.
Christians have always wanted actors playing Yeshua of Nazareth to be good looking Anglo-Saxon types, a little fashion-modelly, a good jawline, lightly tanned like a surfer, maybe a bit sweaty but always with wavy brown hair. Even Martin Scorsese adhered to this expectation. Was a full-face photographic closeup of a sexy J.C. ever used for a Passion of the Christ one-sheet? If so I can’t find it. Here, in any case, is a closeup of a handsome Argentinian actor (Rodrigo Santoro) with a strong, straight nose and damp, stringy hair and a crown of thorns, captured in a somewhat forlorn mood as he hangs from a cross on Golgotha. Which is an effective way to sell Timur Bekmambetov‘s Ben-Hur (Paramount, 8.19) — a “Tale of the Christ’ from the stocky, bearded director of Wanted and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.
Did you know that prior to being condemned by Messala (Toby Kebbell) to life as an oar slave on a Roman ship that Judah Ben-Hur (Jack Huston) travelled to Nazareth and had a philosophical conversation with a brawny, bearded carpenter of Brazilian ancestry (Rodrigo Santoro)? Carpenter: “Love your enemies. God is love. He has a path for you.” JBH: “If he’s already decided my path how am I better off [something or other]?” Carpenter: “Why don’t you ask God?”
Wiki tipoff: “Unlike in the original film, Jesus H. Christ will have a prominent role in this version. Paramount Pictures’ vice chairman Rob Moore [has] stated that Christ in this version “is going to be consistent with people’s expectations,” and that the “expectations of the faithful will be honored by this one.” This was because Paramount wants to avoid the sort of backlash received by Darren Aronofsky‘s Noah because some Christians were dismayed by the film’s inventive and inaccurate interpretation of the Bible.”
What is that Godawful song playing over portions of this?
The trailer obviously makes clear that Jack Hawkins‘ Quintus Arrius character has been eliminated from the upcoming version, which Paramount will release on 8.19.
This teaser is all about emphasizing how “real” and un-CG’ed the shooting of the new Ben-Hur chariot race was. Director Timur Bekmambetov, costars Jack Huston and Toby Kebbell…all on the same page. Why, then, does the moment when Judah Ben-Hur’s chariot rides over the wreckage and he’s nearly thrown out of the chariot…why does that scene look utterly real in the ’59 version but like exaggerated CG bullshit in the newbie? And why does the new sequence look so bleachy and washed out compared to the William Wyler version, which is full of rich sandy browns and arid yellows with accents of blue and red? I’m not saying that Bekmambetov, Huston and Kebbell are lying about shooting their version realistically. I’m saying it doesn’t look or feel as arresting as the old version. I’m not being a knee-jerk crank here. I’m not saying “oh, the older stuff is always better.” The newbie really doesn’t look as good. Honest.
In a 5.31 studio-by-studio assessment of summer releases, The Hollywood Reporter‘s Stephen Galloway quoted box-office analyst Jeff Bock about Paramount Pictures’ slate: “Paramount has a lot riding on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows (6.3) and Star Trek Beyond (7.22). They would ideally like to pump infinite sequels out of these properties. And then there’s Timur Bekmambetov‘s Ben-Hur (8.19). God help them.”
I for one haven’t the slightest intention of even glancing at the Ninja Turtles trailer, much less sitting through it. And I can’t imagine how my life would be adversely affected if I missed the Star Trek flick. But Ben-Hur, at least, offers a certain grotesque fascination. Will it just blow chunks in every respect, given Bekmambetov’s slovenly tendencies as a director? Is there a chance of any aspect of the newbie being regarded as an improvement over William Wyler‘s 1959 version?
The Coen bothers have a near-perfect track record. They’ve never made a “bad’ film, but once in a blue moon they don’t quite nail it. The Ladykillers, The Man Who Wasn’t There, arguably Raising Arizona. (I don’t agree with the alleged consensus view that Intolerable Cruelty is a stumble — I think it’s wall-to-wall hilarious.) In any event it gives me no pleasure (in fact it almost hurts) to report that another mitigated Coen misfire is now upon us. Hail, Caesar! (Universal, 2.5) is a zany re-imagining of early 1950s Hollywood that I loved in script form. This part is funny and that part is cool, but the whole never lifts off.
The smarty-pants dialogue has verve and flair. The attitudes, haircuts, costumes and production design are all aces. Pic has many elements, in fact, that are sharp and zippy and loads of fun (including a sailors-shipping-out dance number with Channing Tatum), but it’s spotty and slapdash. Something is missing. Yes, if you ease up on your Coen Bros. expectations Hail, Caesar! is agreeable enough. It’s not slop. It’s apparently much better than the other January and February openers playing right now.
“Why is this not coming together?” I said to myself during the pre-Sundance screening two and a half weeks ago. “The material works on paper and that the Coens are my favorite boys so what the fuck? C’mon, guys…get it together!” Hail, Caesar! is far from a trainwreck but at best it’s a 6.5 or 7. It’s supposed to be one of their knucklehead comedies but while it’s amusing here and there it’s never consistently funny in a follow-through, momentum-building sort of way.
Remember the inspired “Wheezy Joe” bit in Intolerable Cruelty (i.e., the gun mistaken for an inhaler)? There’s nothing in Caesar that comes close to that. If you ask me Inside Llewyn Davis — by any yardstick a downish, somber-attitude film — is funnier in its own studied way. John Goodman‘s back-seat performance as a junkie musician was a stone classic; ditto that “where’s his scrotum?” scene along with the moment when the amiable G.I. folk singer slurps the cereal milk. There are no bits or performances in Hail, Caesar! that deliver on this level.
Hail, Casear! is a satirical take on Hollywood culture around 1950 or ’51. It’s about real-life MGM general manager and vp Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin) and how he deals with the kidnapping of Baird Whitlock (George Clooney), a Robert Taylor-like star during the filming of a Quo Vadis-like Biblical epic called Hail, Caesar!: A Tale of the Christ.
MINOR SPOILER WHINERS ALERT: The genius move, for me, is the Coen’s decision to not only cast lefty-commie screenwriters as the kidnappers but depict them as being in league with the Russians — a vision of subversion straight out of the HUAC playbook and the commie-hating minds of John Wayne, Cecil B. DeMille and Adolph Menjou.
I for one have never seen an Ultra Panavision 70 film projected correctly (i.e., 2.76:1) inside a theatre in my entire life. I saw a restored version of Ben-Hur (which was shot in Camera 65, the exact same process) at the 2011 New York Film Festival, but they showed it within a 2.55:1 aspect ratio. I’m not persuaded that Ultra Panavision 70/Camera 65 flicks that played in the ’50s and ’60s (Raintree County, Ben-Hur, How the West Was Won, Mutiny on the Bounty, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, The Fall of the Roman Empire, etc.) were shown in 2.76:1. I suspect that they were mostly projected at 2.55:1 except at the Cinerama Dome, which of course was built to project extra-wide Cinerama films. 2.76:1 is really, really wide. I’m familiar with the full-width Ben-Hur and Mutiny on the Bounty only from looking at the DVD/Blurays. So when I see an Ultra-Panavision 70 version of The Hateful Eight early next week, it’ll be my first encounter with this process on a big screen.
Like many others I’ve been inspired by that much-derided BBC list of the 100 Greatest American Films to assemble my own roster. Except I can’t pare it down to 100 — the best I can do is 160, and even with this number I’ve had to cut dozens and dozens. It’s not a fun thing to do because over and over again you’re saying “no, no, naaah, hasn’t aged well, no longer, naaah, don’t think so.” And every one of the films that’s been “naahed” was pretty good if not great to start with. On its own terms, I mean.
I’ve broken my list into groups of ten. There are several great films I’ve left out because I’ve never liked watching them very much so there. If a film bothers me on some level, it gets tossed — I don’t care how “great” everyone else says it is. I’m not saying there aren’t 200 or 300 more films that could easily be on someone else’s list. I’m saying these are my choices, and it wasn’t easy.
The most daunting part was choosing The Best American Film Of All Time, which it not a rock or a boulder but a dream, a passing fancy, a thought bubble in the mind of God. Or whatever…a film that expresses something vital and enduring about the American experience or character or attitude. But that sounds pretentious and tedious. Every and every greatest film choice on this list is a keeper, but the very best is…oh, the hell with it. I’m choosing The Treasure of The Sierra Madre (’48) but tomorrow I might select Dr. Strangelove or Zero Dark Thirty or 12 Angry Men or Tender Mercies. No guarantees, nothing rock solid. The top tier of any list is always debatable.
The definition of an “American” film is one principally funded by an American company.
HE’s Top Ten Greatest American Films: (1) The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, (2) Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, (3 & 4) The Godfather & The Godfather, Part II (5) The Graduate, (6) Election, (7) Zodiac, (8) Rushmore, (9) Pulp Fiction, (10) Some Like It Hot.
Greatest American Films (11 to 20): (11) North By Northwest, (12) Notorious, (13) On The Waterfront, (14) Groundhog Day, (15) Goodfellas, (16) Out Of The Past, (17) Paths of Glory, (18) Psycho, (19) RagingBull, (20) 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Greatest American Films (21 to 30): (21) Annie Hall, (22) Apocalypse Now, (23) Strangers on a Train, (24) East of Eden, (25) Bringing Up Baby, (26) The African Queen, (27) All About Eve, (28) The Wizard of Oz, (29) Zero Dark Thirty, (30) Only Angels Have Wings.
Greatest American Films (31 to 40): (31) Repo Man, (32) Heat, (33) Red River, (34) Drums Along the Mohawk, (35) Gone With The Wind, (36) Rebel Without a Cause, (37) Ben-Hur (38) The Best Years of Our Lives, (39) The Big Sleep, (40) Shane.
Greatest American Films (41 to 50): (41) Rear Window, (42) Bonnie And Clyde, (43) The Bridge On The River Kwai, (44) Casablanca, (45) Chinatown, (46) Citizen Kane (47) Marnie…kidding! I really mean Duck Soup, (48) King Kong, (49) 12 Angry Men (50) The Informer.
A couple of weeks ago a demo reel of Quentin Tarantino‘s The Hateful Eight was screened during CineGear Expo at Paramount Studios — around noon on Saturday, 6.6, to be exact. I missed it but The Hollywood Reporter‘s Carolyn Giordinadidn’t. She filed a story that afternoon, explaining that The Hateful Eight is “believed to be the first production since 1966’s Khartoum to use Ultra Panavision 70 anamorphic lenses.” But she didn’t say what 70mm anamorphic actually means or what Tarantino’s film will actually look like when it’s projected so allow me.
Ultra Panavision 70 image from 1962 Mutiny on the Bounty.
In a phrase, the aspect ratio of The Hateful Eight will be ultra-Scopey, super-duper, triple-ass wide.
If you own either the Ben-Hur or Mutiny on the Bounty Blurays you know what this looks like. Like those blockbusters of yore, the width-to-height ratio will be 2.76 to 1. We’re talking considerably wider than standard CinemaScope or Panavision aspect ratio of 2.39. to 1. The posters for The Hateful Eight are calling the process Super-CinemaScope. I don’t know if that’s a patented process but back in the Pleistocene Era of the early to mid ’60s it was called (and probably should still be called) Ultra Panavision 70.