Esther and the King (1960)

User Rating:

4.8/10   

Directors:

Raoul Walsh
Mario Bava

Writers:

Raoul Walsh (screenplay) and
Michael Elkins (screenplay)
(more)

Release Date:

14 December 1960 (USA)

Genre:

Drama

Plot Keywords:

Harem | Beautiful Woman | Biblical | Hanging | Adultery

Cast

Joan Collins	...	Esther
Richard Egan	...	King Ahasuerus
Denis O'Dea	...	Mordecai
Sergio Fantoni	...	Haman
Rik Battaglia	...	Simon (as Rick Battaglia)
Renato Baldini	...	Klydrathes
Gabriele Tinti	...	Samual
Rosalba Neri	...	Keresh
Robert Buchanan	...	Hegai
Daniela Rocca	...	Queen Vashti
Folco Lulli	...	Tobiah
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Ombretta Ostenda	...	(uncredited)
Aldo Pini	...	Capitain Of The Guards (uncredited)
Italo Tancredi	...	Gisco (uncredited)

Directed by
Raoul Walsh
Mario Bava		(Italian version)

Writing credits
Raoul Walsh		(screenplay) and
Michael Elkins		(screenplay)
Ennio De Concini		(writer) uncredited

Produced by
John Twist	....	associate producer
Raoul Walsh	....	producer

Original Music by
Angelo Francesco Lavagnino		(as Francesco Lavagnino)
Roberto Nicolosi

Cinematography by
Mario Bava		(director of photography)

Film Editing by
Jerry Webb

Art Direction by
Giorgio Giovannini		(as G. Giovannini)

Makeup Department
Manlio Rocchetti	....	hairdresser (as M. Rocchetti)
Euclide Santoli	....	makeup artist (as E. Santoli)

Production Management
Ferruccio De Martino	....	production supervisor
Massimo De Rita	....	unit manager (as M. de Rita)
Mike Holden	....	production manager

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Ottavio Oppo	....	assistant director (as O. Oppo)

Camera and Electrical Department
Ubaldo Terzano	....	camera operator (as U. Terzano)

Costume and Wardrobe Department
Anna Maria Feo	....	costume supervisor (as A.M. Fea)

Other crew
Harriet Medin	....	dialogue coach (uncredited)

Production Companies

• Galatea Film (as Galatea Productions)
• Titanus (uncredited)
• Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation (presents) (as Twentieth Century-Fox)

Distributors

• Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation (1960) (USA) (theatrical) (released through)
• Deutsche Fox (1961) (West Germany) (theatrical)
• Fox Video (1995) (USA) (VHS)
• ClassicLine (2002) (Brazil) (DVD)
• Pop Flix (2006) (USA) (DVD)
• St. Clair Vision (2006) (USA) (DVD)

Other Companies

• Digitmovies Alternative Entertainment  soundtrack
• Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation  CinemaScope is the registered trademark of

Also Known As:

Esther e il Re (Italy)

Runtime:

109 min

Country:

Italy | USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

4-Track Stereo (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

West Germany:12 (nf) | USA:Approved (certificate #19742) | Finland:K-16

Filming Locations:

Titanus Appia Studios, Rome, Lazio, Italy

Company:

Galatea Film

Movie Connections:

Version of Esther (1986)

Bargain-Basement Epic

I saw this film shortly after seeing "Spartacus", which probably meant that it was not seen to its best advantage. Although both films date from the same year, and although both fall within the same tradition of the historic/Biblical epic, they are very different in terms of quality. Whereas "Spartacus" is perhaps the greatest epic ever made, "Esther and the King" is very much from the bargain-basement end of the market.

Like a number of other bargain-basement epics ("Samson and Delilah", "Salome" and "Solomon and Sheba" all come to mind), "Esther" is an odd mixture of godliness and sexiness. Films of this nature generally preached a vaguely Christian message (in this case that religious toleration is preferable to sectarian genocide) but in order to get that message across the producers seemed to find it necessary to show as much female flesh as the censors of the day would permit, with nubile slave-girls and scantily-dressed dancers much in evidence. The Bible tells us that Queen Vashti incurred the displeasure of her husband King Ahasuerus because she refused his command to appear in the palace "to shew the people and the princes her beauty". In this film, however, Vashti is guilty of quite the opposite offence, namely that of showing the people and the princes more of her beauty than she ought to by doing a striptease down to her panties in the royal hall.

There is, moreover, a good deal of male flesh on view as well as female. The main qualification for the male lead in this type of epic was a pair of muscular legs that would look good in a short kilt or tunic. (Acting ability was very much a secondary consideration). This convention is adhered to here; although the ancient Persians, unlike the Greeks, Romans or Egyptians, preferred to wear trousers, Richard Egan as Ahasuerus still dresses Roman-style, as do Sergio Fantoni as the main villain Haman and Richard Battaglia as the secondary hero Simon. (Simon is an invented character not found in the Biblical account, Esther's sweetheart before she is chosen as the King's second wife).

The one person who is exempt from the need to strip down to the bare essentials is, surprisingly enough, Joan Collins, strikingly attractive in this film but covered up throughout. I say "surprisingly" because since "The Bitch" and "Dynasty" the popular perception is that she was a one-trick pony, an actress who specialised in playing sultry villainesses and little else. There was, however, more to her than that. Although she did play a villainess in her earlier epic "Land of the Pharaohs", she was a versatile actress during her time as a Hollywood star and was quite as much at home playing virtuous heroines. (In "Sea Wife" she even played a nun). Here she plays Esther as an innocent girl-next-door suddenly, and unexpectedly, raised to royal status, and is probably the best actor on display.

As with many epics, liberties are taken with history. Much of the plot turns upon a coming war between the Persians and the Greeks under "that young Macedonian upstart Alexander". The Biblical Ahasuerus is normally identified by historians with the Persian King Xerxes I, who reigned from 485 to 465 BC, well before the time of Alexander (356-323 BC). When war comes in the film, the Persians defeat the Greeks, whereas Alexander was in fact victorious in his war against Persia. In order to strengthen the religious tone of the film, a contrast is made between the monotheistic Jews and supposedly polytheistic Persians; in reality the state religion of Persia at this time was Zoroastrianism, a religion which only recognised one god, Ahura Mazda.

The film's main weakness, however, is not its departures from both the Biblical version of the story or from historical fact, something that could be forgiven if the resulting film was artistically satisfying. The main problem is that I found it impossible to believe in either the characters or the story. With the exception of Denis O'Dea as Esther's wise old uncle Mordecai, all the male stars are either wooden or hammy, and with the exception of Collins herself the female ones are just twentieth-century glamour girls transported back in time, with no real function other than to look decorative. The dialogue often sounds stilted, sometimes deliberately so, and this has the effect of distancing the film even further from reality. It may be a fantasy of the ancient world rather than an attempt to recreate that world accurately, but even a fantasy needs to be populated by characters who bear some resemblance to flesh-and-blood human beings. Apart from Collins and O'Dea, that resemblance is all too often lacking. 5/10