One of the Great Epics - El Cid
movie guru, Action film aficionado, Fan of Superb Productions
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FEB
19
2008
El Cid —
El Cid (1961)This is a movie, vast in scope, that was made back in the days when money was no object, just to put out the best film they possibly could. Today, Films like El Cid and Lawrence of Arabia might not be able to be made due to cost and time considerations.
El Cid is the story of the national hero of Spain, Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar (Charlton Heston) who saw beyond the crude prejudices of his day and willed a united Spain of both Spaniards and Moors against the further incursions of Islam from Northern Africa. The movie, while made over forty years ago, is exceedingly timely for us today as one of the first scenes shows what we immediately recognize as an Ayatollah stirring up the Spanish Moors to go to war against the European Spanish in the name of Islam.
Cid has the courage to free the defeated Moors on their parole that they will no longer war against King Ferdinand. This, unfortunately makes him an outlaw and he must fight the king's champion after he slurs Rodrigo's father. The champion was unfortunately also his prospective father in law and father of the lovely Dona Chimene (Sophia Loren). These incidents set the stage for an exceptionally fine drama lasting 3 hours. Don't worry unlike some of these overlong draggy movies of late, El Cid will keep you engrossed the entire time because of the sheer spectacle of the production and the star power of Charlton Heston, Sophia Loren, and the rest of the cast.
Produced by that showman of showmen Samuel Bronston and directed by action specialist Anthony Mann, El Cid has the best of everything from scenic Spanish locations to breathtaking mortal combat without any Computer Generated Imagery. In those days they had to act - not prance around solo in front of a blue screen and rely on the computer geeks to fill in the opponents afterward.
Available for the first time on DVD, El Cid is beautifully restored by a team headed by Martin Scorsese. The film is in brilliant technicolor and in the proper 2.20:1 Super Technirama 70 theatrical format. There is a full length commentary and a bonus disk loaded with extra features. This is truly a great DVD package that just became available this month.
El Cid is recommended by GeorgeChabot
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