Weekend Project: Lawrence of Arabia

I was a film major in college, yet I must say that the number of films I have actually seen is quite limited in scope and variety…mostly obscure randomness and international flicks.  So this weekend my project was a classic: Lawrence of Arabia.  An epic and a tragedy.  (I’ll try not to include any spoilers, though I must admit that the plot itself doesn’t really seen to be the point of the movie.)  I read the excerpt about the movie from Roger Ebert’s The Great Movies, where he said that there’s really no plot, no love interest, no point, but that is a beautiful film.  Well, I do agree that it is a strikingly beautiful film.  However, I do think there is a plot and more importantly there is a love interest, though it is not a woman.

via greatamericanmovies.com

I think Lawrence’s love interest is the Arab people, and perhaps the desert.  Both of which are very difficult lovers.  The desert, it never loves back.  And the Arab people, they can, but in a way that is different from English customs and ideas.  Just look at the crisis Lawrence experiences when he is faced with the fact that he isn’t really Arab: he says he is invisible, that he can pass…but when a Turkish soldier points out his pale skin, he lashes out.  Because he realizes his love is an outsider’s love.  And I think the tragedy is, because he is an Englishman, he knows he’s fighting for a cause that is basically hopeless.  There will be no Arab nation if the British and French can help it, yet he almost goes mad trying to make it happen, trying to bring “freedom,” thinking that making the nation will make him belong.

Well, it’s much more complicated than all of that, really.  If you haven’t seen the movie, you should.  It’s fabulous.