Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment released the 1959 Ben-Hur on 4K UHD last month. Because it’s three and a half hours (two 4K discs!) it took me into March to watch it. But even though it’s long, it really moves. Friends turn to foes, Judah Ben-Hur (Charlton Heston) is falsely arrested, tries to escape and the adventure is on.
The chariot race gets all the attention but the slave ship battle with miniatures and full sets is stunning too. Ben-Hur is famously wider than almost anything else, although on 4K Sinners was this wide too, when it wasn’t in IMAX.
The 4K really puts you in biblical times. Well, it was the late ‘50s but that seems ancient too. So it’s the Technicolor bible, not the gritty realistic one of The Passion of the Christ, but it’s so vivid in 4K it’s palpable. Of course, the extras are all real. Now you can see all the detail of the guys in the back. Matte paintings hold up to create the grand palaces and vast kingdoms.
Many of the locations have that deep 4K HDR shadow. Joseph (Laurence Payne)’s shop is shrouded as the soldiers march outside, like many shots in the Leone westerns. Ben-Hur walks through the dark barracks early on, then sits in a dark cell, in the slave rowing quarters under the ship.
This wasn’t a surround sound movie but the score accents in the rear in this mix. When the colliseum band trumpets in the rear, that counts too. The rumble of the horses vibrates the floor and they did get some crowd chearing in the rear.
Two new bonus features give a good summary to lead into the lengthy archival materials. The second new featurette goes into the technical aspects, like Quentin Tarantino and Ryan Coogler bringing back those lenses and format. This gives the basis for the grandeur and the retro resurrection of it in recent films.
Of note in the archives is a feature length Heston documentary from 2011, so already after his death. It includes 16mm behind-the-scenes footage and home movies. Heston’s son, Fraser, reads his diaries from meetings and the set. Fraser’s sister, Holly, and stars like Tom Selleck reflect on the actor too.