LAWRENCE OF ARABIA

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Lawrence of Arabia
David Lean's directorial masterpiece

Feisal: No Arab loves the desert. We love water and green trees, there is nothing in the desert. No man needs nothing.
Or is it that you think we are something you can play with because we are a little people? A silly people, greedy,
barbarous, and cruel? What do you know, Lieutenant. In the Arab city of Cordova, there were two miles
of public lighting in the streets when London was a village...

Lawrence: Yes, you were great. Time to be great again



'The desert is an ocean in which no oar is dipped' and on this ocean the Bedu go where
they please and strike where they please.
MOVIE REVIEW
Sherif: Have you no fear, English?
Lawrence: My fear is my concern.

LAWRENCE OF ARABIA
Ali: El Aurens. Truly for some men, nothing is written unless they write it.



The scene begins with an endless horizon above which the golden desert sun slowly rises, first seen as a growing sliver of bright light. On camelback for many days, Lawrence is led across sweeping desert sand dunes by a nomadic Bedouin guide Tafas (Zia Mohyeddin). He slowly learns Bedouin ways and how to swiftly ride on his camel, his golden hair and tan clothing blending into the natural sand-colored surroundings. At night under a sparkling, star-studded sky, he assures Tafas that although he is from England, he is unique and not fat like most English-speaking people: "I am different."


Lawrence: Sherif Ali, so long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe, so long will they
be a little people, a silly people, greedy, barbarous, and cruel, as you are.
Sherif: Come, I will take you to Feisal.
Lawrence: I do not want your company, Sherif.
Sherif: Wadi Safra is another day from here. You will not find it. And not finding it, you will die.
Lawrence: I will find it, with this. (He holds up his compass which Sherif snags with his camel stick.)
Sherif: Good Army compass. How if I take it?
Lawrence: Then you would be a thief.
Sherif: Have you no fear, English?
Lawrence: My fear is my concern.

This sweeping, highly literate historical epic covers the Allies' mideastern campaign during World War I as seen through the eyes of the enigmatic T. E. Lawrence (Peter O'Toole, in the role that made him a star). After a prologue showing us Lawrence's ultimate fate, we flash back to Cairo in 1917. Lawrence talks his way into a transfer to Arabia. Once in the desert, he befriends Sherif Ali Ben El Kharish (Omar Sharif, making one of the most spectacular entrances in movie history) and draws up plans to aid the Arabs in their rebellion against the Turks.


Arthur Kennedy - Jackson Bentley
Claude Rains - Mr. Dryde
Jack Hawkins - Gen.Allenby
Anthony Quayle - Col. Harry Brighton
José Ferrer - Turkish Bey
Anthony Quinn - Auda abu Tayi



At age 29, young Lawrence began his career in the British headquarters in Cairo during World War I (January 1917), working at a lowly desk job. He is disgruntled and uninterested in his work as a military cartographer coloring maps, wanting only to get involved in adventures out in the desert - where "Bedouin Tribes Attack Turkish Stronghold." An exhibitionist, Lawrence shows how he can snuff out a burning hot match with his fingers. He also advises Corporal Potter who tries to repeat the performance:


THE BURNING MATCH TRICK

Potter: Oh, it hurts.
Lawrence: Certainly it hurts.
Potter: Well, what's the trick, then?
Lawrence: The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts.




The awesome Arabian desert crossing is treacherous - searing heat in the "Sun's Anvil," dust storms and swirling
cyclones - an endless trek that exhausts and kills some of the men. As they begin to reach the end of the desert,
it is noticed that Gasim's camel is riderless, and Lawrence unhesitatingly insists and proposes going back for him:


Ali: In God's name understand, we cannot go back.
Lawrence: I can...
Ali: If you go back, you'll kill us all. Gasim you have killed already.
Lawrence: Get out of my way.
Another Arab: Gasim's time is come, Lawrence. It is written!
Lawrence: Nothing is written.
Ali (riding back with Lawrence): Go back, then. What did you bring us here for with your blasphemous conceit? Eh, English blasphemer? Aqaba? What is Aqaba? You will not be at Aqaba, English. Go back, blasphemer! But you will not be at Aqaba!
Lawrence (riding ahead and turning): I shall be at Aqaba. That is written...(He points at his head.)..in here!
Ali (shouting after him): English! English!

Alec Guinness - Prince Feisal





Like the desert itself, in which most of the action in Lawrence of Arabia takes place, this much-heralded film about the famous British soldier-adventurer, which opened last night at the Criterion, is vast, awe-inspiring, beautiful with ever-changing hues.


It is an eye-filling spectacle— a brilliant display of endless desert and camels and Arabs and sheiks and skirmishes with Turks and explosions — enhanced by the thrilling Maurice Jarre score. Possibly the best movie ever made.








In 1962 when the film first opened, it was 222 minutes long, but it was subsequently cut down by 35 minutes to 187 minutes, and not restored to 217 minutes until 1989. [This was to satisfy profit-seeking theater-owners who wanted additional showings of the over-long film.] The film was budgeted at $12 million, and had a box-office of over $20 million. The nearly four-hour long film (without any female speaking roles) featured a star-studded cast, with a virtually unknown, blue-eyed Irish Shakespearean stage actor Peter O'Toole in his first starring role. [Both Marlon Brando and Albert Finney were also considered for the role.] The lead character is the heroic, contradictory, uncrowned King of Arabia - T.E. Lawrence - a solitary, masochistic adventurer (with confused sexuality) who paradoxically wanted to be both extraordinary and ordinary. In the end, his excessive arrogance and pushing of limits led to his own downfall, and to his belief that he had failed in his mission and duty.