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| The Ten Commandments | 
 enlarge | Director: Cecil B. Demille
Actors: Judith Anderson, Anne Baxter, Yul Brynner, John Carradine, Donald Curtis
Studio: Paramount
Category: Video
List Price: $14.95
Buy Used: $1.90
You Save: $13.05 (87%)
New (17) Used (43) Collectible (8) from $1.90
Avg. Customer Rating:  332 reviews
Sales Rank: 7038
Format: Color, Dolby, Ntsc
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: G (General Audience)
Media: VHS Tape
Running Time: 220 minutes
Number Of Items: 2
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.3 x 4.2 x 1.1
ISBN: 6300215830
UPC: 097360652437
EAN: 9786300215832
ASIN: 6300215830
Theatrical Release Date: October 5, 1956
Release Date: December 7, 1992
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Former rental with stickers, may be in a plastic box with cut artwork or in a rough-worn original box. I have spot checked these and they seem ok. I will refund if unplayable.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Still Great After 50 Years September 20, 2008
Like most people, I watched "The Ten Commandments" on TV many times over the years while growing up. Many of its scenes are etched in my memory. But in the wake of Charlton Heston's recent death, I decided to have a marathon viewing of his films and watched "Commandments" for the first time since my adolescence. It was interesting to see it now with more mature eyes (and without being interrupted by a million commercials).
Made in 1956, this film launched Heston's career as the star of big historical epics. He is dynamic and powerful as Moses, who grows up believing he is Egyptian royalty, only to discover that he is actually born of a slave. Moses becomes the messenger of God and delivers the Hebrews out of their terrible bondage. The cast is very good, especially Yul Bryner as Rameses and Sir Cedric Hardwicke as Sethi. The script is lyrical and literate, both socially conscious and reverent at the same time. The special effects in the parting of the Red Sea sequence are impressive even today, although some of the other effects (like the "pillar of fire") are animated and look pretty cheesy. However, the scene where the Angel of Death slithers through the city as a slow-moving mist is still chilling.
To modern audiences, the film will seem melodramatic and exaggerated, but that was the intended style. The director, Cecil B. DeMille, got his start making silent movies where the actors needed to overact to convey the emotion of the scene. In fact, the 50th anniversary DVD of "Commandments" includes the 1923 version, also directed by DeMille. In the earlier film, the story of Moses and Rameses is featured only in the prologue, which is then followed by a "modern day" story of two brothers and what happens if a person does not live by God's laws. It's a wonderful time capsule of movie making and it's interesting to compare (and contrast) it to the later film. Despite it's age, the silent version has surprisingly good special effects.
The other extras in the 50th Anniversary set are also good. There is a 40-minute documentary on the making of the film which features interviews with surviving cast members, including Heston. There are also enthusiastic and informative commentaries by Katherine Orrison on both versions of the film. She shares many interesting anecdotes and behind-the-scenes stories, and both are worth a listen.
So if you've never seen "The Ten Commandments," by all means you should. If it's been a while, revisit the grandeur and spectacle of this cinema classic.
 A Bible film even we atheists can like! September 12, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
In the begining, deMille created a silent film. And it was good. But lo! It lacked color, it lacked sound and it lacked the great Heston. So deMile created "The Ten Commandments" anew, and saw that it was good, said that it was good, and it was... really quite corking, actually.
"The Ten Commandments" really only features said laws towards the end of the movie, but that's ok because as they say, getting there is half the fun. The movie is a spectacle on a grand scale, with huge sets, a cast of literally thousands, location filming in Egypt, beautiful costumes and a 1950's mentality that meant they had to sanitize quite a bit of the actual story.
The tale the movie tells is one known to most people. The Hebrews are living as slaves in Egypt until God tells Moses (Charlton Heston), to go tell the Pharaoh (an amazingly good Yul Brenner), to let his people go. Moses does, Pharaoh tells him to get lost, and plagues happen. Eventually the innocent are murdered and Moses is allowed to take his people into the Promises Land where they will be slaves to God, instead of to Pharaoh.
`course that's just my interpretation of Exodus.
The film is specatcle of the first order, with a huge a-list of Hollywood's finest actors including Heston, Brenner, Vincent Price, Edward G Robinson, Yvone de Carlo and others. All the performances are great, particularly the two leads. Atheist though I am, even I found Heston compelling in his role as Moses.
What's most interesting, though, is some of the side stories to the movie. If you pick up a copy of the DVD, you can hear an audio commentary by a woman (I forget her name, forgive me), who obviously is a believer, as was deMille. What makes that so interesting is hearing her talk about the compromises to the Biblical story that deMille made, and justifying them to herself and the audience!
For example, she points out one scene where Moses is standing next to a black woman. That he had an Ethiopian wife is news to me (apparently I didn't read Exodus close enough), and this movie doesn't really want you to know that he did. All you see is a black woman standing next to Moses and some large black guy standing next to her looking more like a Zulu than an Ethiopian. Of course this was because we didn't want to ruffle the feathers of 1950's society by showing an interracial marriage (though apparently deMille himself was big on civil rights).
Also glossed over, and again something I missed in the Bible, is that due to Moses' stammering, Aaron actually spoke to Pharaoh. I knew he had problems talking, but I'd assumed God had just fixed that. In the movie there's no stammering and no Aaron talking to Pharaoh.
Of course the Biblical facts had to be gussied up a little for the film, in order to make the movie more, well, movie-like. But I find it interesting that people who believe in God would think it's ok to twist the stories they believe in just to make a good movie.
Anyhow, theology aside this is indeed a great film and one worthy of all the adulation it gets!
This DVD is worth every penny. You not only get the movie and the commentary mentioned above, but you also get the fascinating silent film version of the movie! A great buy!
Fabulous August 25, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This movie is so amazing. I watched it with my grandparents when it was on VHS, and now that it is on digitally remastered DVD, the color and clarity of it is amazing. Such a great movie, one to definitely share with the kids.
A Marvelous Carnival Show. August 18, 2008
This movie influenced my childhood more than any other film---save, perhaps Gone With The Wind. Yes, it was pure ham. Yes, the story is ridiculous and over-the-top. Yes, a lot of the acting is bad. Yes, nowadays I can barely make it 20 minutes into the movie before I yawn and turn to something else. Oh, but as a 6 year-old child! It was pure magic, glorious and inspiring. Probably in all the wrong ways, of course. What I took from this fabulous spectacle as a child: it inspired my fascination with Ancient Egypt; I fell in love with Anne Baxter (maybe she was over-acting, but she oozed glamour and sensuality!), and it led me to find more, and much better films of hers, like Orson Wells' The Magnificent Ambersons; Yul Bryner exuded masculinity; he defined my image of a Pharoh (minus his butt-kicking by Moses). I could never understand what Nefretiri saw in Charlton Heston's boring old Moses, when she had bad-boy Bryner beside her the whole time! Which brings me to my point: as a Biblical lesson, De Mille's Ten Commandments is an utter failure. I always sympathized with the grand, gorgeously costumed Egyptians. To me (as a child) Moses was the villian for messing everything up. Why would anyone want to follow a ragged old Moses, always ranting and raving like a madman, into the ugly desert when Egypt looked so rich and wonderful. It never made sense why a powerful prince would want to trade all that treasure for rags and sand. It was the beginning of a trend I noticed in nearly all Biblical films from that era: the doomed pagans always seemed more attractive than the supposed good guys. The bad guys were having all the fun! Historically, of course, this film is utter hogwash...but I'll save those details for another time. It was great viewing as a child, and for those memories, I give it four stars.
Anniversity Collection is Great July 31, 2008
This is a great addition our collection of old, wonderful movies. I also found it to be a enjoyable conclusion to a small group study of the book of Exodus.
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