Lawrance of arabia

[Hiero]

I watch the movie Lawrance Of Arabia for the first time and this man stood out to most of the english men back then who always fought for enlgnad and for englands interest but Lawernce fought for a common good and fought for the arabs so they could have complete indpedent control free from British empire. I was wondering what other opinions or info you have.

[mhallex]

Movies and reality are very different things...

T. E. Lawerence used his credibility with the arab rebels in order to get them to follow the directives he had been given by the British government. At least the other Brits were honest about their imperialism, Lawerence ended up betraying the trust of the arabs.

[New Tolerance]

This is really ironic, I was about to buy that movie yesterday. But I couldn't find it, damn.

[Hiero]

It's a good movie, thanks for the info.

[LuZhiming]

Very strange this is, I just got that movie today. I have seen it before, but this is the first time I have owned it. Although this is for obvious reasons ignored, Lawrence of Arabia is quite a significant historical figure, especially when you consider this Palestinian state crisis in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict....

[Hiero]

There having a documentory of him on sbs in australia this year wil be interesting to see the facts

[timbaly]

According to the movie he knew deep down that England and France where going to take the Turks place as the imperialist over the arabs, yet he never came to terms with it and I think he truly wanted to believe what General Allenby and the politician by his side (Claude Raines's character, can't remember the name) that they had no imperila intentions. Of course he knew they would betray him but he told his arab army otherwise in order to keep them by his side.

[birdfarm]

Interesting that you find this movie worth seeing. I haven't seen it in a while, but my recollection is that it contains nothing of any use to a leftist.

As far as I remember, it depicted Arabs as wild and savage, and it made some kind of hero out of a servant of British imperialism. I am not at all interested in what thoughts may have tortured Lawrence's soul: he remains a servant of British imperialism in deed and in effect, and deed and effect are what count in history. England had hundreds of years' history of cruel and rapacious imperialist tyranny, and no one with any ideological common ground with any of us would have served in the English armed forces for five seconds.

If you want history, look somewhere else besides mainstream Hollywood. Albert Hourani has a very respected mainstream "History of the Arab Peoples"--I'm not familiar with any leftist works of similar scope--if you know of any, please post. Be careful--almost all that is written or portrayed about Arabs by outsiders is tainted by racism, and much that is written both by Arabs and non-Arabs is tainted by admiration for autocratic rulers. Definitely do not believe everything you read on these topics!

hasta la victoria siempre
~v

[Jesus Christ]

Nevertheless, the movie is a classic, and is very well.
It is not as harsh as you make it seem, it is unusually accurate at times also.

[LuZhiming]

Originally posted by [email protected] 7 2004, 11:49 PM
As far as I remember, it depicted Arabs as wild and savage, and it made some kind of hero out of a servant of British imperialism. I am not at all interested in what thoughts may have tortured Lawrence's soul: he remains a servant of British imperialism in deed and in effect, and deed and effect are what count in history. England had hundreds of years' history of cruel and rapacious imperialist tyranny, and no one with any ideological common ground with any of us would have served in the English armed forces for five seconds.

If you want history, look somewhere else besides mainstream Hollywood. Albert Hourani has a very respected mainstream "History of the Arab Peoples"--I'm not familiar with any leftist works of similar scope--if you know of any, please post. Be careful--almost all that is written or portrayed about Arabs by outsiders is tainted by racism, and much that is written both by Arabs and non-Arabs is tainted by admiration for autocratic rulers. Definitely do not believe everything you read on these topics!

hasta la victoria siempre
~v
I really doubt it depicts Arabs as "wild and savage." First, the movie has a scene in which Sherif Ali ibn el Kharish is crying over the failure of Lawrence's Arab National plan and Lawrence combing back to Arabia. It shows that same character saying "God help you English" to Lawrence after the latter had shown blatant hatred of him early in the movie. He also says "Gold help them" referring to Turkish soldiers under British bombardment. There is also a scene in which Ali ibn el Kharish refuses money from Lawrence, but still joins his campaign. That same scene shows him complaining about Lawrence hiring murderers as bodyguards. He also is found worrying about Lawrence in many different parts of the movie. And let us not forget the depictment of Daud and the other kid, which I don't believe was anything resembling your words. If anything, you could say the movie depicted Turks as wild and savage, because it largely did.

Of course the movie isn't historically accurate, but that doesn't [in the opinion of myself and others] change the quality of it.