adonis98-743-186503 When a Jewish prince is betrayed and sent into slavery by a Roman friend, he regains his freedom and comes back for revenge. Ben-Hur looks and sounds beautiful unfortunately it's also way too long and it's a patience that i don't exactly require and as much as good as Heston's perfomance was the end result wasn't anything special or the movie that everyone makes it sound like and to be honest i liked the 2016 remake with Morgan Freeman way way better than this one and it actually pains me to say this but Ben-Hur is overrated and alot. (5/10)

BA_Harrison A perennial Xmas favourite on TV during my childhood, spectacular biblical epic Ben-Hur opens with the birth of Jesus: manger, star, wise men, shepherds... the whole nine yards. Those TV programmers knew what they were doing.The film then scoots to XXVI A.D.-Jesus is now a grown man doing God's work; meanwhile, Jewish prince Judah Ben-Hur (played by distinctly non-Jewish blue-eyed hunk Charlton Heston) is reunited with his Roman childhood friend Messala (Stephen Boyd), who has just been appointed tribune of Judea. Messala, desperate to keep the Jews under control, asks Judah to help him quell any potential rebellion, but his friend refuses to betray his people. As a result, the pair part as enemies.This animosity proves problematic for Judah when his sister accidentally knocks a roof tile onto the Roman governor as he arrives in town. Seizing an opportunity to make an example of the influential Hur family, Messala sends Judah's mother and sister to jail, and has Judah thrown into slavery as a rower on the Roman galleys. After several years of 'battle speed', 'attack speed', ramming speed' and 'warp speed', Judah earns his freedom by saving the life of a Roman consul during a sea battle. Returning home, Judah searches for his mother and sister, seeks revenge on Messala, and has a profound encounter with Jesus of Nazareth.In the wrong hands, Ben-Hur could have been an epic bore, but director William Wyler proves himself more than worthy of the task, commanding great dramatic performances from his superb cast, and mounting some stunning action scenes, the highlight being the film's iconic chariot race, a breathtaking piece of cinema that still holds up as one of the most exciting sequences ever committed to film. Every last cent of the massive $15,900,000 budget is up there on the screen, with impressive sets, excellent production design and a cast of thousands. Miklós Rózsa's wonderful score complements the action perfectly, the deserved winner of one of the film's eleven Oscars.Sadly, Ben-Hur no longer pops up on TV every Christmas, meaning that it's probably not found much of a new audience in recent years-a shame, because it really is worthy of any film fan's time-all three and a half hours of it!

paskuniag-584-890551 Miklos Rosza's score for this film was one of the finest and most memorable ever. One of the reasons I find it so memorable is because he borrowed some phrases from a previous score. I hear several snippets that remind me of his score from "Thief of Baghdad." That's the film that began in England, but was moved to La-La land because the Germans kept blowing up Alexander Korda's studio. Rosza finished scoring this film, then had himself a long career as a Hollywood film composer, winning an Oscar for the score for this film.

Rainey Dawn It's a good movie. I like quite a bit but I will admit there are quite a few scenes that could be cut down or cut out completely. If an edited version of this film were made, more people would watch the film more often. The film is way to long for being nothing more than a fictitious story about a fictitious character set in a historical time period with some historical characters. Cut it down to 1 1/2 to 2 hours and the film would be better and easier to watch more often.Lew Wallace wrote his novel in 1880 entitled Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ. This film is based on that book. It is not historical as in this is a true story. History films just have some historical places, events and people in a fictional tale.The movie is beautiful - grand, epic without a doubt. And it deserves the awards it has won as well as it's classic status. It just has a bit to many unnecessary scenes or they are just drawn out a bit too long.8/10