Moses, Strike a Pose!

I had a chance to sit down and watch the second half of "The Ten Commandments" yesterday. I hadn't seen the movie for some time, and it's funny how your perspective can change in just a few years. It has always been one of my favorites and I still enjoyed it, but some of its flaws (or charms?) where much more apparent. For example, Moses' beard at the very end of the movie looks like the cotton ball Santa Claus beards that we made in first grade. And I couldn't help but notice all the dramatic poses. It would have been hilarious to see Cecil B. Demille directing the actors to stand in awkward, dramatic poses straight from a Michaelangelo painting. The best example is when the Red Sea is coming down on Pharaoh's soldiers. There's a great shot of three Israelite women with their hair blowing in the wind and their arms held up very femininely for no reason. The negative space is filled perfectly, with the middle woman higher and the other two staggered one higher than the other in a medal podium arrangement. I couldn't help but laugh. And everyone speaks as if they're in an unrevised poem. "Can a man choose from the stars in the heavens?" "All of your gold cannot wipe that mark from your door, Dathan. Or from my heart." But the thing that stood out the most was the way Moses kept rubbing everything in Pharoah's face. When Pharaoh finally lets the Hebrews go and sits sullenly mourning his son, Moses decides that this is the appropriate time to give a poetic speech. I wonder if a lot of the stereotypes that go along with being a prophet come from that movie.