Talk:The Ten Commandments (1923 film)

Technicolor

What evidence is there that the entire Biblical first half of the movie was photographed in Technicolor? Neither of the two books on Technicolor (Glorious Technicolor by Fred Basten and Technicolor Movies by Haines) claim so, nor does the biography Cecil B. DeMille's Hollywood, which says that only the Exodus scenes were photographed in Technicolor (pp. 202, 360). Technicolor was not used for studio photography under artificial lighting until Cytherea in 1924, and most of the Biblical scenes of The Ten Commandments are clearly filmed indoors under artificial lighting (e.g. the Pharaoh's palace). Herbert Kalmus wrote in 1938:

Neither The Toll of the Sea nor The Wanderer of the Wasteland nor any of the inserts made until the middle of 1924 had given us experience photographing with artificial light. We were therefore very glad to obtain an order for an insert in a production directed by Mr. George Fitzmaurice, called Cytherea, photographed in the United Studios lot in Hollywood, giving us our first experience in photographing an interior set on a dark stage.

— Walloon 17:40, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Your correct. I misread an article from the Los Angeles Times about the prologue being in Technicolor, but in fact it is only the Exodus sequences: the flight of the Hebrews from the city of Rameses, etc. AllTalking 22:36, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

CBDM's introductory comments?

Hey there, I just heard that (some version of?) The Ten Commandments has a well-known introduction delivered by the director himself... Is this true? And if so, what were the words (or better yet, any video clip found online?) BTW I heard this because the Sodenbergh film "Schizopolis" apparently parodies it by having him appear before the film saying "If you don't understand this movie, the problem is with YOU, not with the movie..." 199.214.27.209 —Preceding signed but undated comment was added at 19:18, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

I take it that you've never seen the complete 1956 version. If you want to hear that introduction, get yourself a copy, start it at the very beginning and enjoy the overture and opening titles. Then, when the story's about to start, you'll hear the introduction as spoken by the director himself. JDZeff (talk) 04:38, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Fading

I removed a paragraph from the introduction, dealing with the state of Technicolor in a print the editor viewed, for several reasons:

A rare telecast of this film showed that the original Technicolor footage had faded and could only be appreciated if the viewer increased the color intensity of the monitor. Film historians have noted that early Technicolor prints deteriorated more rapidly than black and white prints due to the effect of the chemicals on the silver nitrate base of film stock. Preservationists have used digital processes to restore the color in some of the surviving two-strip Technicolor prints, most notably in Universal's 1930 film King of Jazz.

(1) It did not belong in the introduction, which is a summary. (2) It compared the Technicolor of The Ten Commandments to The King of Jazz, although they were made under different systems, (3) That a television showing of The Ten Commandments is "rare" is irrelevant, the film has been available on VHS and DVD for over a decade, (4) There is no such thing as "two-strip Technicolor", a common error. Technicolor processes 1 through 3 were photographed on a single strip of negative film. Process 4 was photographed on three strips of negative film, hence Process 4 was called "three-strip". — Walloon (talk) 19:40, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Public domain

This is a little early, but on January 1, 2019, this film will be in the public domain. If anyone manages to find the film at that time, it should be shown as part of the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:1C2:4301:F8E1:49EE:F9AD:4C6A:1DF8 (talk) 21:41, 21 June 2015 (UTC)