Word: epical
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...Gibson's first achievement in "The Passion of the Christ" is to strip the biblical epic of its encrusted sanctimony and show biz. It takes hard men to work this Holy Land, men who labor under the twin burdens of poverty and the oppression of Roman occupation. Their clothes are dirt-dry and sweat-drenched. By jolting the viewer to reconsider Hollywood's calcified stereotypes of the New Testament, Gibson wants to restore the immediacy of that time, the stern wonder of that land, the thrilling threat of meeting the Messiah on the mean streets of Jerusalem...
...book "Spectacular! The Story of Epic Films," the elegant historian Carlos Clarens (using the pseudonym John Cary) gave a fair evaluation of "King of Kings": "De Mille's version of Christ was a fundamentalist one: H.B. Warner was indeed 'a sweet Jesus, meek and mild,' and this time sheer reverence held De Mille in check. There were a couple of zebras drawing Magdalene's chariot, and the earthquake that follows the crucifixion was as stunning as the Red Sea parting, although virtually thrown away.... De Mille's sincerity was on a par with his stern ruling that, during production...
...Samuel Bronston reinvented the epic for the '60s. Actually, he exploited the popularity of other people's late-'50s Biblical spectacles ("The Ten Commandments," "Ben Hur") to acquire financing for grand frescos of national heroes ("El Cid") and collapsing monarchies ("The Fall of the Roman Empire") in smart, stately films from screenwriter Philip Yordan and ace auteurs Nicholas Ray and Anthony Mann. Ray's "King of Kings" has Jeffrey Hunter, who was gorgeous and effusively manly in "The Searchers" a few years before, as a Jesus with star quality to spare - which the original must also have had. In orange...
...incessant Star Wars comparisons are more than valid, as your own disparaging description of The Two Towers could easily apply to any of the first three films; The Lord of the Rings has officially replaced George Lucas’ space operas as the standard bearers for epic populist entertainment. These will remain important films 25 years from now, and to give the award to another film in 2003 will be forever remembered as one of the Academy’s biggest blunders. I agree that the Academy hasn’t properly identified the year’s best film...
Distinguished Professor of Classics, Emeritus at the City University of New York, Charles Rowan Beye will discuss his new book Odysseus: A Life. This is the first book to chronicle Homer’s epic fictional hero’s life from start to finish and is described as “a witty, unusual and fascinating biography of Odysseus.” Free. 6 p.m. Harvard Book Store...