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Lawrence of Arabia (film)

Lawrence of Arabia is a 1962 epic biographical adventure drama film based on the life of T. E. Lawrence and his 1926 book Seven Pillars of Wisdom (also known as Revolt in the Desert[6]). It was directed by David Lean and produced by Sam Spiegel through his British company Horizon Pictures and distributed by Columbia Pictures. The film stars Peter O'Toole as Lawrence with Alec Guinness playing Prince Faisal. The film also stars Jack Hawkins, Anthony Quinn, Omar Sharif, Anthony Quayle, Claude Rains and Arthur Kennedy. The screenplay was written by Robert Bolt and Michael Wilson.

Lawrence of Arabia

David Lean

Seven Pillars of Wisdom
by T. E. Lawrence

Sam Spiegel

Freddie A. Young

Anne V. Coates

Maurice Jarre

Columbia Pictures[1]

  • 10 December 1962 (1962-12-10)

227 minutes[2]

United Kingdom[3]
United States[4]

English

$15 million[5]

$70 million[5]

The film depicts Lawrence's experiences in the Ottoman provinces of Hejaz and Greater Syria during the First World War, in particular his attacks on Aqaba and Damascus and his involvement in the Arab National Council. Its themes include Lawrence's emotional struggles with the violence inherent in war, his identity and his divided allegiance between his native Britain and his new-found comrades within the Arabian desert tribes.


The film was nominated for ten Oscars at the 35th Academy Awards in 1963, winning seven including Best Picture and Best Director. It also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Drama and the BAFTA Awards for Best Film and Outstanding British Film. The dramatic score by Maurice Jarre and the Super Panavision 70 cinematography by Freddie Young also won praise from critics.


Lawrence of Arabia is widely regarded as one of the greatest films ever made. In 1991, it was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.[7][8] In 1998, the American Film Institute placed it fifth on their 100 Years...100 Movies list of the greatest American films and it ranked seventh on their 2007 updated list. In 1999, the British Film Institute named the film the third-greatest British film. In 2004, it was voted the best British film in The Sunday Telegraph poll of Britain's leading filmmakers.

as T. E. Lawrence. Albert Finney was a virtual unknown at the time but he was Lean's first choice to play Lawrence. Finney was cast and began principal photography but was fired after two days for reasons that are still unclear. Marlon Brando was also offered the part, while Anthony Perkins and Montgomery Clift were briefly considered before O'Toole was cast.[9] Spiegel disliked Clift, having worked with him on Suddenly, Last Summer (1959). Alec Guinness had played Lawrence in the play Ross and was briefly considered for the part but Lean and Spiegel thought him too old. Lean had seen O'Toole in The Day They Robbed the Bank of England (1960) and was bowled over by his screen test, proclaiming, "This is Lawrence!" Spiegel eventually acceded to Lean's choice. Pictures of Lawrence suggest also that O'Toole bore some resemblance to him, though at 6 feet 2 inches (1.88 m) tall O'Toole was significantly taller than Lawrence.[10] O'Toole's looks prompted a different reaction from Noël Coward, who quipped after seeing the première of the film, "If you had been any prettier, the film would have been called Florence of Arabia".[11]

Peter O'Toole

as Prince Faisal. Faisal was originally to be portrayed by Laurence Olivier. Guinness had performed in other David Lean films and he got the part when Olivier dropped out. Guinness was made up to look as much like the real Faisal as possible; he recorded in his diaries that, while shooting in Jordan, he met several people who had known Faisal who actually mistook him for the late prince. Guinness said in interviews that he developed his Arab accent from a conversation that he had with Omar Sharif.

Alec Guinness

as Auda Abu Tayi. Quinn got very much into his role; he spent hours applying his own makeup, using a photograph of the real Auda to make himself look as much like him as he could. One anecdote has Quinn arriving on-set for the first time in full costume, whereupon Lean mistook him for a native and asked his assistant to ring Quinn and notify him that they were replacing him with the new arrival.

Anthony Quinn

as General Edmund Allenby. Spiegel pushed Lean to cast Cary Grant or Laurence Olivier (who was engaged at the Chichester Festival Theatre and declined). Lean convinced him to choose Hawkins because of his work for them on The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957). Hawkins shaved his head for the role and reportedly clashed with Lean several times during filming. Guinness recounted that Hawkins was reprimanded by Lean for celebrating the end of a day's filming with an impromptu dance. Hawkins became close friends with O'Toole during filming, and the two often improvised dialogue during takes, to Lean's dismay.

Jack Hawkins

as Sherif Ali ibn el Kharish. The role was offered to many actors before Sharif was cast. Horst Buchholz was the first choice but had already signed on for the film One, Two, Three. Alain Delon had a successful screen test but ultimately declined because of the brown contact lenses he would have had to wear. Maurice Ronet and Dilip Kumar were also considered.[12] Sharif, who was already a major star in the Middle East, was originally cast as Lawrence's guide Tafas but when the other actors proved unsuitable, Sharif was shifted to the part of Ali. An amalgamation of numerous Arab leaders, particularly Sharif Nassir, Faisal's cousin, who led the Harith forces in the attack on Aqaba, this character was created largely because Lawrence did not serve with any one Arab leader (aside from Auda) throughout the majority of the war; most such leaders were combined into Ali's character.

Omar Sharif

as the Turkish Bey. Ferrer was initially dissatisfied with the small size of his part and accepted the role only on the condition of being paid $25,000 (more than O'Toole and Sharif combined) plus a Porsche.[13] Afterwards, Ferrer considered this his best film performance, saying in an interview: "If I was to be judged by any one film performance, it would be my five minutes in Lawrence". Peter O'Toole once said that he learned more about screen acting from Ferrer than he could in any acting class. According to Lawrence in Seven Pillars of Wisdom, this was General Hajim Bey (in Turkish, Hacim Muhiddin Bey), though the film does not name him. Biographers including Jeremy Wilson and John Mack have argued that Lawrence's account is to be believed; others including Michael Asher and Lawrence James argue that contemporary evidence suggests that Lawrence never went to Deraa at this time and that the story is invented.

José Ferrer

as Colonel Harry Brighton. Quayle, a veteran of military roles, was cast after Jack Hawkins, the original choice, was shifted to the part of Allenby. Quayle and Lean argued over how to portray the character, with Lean feeling Brighton to be an honourable character, while Quayle thought him an idiot. He is in essence a composite of all of the British officers who served in the Middle East with Lawrence, most notably Lieutenant Colonel S. F. Newcombe (in Michael Wilson's original script, the character was named Colonel Newcombe, before Robert Bolt changed it). Newcombe, like Brighton in the film, was Lawrence's predecessor as liaison to the Arab Revolt; he and many of his men were captured by the Turks in 1916 but he escaped. Brighton was created to represent how ordinary British soldiers would feel about a man like Lawrence: impressed by his accomplishments but repulsed by his affected manner.

Anthony Quayle

as Mr. Dryden. Like Sherif Ali and Colonel Brighton, Dryden was an amalgamation of several historical figures, primarily Ronald Storrs, a member of the Arab Bureau but also David Hogarth, an archaeologist friend of Lawrence; Henry McMahon, the High Commissioner of Egypt who negotiated the McMahon–Hussein Correspondence which began the Arab Revolt and Mark Sykes, who helped draw up the Sykes–Picot Agreement which partitioned the post-war Middle East. Robert Bolt stated that the character was created to "represent the civilian and political wing of British interests, to balance Allenby's military objectives".[14]

Claude Rains

as Jackson Bentley. In the early days of the production, when the Bentley character had a more prominent role, Kirk Douglas was considered for the part; Douglas expressed interest but demanded a star salary and the highest billing after O'Toole and thus was turned down by Spiegel. Later, Edmond O'Brien was cast in the part.[15] O'Brien filmed the Jerusalem scene and (according to Omar Sharif) Bentley's political discussion with Ali but he suffered a heart attack on location and had to be replaced at the last moment by Kennedy, who was recommended to Lean by Anthony Quinn.[16] The character was based on famed American journalist Lowell Thomas, whose reports helped make Lawrence famous. Thomas was a young man at the time who spent only weeks at most with Lawrence in the field, unlike Bentley, who is a middle-aged man present for all of Lawrence's later campaigns. Bentley was the narrator in Wilson's original script but Bolt reduced his role significantly in the final treatment.

Arthur Kennedy

as General Archibald Murray. He releases Lawrence to Mr. Dryden.

Donald Wolfit

as Gasim. Johar was a well-known Indian actor who occasionally appeared in international productions.

I. S. Johar

as Majid. Ratib was a veteran Egyptian actor. His English was not considered good enough, so he was dubbed by an uncredited Robert Rietti in the final edit.

Gamil Ratib

as Farraj. At the time, Ray was a rising Anglo-Brazilian actor who had appeared in several films, including Irving Rapper's The Brave One (1956) and Anthony Mann's The Tin Star (1957).

Michel Ray

John Dimech as Daud

as Tafas. Mohyeddin, one of Pakistan's best-known actors, played a character based on Lawrence's actual guide, Sheikh Obeid el-Rashid of the Hazimi branch of the Beni Salem, whom Lawrence referred to as Tafas several times in Seven Pillars.

Zia Mohyeddin

as the medical officer. He was cast at the last minute during the filming of the Damascus scenes in Seville. The character was based on an officer mentioned in an incident in Seven Pillars of Wisdom. Lawrence's meeting the officer again while in British uniform was an invention of the script.

Howard Marion-Crawford

as the club secretary. Gwillim was recommended to Lean for the film by close friend Quayle.

Jack Gwillim

as the RAMC colonel. He worked on several of Lean's films as a dialogue coach and was one of several members of the film crew to be given bit parts (see below).

Hugh Miller

as a Damascus sheik (uncredited)

Peter Burton

Kenneth Fortescue as Allenby's aide (uncredited)

[17]

as Corporal William Potter (uncredited)[18]

Harry Fowler

as a reporter (uncredited)

Jack Hedley

as Corporal Michael George Hartley, Lawrence's companion in O'Toole's first scene (uncredited)

Ian MacNaughton

as Silliam, Faisal's servant (uncredited)

Henry Oscar

as Corporal Jenkins (uncredited)[17]

Norman Rossington

as Elder Harith (uncredited)[17]

John Ruddock

as the Turkish sergeant (uncredited)

Fernando Sancho

Stuart Saunders as the (uncredited)

regimental sergeant major

as the driver of the car which takes Lawrence away at the end of the film (uncredited)

Bryan Pringle

The crew consisted of over 200 people. Including cast and extras, over 1,000 people worked on the film.[19] Members of the crew portrayed minor characters. First assistant director Roy Stevens played the truck driver who transports Lawrence and Farraj to the Cairo HQ at the end of Act I; the sergeant who stops Lawrence and Farraj ("Where do you think you're going to, Mustapha?") is construction assistant Fred Bennett and screenwriter Robert Bolt has a wordless cameo as one of the officers watching Allenby and Lawrence confer in the courtyard (he is smoking a pipe).[20] Steve Birtles, the film's gaffer, played the motorcyclist at the Suez Canal; Lean is rumoured to have provided the cyclist's voice shouting "Who are you?" Continuity supervisor Barbara Cole appeared as one of the nurses in the Damascus hospital scene.

Production[edit]

Pre-production[edit]

Previous films about T. E. Lawrence had been planned but had not been made. In the 1940s, Alexander Korda was interested in filming The Seven Pillars of Wisdom with Laurence Olivier, Leslie Howard, or Robert Donat as Lawrence, but had to pull out owing to financial difficulties. David Lean had been approached to direct a 1952 version for the Rank Organisation, but the project fell through.[40] At the same time as pre-production of the film, Terence Rattigan was developing his play Ross which centred primarily on Lawrence's alleged homosexuality. Ross had begun as a screenplay, but was re-written for the stage when the film project fell through. Sam Spiegel grew furious and attempted to have the play suppressed, which helped to gain publicity for the film.[41] Dirk Bogarde had accepted the role in Ross; he described the cancellation of the project as "my bitterest disappointment". Alec Guinness played the role on stage.[42]


Lean and Sam Spiegel had worked together on The Bridge on the River Kwai and decided to collaborate again. For a time, Lean was interested in a biopic of Gandhi, with Alec Guinness to play the title role and Emeric Pressburger writing the screenplay. He eventually lost interest in the project, despite extensive pre-production work, including location scouting in India and a meeting with Jawaharlal Nehru.[43] Lean then returned his attention to T. E. Lawrence. Columbia Pictures had an interest in a Lawrence project dating back to the early '50s, and the project got underway when Spiegel convinced a reluctant A. W. Lawrence to sell the rights to Seven Pillars of Wisdom for £22,500.[44]


Michael Wilson wrote the original draft of the screenplay. Lean was dissatisfied with Wilson's work, primarily because his treatment focused on the historical and political aspects of the Arab Revolt. Lean hired Robert Bolt to re-write the script to make it a character study of Lawrence. Many of the characters and scenes are Wilson's invention, but virtually all of the dialogue in the finished film was written by Bolt.[45]


Lean reportedly watched John Ford's 1956 film The Searchers to help him develop ideas as to how to shoot the film. Several scenes directly recall Ford's film, most notably Ali's entrance at the well and the composition of many of the desert scenes and the dramatic exit from Wadi Rum. Lean biographer Kevin Brownlow noted a physical similarity between Wadi Rum and Ford's Monument Valley.[46]


In an interview with The Washington Post in 1989, Lean said that Lawrence and Ali were written as being in a gay relationship. When asked about whether the film was "pervasively homoerotic", Lean responded:

Release[edit]

Theatrical run[edit]

The film premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square in London on 10 December 1962 and was released in the United States on 16 December 1962.


Jordan banned the film for what was felt to be a disrespectful portrayal of Arab culture.[10] Egypt, Omar Sharif's home country, was the only Arab nation to give the film a wide release, where it became a success through the endorsement of President Gamal Abdel Nasser, who appreciated the film's depiction of Arab nationalism.

Reception[edit]

Box office[edit]

During its initial theatrical run, the film earned $15 million in box office rentals in the United States and Canada.[86]

Critical reaction[edit]

Bosley Crowther of The New York Times called the film "vast, awe-inspiring, beautiful with ever-changing hues, exhausting and barren of humanity". He further wrote Lawrence's characterisation was lost within the spectacle, writing the film "reduces a legendary figure to conventional movie-hero size amidst magnificent and exotic scenery but a conventional lot of action-film cliches".[87] Similarly, Variety wrote that the film was "a sweepingly produced, directed and lensed job. Authentic desert locations, a stellar cast and an intriguing subject combine to put this into the blockbuster league." However, it later noted Bolt's screenplay "does not tell the audience anything much new about Lawrence of Arabia nor does it offer any opinion or theory about the character of this man or the motivation for his actions".[88] Philip K. Scheuer of the Los Angeles Times wrote: "It is also one of the most magnificent pictures, if not the magnificent, and one of the most exasperating ... The awesome majesty of the landscapes in Jordan and elsewhere, the mass movements of Bedouins and British and Turks with, of course, the ever-present camels, sweep against the eye long after one has lost the ability to exclaim in astonishment over them. And all this is Technicolor and Super Panavision 70, the finest process, under F. A. Young as director of photography. Maurice Jarre composed a score to match."[89]


A review in Time magazine felt that while Lawrence of Arabia "falls far short of Kwai in dramatic impact, it nevertheless presents a vivid and intelligent spectacle". It further praised O'Toole's performance, writing he "continually dominates the screen, and he dominates it with professional skill, Irish charm and smashing good looks".[90] Chicago Tribune wrote the photography was "no less than superb" and felt the script "is taut and expressive and the musical score deftly attuned to the tale. Director David Lean has molded his massive material with skill, but personally I felt the film was too long, the running time is 221 minutes, or 20 minutes short of 4 hours and in the latter part, unnecessarily bloody."[91] A review in Newsweek praised the film as "an admirably seriously film ... The size, the scope, the fantastical scale of his personality and his achievement is triumphantly there." It also praised the ensemble cast as "all as good as they ought to be. And Peter O'Toole is not only good; he is an unnerving look-alike of the real Lawrence. He is reliably unreliable, steadily mercurial."[92]


In 1998, the American Film Institute (AFI) ranked Lawrence of Arabia in fifth place in their list of 100 Years...100 Movies. In 2006, AFI ranked the film #30 on its list of most inspiring movies.[93] In 2007, it was ranked in seventh place in their updated list and listed as the first of the greatest American films of the "epic" genre.[94] In 1991, the film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.[8] In 1999, the film placed third in the British Film Institute's poll of the best British films of the 20th century. In 2001, the magazine Total Film called it "as shockingly beautiful and hugely intelligent as any film ever made" and "faultless".[95]


It was ranked in the top ten films of all time in the 2002 Sight and Sound directors' poll.[96] In 2004, it was voted the best British film of all time by over 200 respondents in The Sunday Telegraph poll of Britain's leading filmmakers.[97] O'Toole's performance is often considered one of the greatest in cinema history, topping lists from Entertainment Weekly and Première. T. E. Lawrence, portrayed by O'Toole, was selected as the tenth-greatest hero in cinema history by the American Film Institute.[98] In 2012, the Motion Picture Editors Guild listed the film as the seventh best-edited of all time based on a survey of its membership.[99] In March 2024, Robbie Collin of The Telegraph ranked Lawrence of Arabia as the greatest biographical film of all time.[100]


Lawrence of Arabia is currently one of the highest-rated films on Metacritic; it holds a perfect 100 rating based on eight reviews.[101] It has a 94% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 133 reviews, with an average rating of 9.30/10. Its critical consensus reads: "The epic of all epics, Lawrence of Arabia cements director David Lean's status in the film-making pantheon with nearly four hours of grand scope, brilliant performances, and beautiful cinematography."[102]


The Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa cited this movie as one of his 100 favourite films.[103]

Legacy[edit]

Its visual style has influenced many directors, including George Lucas, Sam Peckinpah, Stanley Kubrick, Martin Scorsese, Ridley Scott, Brian De Palma, Oliver Stone, Denis Villeneuve, and Steven Spielberg, who called the film a "miracle".[113] Spielberg further considered it his favourite film of all time and the one that inspired him to become a filmmaker,[114] crediting the film, which he saw four times in four successive weeks upon its release, with understanding "It was the first time seeing a movie, I realized there are themes that aren't narrative story themes, there are themes that are character themes, that are personal themes. [...] and I realized there was no going back. It was what I was going to do."[115]


Film director Kathryn Bigelow also considers it one of her favourite films, saying it inspired her to film The Hurt Locker in Jordan.[116] Lawrence of Arabia also inspired numerous other adventure, science fiction and fantasy stories in modern popular culture, including Frank Herbert's Dune franchise, George Lucas's Star Wars franchise, James Cameron's Avatar franchise, Ridley Scott's Prometheus (2012), and George Miller's Mad Max: Fury Road (2015).[117]

BFI Top 100 British films

Clash of Loyalties

Lawrence of Arabia: The Authorised Biography of T. E. Lawrence

List of films considered the best

Brownlow, Kevin (1996). . Richard Cohen Books. ISBN 978-1-86066-042-9.

David Lean: A Biography

Jackson, Kevin (2007). Lawrence of Arabia (BFI Film Classics). . ISBN 978-1-8445-7178-9.

British Film Institute

Phillips, Gene D. (2006). Beyond the Epic: The Life and Films of David Lean. Lexington: . ISBN 978-0-8131-2415-5.

University Press of Kentucky

Turner, Adrian (1994). The Making of David Lean's Lawrence of Arabia. Dragon's World Ltd.  978-1-85028-211-2.

ISBN

Morris, L. Robert; Raskin, Lawrence (1992). Lawrence of Arabia: The 30th Anniversary Pictorial History. New York: . ISBN 978-0-3854-2479-0.

Anchor Books

Murphy, David (2008). The Arab Revolt: 1916–1918. London: . ISBN 978-1-8460-3339-1.

Osprey Publishing

by Michael Wilmington on the National Film Registry website

Lawrence of Arabia

at IMDb

Lawrence of Arabia

at the TCM Movie Database

Lawrence of Arabia

at Box Office Mojo

Lawrence of Arabia

at Rotten Tomatoes

Lawrence of Arabia

at Metacritic

Lawrence of Arabia

at the American Film Institute Catalog

Lawrence of Arabia

essay by Daniel Eagan in America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry, A&C Black, 2010 ISBN 0826429777, pages 586-588

Lawrence of Arabia

Digitised BAFTA Journal (Winter 1962–1963)

The Making of Lawrence of Arabia