Lawrence of Arabia (1962)

Peter McGinn

7.0

Sep 24, 2020

This is obviously an epic film, lasting nearly four hours with the wide, sweeping desert vistas and huge cast. It describes a fairly brief period of time out of a remarkable man’s life. I wonder how modern viewers handle the length of the movie, accustomed as they are to movies this lengthy featuring superheroes with humor and almost constant action. I don’t even remember how long ago I originally watched Lawrence of Arabia —quite possibly forty or more years ago. It has aged pretty well overall. The only negative thing that struck me when I recently re-watched it may well be due to my age…

r96sk

10.0

Sep 10, 2024

227 minutes of greatness! I've always wanted to watch <em>'Lawrence of Arabia'</em> given its standing as being one of the greats, though that rather long run time always put it on my subconscious back-burner. At last, I rooted out some time for it and man it was a well spent near four hours! I'm not going to say its length is ignorable, though it truly doesn't feel like a 3hr 47min movie - so every credit to all involved. Peter O'Toole's performance is undoubtedly outstanding, I can't really add anything more to what I'm sure many, many others have noted down the decades - he is, put si…

CinemaSerf

9.0

Nov 19, 2024

This has got to be in my top ten movies - it is an almost flawless exercise in marrying fantastic photography, casting, writing, costumes and a score into three hours of wonderful entertainment. Rumour has it that Albert Finney was offered the lead role and suggested Peter O'Toole instead. If that is true (or not) then clearly serendipity was already on hand to guide this rendition of the story of TE Lawrence, who inspired and led an Arab uprising against the Ottoman empire. The iconic scene that introduces us to Omar Sharif as Lawrence heads to meet Prince Faisal (Alec Guinness) starts us on…