Exodus (1960)

Director:

Otto Preminger

Writers:

Dalton Trumbo (screenplay)
Leon Uris (novel)

Release Date:

15 December 1960 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Drama | History | War

Plot:

The theme is the founding of the state of Israel. The action begins on a ship filled with Jewish immigrants...

Plot Keywords:

Jewish | Israel | Arab | Nurse | Cyprus

Awards:

Won Oscar. Another 3 wins & 6 nominations

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Paul Newman	...	Ari Ben Canaan
Eva Marie Saint	...	Kitty Fremont
Ralph Richardson	...	Gen. Sutherland
Peter Lawford	...	Maj. Caldwell
Lee J. Cobb	...	Barak Ben Canaan
Sal Mineo	...	Dov Landau
John Derek	...	Taha
Hugh Griffith	...	Mandria
Gregory Ratoff	...	Lakavitch
Felix Aylmer	...	Dr. Lieberman
David Opatoshu	...	Akiva Ben Canaan
Jill Haworth	...	Karen
Marius Goring	...	Von Storch
Alexandra Stewart	...	Jordana Ben Canaan
Michael Wager	...	David Ben Ami

Runtime:

208 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.20 : 1

Sound Mix:

4-Track Stereo (35 mm prints) | 70 mm 6-Track (Westrex Recording System) (70 mm prints)

Certification:

Iceland:12 | West Germany:12 (f) | USA:Approved ( certificate #19611) | Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Spain:18 | Sweden:15 | UK:PG

Filming Locations:

Acre, Israel

Company:

Otto Preminger Films

Trivia:

Director Otto Preminger helped to end the stigma of the Hollywood blacklist by hiring Dalton Trumbo to adapt the screenplay for the film

Goofs:

Plot holes: General Sutherland tells Kitty that Tom should not have gone on what became his fatal photojournalist assignment because it was a minor border incident where Jews blow up some bridges. Kitty shows the General the last photo taken by Tom of a fighter strafing the truck the General and Tom were riding in taken by Tom from an obviously dangerous vantage point. The Jews had no fighter aircraft.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Cypriot guide: The island of Cyprus, madame. World famous for beauty, and long, tragic history. Been conquered many times, conquered by Phoenicians, Assyrians, Persians, Macedonians; also conquered by Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Turks. Purchased from Turkey by your esteemed self, the British Empire. All Cyprus most wanted the British.
Kitty Fremont: [correcting him] I'm an American.
Cypriot guide: Fond of Americans, also; we Cypriots are fond of everybody.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Saturday Night Live: Michael Palin/Eugene Record (#3.16)" (1978)

Soundtrack:

Greensleeves

Popular in 1960 But Today Uninspired

Early in the film, while discussing the squabbling between Jews and Arabs over Palestine, an exasperated Eva Marie Saint sighs and asks "How is it all going to end?" How indeed! It is a question the world has asked for more than half a century, and to date there is no answer in sight.

Concerning the creation of the Jewish state of Israel, the 1958 Leon Uris novel EXODUS was among the great bestsellers of its era and remains widely read to this day. The 1960 film version was also widely admired at the time of its release--but it is seldom seen today. There is a reason for that. In spite of its reputation, the film is remarkably slapdash. The cinematography is poor, lacking arresting visuals and often so sloppy that the shadows of the boom mikes are visible here, there, and everywhere throughout the film. The sound mix is also quite poor, with post-production effects as much off the mark as they are on. But the great flaws here are the script and the cast.

Written for the screen by Dalton Trumbo, the script has a very artificial and very talky quality. This might be overlooked if Trumbo actually had anything to say in the process--but he does not, and a remarkably gifted cast struggles vainly against one artificial line after another. Paul Newman is horrifically miscast; Eva Marie Saint, Ralph Richardson, and Lee J. Cobb fare a bit better, but Jill Haworth is chiefly memorable for giving the single worst performance in the film. As for Sal Mineo's much lauded performance, today it seems extremely theatrical.

Even so, EXODUS would remain passable were it not for the incredibly naive brand of Zionism the film adopts. More than fifty years later after endless wars, waves of terrorism, and failed peace talks we all know that it was NEVER as simple as this movie would have us believe. When all is said and done, the most memorable thing about EXODUS is the Academy Award-winning score by Ernest Gold, which really is as good as every one says it is.

The film is presently available to the homemarket as a no-frills DVD. Final thought: it has moments of interest and on rare occasions even brilliance, but those moments are few and far between. Best left to those who remember it fondly from its 1960 debut.

Gary F. Taylor, aka GFT, Amazon Reviewer