This year is either the 50th anniversary of "The Ten Commandments," or the 3,500th anniversary. It depends on your point of view. For Hollywood, however, it has been half a century since Cecil B. DeMille used special effects to create a blockbuster movie and revolutionize modern cinema.
It has also been about that long since Hollywood produced a film so universally loved. No, the film hasn't aged too well. It's true Yul Brynner and Charlton Heston are still iconic in their roles as Pharaoh and Moses. But the "wise guy" performance of Edward G. Robinson and some of the ham-handed "magic tricks" have more guffaw than awe about them now.
Still, when Heston/Moses parts the sea, audiences are reminded of what Tinsel Town has always done best — take your breath away. The lesson Hollywood failed to learn, however, is about storytelling. A great story can create an instant hit and a potential classic. And DeMille knew the Passover events were as powerful today as 3,500 years ago. From Pharaoh's stubbornness to the fretting of Moses, the characters and events capture the essence of what it means to be human. Very few scripts today embody such universal aspects of humanity so well. The current writers depict "types" — the drug-dealer, the hobo, the soldier — but what they miss is the universal soul of people.
That's why writers in the past spent so much time rewriting the Bible. They recognized the power of the stories. John Steinbeck's Nobel-winning novels, such as "East of Eden" and "Grapes of Wrath," are just two examples. But that kind of adaptation is a talent few modern screenwriters are to cultivate. But then only a handful of actors today could even pull off the larger-than-life performances given by DeMille's two leading men. In fact, there is an almost apologetic smallness to characters in today's films, and boyish — or girlish — lightness to the performers and their performances. In that regard, "The Ten Commandments" not only shows how far the American film industry has come in 50 years, but it shows all the wonderful attributes that the industry has jettisoned to get here.