Retrospective: Lawrence of Arabia (Patreon)

Screened at the Dryden in Rochester, New York.

“Sherif Ali! So long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe, so long will they be a little people. A silly people! Greedy, barbarous, and cruel — as you are!”

Lawrence assumes his White Man’s Burden like a father slinging a toddler over his shoulder. He looks at these desert primitives fighting among themselves, killing each other for drinking from the wrong well, unable to wrap their heads around newfangled paper money, and sees a class of promising young upstarts. Uplifting these pupils of his will pulverize him like the Sun’s Anvil. 

Even in the days after the Nakba and the Suez crisis, David Lean hasn’t seen the extent of Lawrence’s legacy. The British ultimately used the Arab Revolt as a mechanism to save their dying empire — as failed a ploy as any in the Twentieth Century — leading to Sykes-Picot and the founding of Mandatory Palestine. You can draw a nearly straight line from Lawrence’s campaign in Aqaba to the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

David Lean nearly understands that. He gives Jack Hawkins and Claude Rains (the greatest British supporting actor in Twentieth Century cinema) scene upon scene of calculating imperial discussions. Lawrence clearly fails to understand the imperial agenda he’s serving, even as he naively seeks his leaders’ assurance that they won’t betray the Arabs. The moments where Lawrence gets Arabs under his care killed are a clear sign that his presence isn’t entirely good for the Arabs. Whatever problems the movie has, a lack of nuance isn’t one of them.

Yet this is all undone by the fact that Lawrence is better at being an Arab than Sherif Ali or Auda Abu Tayi or Prince Faisal (played by Alec Guinness, perhaps my favorite actor of all time, in perhaps his second most role in a David Lean movie). He rides into the unlivable Nafud desert — something the real T. E. Lawrence never did — and then returns to it to save one Arab under his care. Yes, he is then forced to execute this man, undermining his good deed (and this is a genuinely amazing part of the movie), but this frames a major geopolitical theater through the inner turmoil of one limey twink.

And that makes the movie hard to stomach. Yes, the use of Super Panavision 70 is frightening and powerful. Peter O’Toole is genuinely scary in this movie. Maurice Jarre’s score is almost as stunning as Omar Sharif’s cheekbones. But the unconvincing and sanctimonious turn to anti-war sentiment, the rather tedious second half of the movie, and the sheer blinkeredness of the whole affair make this a difficult movie to appreciate. It should be studied closely, but not admired.