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Ben-Hur is a 1959 film directed by William Wyler and is, today, the best-known version of the film based on the Ben-Hur book by Lew Wallace.
It was done in the spectacular block buster style, and featured Charlton Heston as Judah ben-Hur and Stephen Boyd as Messala.
It premiered at Loew's Theater in New York City on November 18, 1959.
This version won a stunning 11 Academy Awards (a number matched only by two other movies in the history of Academy Awards - Titanic in 1997 and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King in 2004).
The movie was filmed in a process known as "MGM Camera 65", a 70mm anamorphic print at an aspect ratio of 2.76:1, considered to be one of the widest prints ever made, having a width of almost three times its height. This allowed for spectacular panoramic shots in addition to four-channel audio.
Even by today's standards, the chariot race in Ben-Hur is widely considered to be one of the most spectacular action sequences ever filmed. The lack of computer-generated effects, the visually astonishing MGM Camera 65 process, and excellent cinematography made the chariot race one of the most memorable scenes in modern cinema.
This was a successful attempt to save MGM from bankruptcy.
MGM received over 40 scripts.
- Academy Award for Best Picture - Sam Zimbalist, producer
- Academy Award for Best Actor - Charlton Heston
- Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor - Hugh Griffith
- Academy Award for Directing - William Wyler
- Academy Award for Best Art Direction - Set Decoration, Color - Edward C. Carfagno, William A. Horning, and Hugh Hunt
- Academy Award for Best Cinematography, Color - Robert Surtees
- Academy Award for Costume Design, Color - Elizabeth Haffenden
- Best Effects, Special Effects - A. Arnold Gillespie (visual), Milo B. Lory (audible), and Robert MacDonald (visual)
- Best Film Editing - John D. Dunning, and Ralph E. Winters
- Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture - Miklós Rózsa
- Best Sound - Franklin Milton
The film was also nominated for one further award
- Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium - Karl Tunberg
See also
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