Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925) on Netflix
NR19252h 23mAdventureDramaRomance
Judah Ben-Hur welcomes his Roman childhood friend Messala, now an officer of Rome's imperial power. When roof tiles fall during the governor's procession, Messala condemns Judah to the galleys.
- Netflix4.4/5
- IMDb7.8/108,459 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes96%
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Plot summary
Mary and Joseph, traveling from Nazareth, find no room at the inn at Jerusalem's Joppa Gate, and Mary gives birth in a nearby cave, with shepherds and the Magi present. Judah Ben-Hur comes home from Antioch and takes up again with Messala, a Roman friend from boyhood. Messala has put his weight behind Rome's rule over the Jewish people; Judah holds to their freedom. Judah brings him to the family house, where his mother Miriam and sister Tirzah live. When Valerius Gratus, the new Roman governor of Judaea, rides into the city, loose roof tiles fall and startle his horse. Messala sends Judah to the galleys and jails Miriam and Tirzah, and Judah swears revenge. On the march to the ships he collapses at Nazareth, and Jesus, the carpenter's son, offers him water.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- A reported one hundred horses were tripped and killed just to film the chariot race, and animal advocates criticized the wire device known as the "running W"; it took a decade for such devices to fall out of favour in Hollywood. The film became controversial after its release for the harm to animals involved in the filming.
- Production costs climbed to $3,900,000 against MGM's average for the season of $158,000, making Ben-Hur the most expensive film of the silent era.
- A total of 200,000 ft of film was shot for the chariot race sequence and editor Lloyd Nosler cut it down to 750 ft for the released print.
- Ben-Hur was banned in 1930s China under the category of "superstitious films" because of its religious subject matter involving gods and deities.
- The chariot race's opening sequence was re-created shot-for-shot in the 1959 remake, copied in the 1998 animated film The Prince of Egypt, and imitated in the pod race scene of the 1999 film Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace.
- The scenes involving Jesus were shot in two-color Technicolor, and one of the assistant directors on them was a young William Wyler, who later directed the 1959 MGM remake.
