MovieChat Forums > Faraon (1966) Discussion > Needed some editing

Needed some editing


This film is too long, especially in the mass scenes. I can imagine the director didn't want to cut too much, because it probably took him a lot of effort to get all those people on pellicule. But there's far too much of the same, and all those soldiers and/or peasants do not advance the story nor the arguments. In fact, the things that are important in this film mostly happen inside or in close-up dialogues.That being said, I was not impressed by the lead actor or the very sixties looking bimbos. But settings and costumes probably came closer to the "real" ancient Egypt (although I'm not sure we will ever know how it really was) than most Hollywood epics. One remark though: the culture of ancient Egypt was not desert-based but riverside based. It's today's Egypt that is associated with sand, but ancient Egypt spent its days in a mainly green environment.

reply

[deleted]

You are correct about the river culture, and most of where Egyptians really lived, it was green and verdant.

Dumb Egyptian films ("sword & sandals") are always set in deserts! sometimes with camels!


It just shows their historical ignorance off.


I have to say, this is strange and unusual film -- saw it 20 years ago at a college film series -- never could forget it. It is more accurate than 90% of the films about Egypt made in Hollywood. And they must have spent a fortune on costumes & sets -- I mean, this was POLAND in the middle 60s -- communist controlled -- they have a tiny film industry in the first place -- being in POLISH meant the film had no chance of being widely viewed anywhere else. Poland is a tiny nation!

And historically, though it looks surprisingly good, it is a mishmash of various bits of Egyptian history -- not about any one real Pharoah or historical period.

Still, there is something haunting about it. Since I can't make out any of the Polish, the actors might as well be speaking Egyptian -- so you are not taken out of the story by people's harsh American or British accents.

Among the many things they do get right is the emphasis on religion and faith as an integral part of Egyptian society. They really "believed", and American films usually do not "get" that aspect at all -- they are too invested in the idea that ancient cultures were "pagans" and their religions were false until they got Christianity.

The Jewish elements of the story here, therefore, are completely strange (and probably inaccurate). It is especially odd in a Polish film only 20 years after the end of WWII -- the Poles basically eradicated their entire Jewish population, in an area that was once a center of Jewish life and culture. Those who were not gassed in the camps by a very willing Polish population, were driven away (usually to the US). I can't tell if the references here are a kind of Polish guilt or what.

But honestly: one of the most unusual films about Ancient Egypt ever made -- one of the most accurate -- one of the most atypical Polish films ever made - and a bracing antidote to mush-brained nonsense like the A&E mini-series of 2015 "TUT".

reply

The Jewish elements of the story here, therefore, are completely strange (and probably inaccurate). It is especially odd in a Polish film only 20 years after the end of WWII -- the Poles basically eradicated their entire Jewish population, in an area that was once a center of Jewish life and culture. Those who were not gassed in the camps by a very willing Polish population, were driven away (usually to the US). I can't tell if the references here are a kind of Polish guilt or what.


I think you're confusing Poles with Germans.

reply

No pretty sure they meant Poland.

Zardoz (1974) has spoken!
My top 100 http://www.imdb.com/list/ls079512886/

reply