The palace set is so gigantic, the depth of the space established by long rows of guardians receding into the distance, that as Moses walks slowly away from the emperor’s denunciation - “Let the name of Moses be unheard and unspoken, erased from the memory of men for all time” - he attains a physical distance from the camera that enhances his isolation and peril. The film is so sparing with its camera movements that it’s a startling departure from form when the camera dollies in on the Pharaoh Sethi for the banishment of Moses from the Egyptian court, accompanied by thundering drumrolls of doom. Never hurrying, but never letting things drag either, he used long takes, typically planting his camera for medium shots and letting the actors go to work uninterrupted for minutes at a time. DeMille chose not to get in the way of one of the most potent stories ever told. Heston’s style is in perfect harmony with DeMille’s equally calm and patient staging. Is this the holy Lamb of God we all heard of in so many church services? It’s a beautiful, simple image of salvation. As for that desert scene I never got to the end of as a little kid, it reaches a powerful climax when Moses silently contemplates a lamb who serves as the herald of a life-saving oasis. Baxter’s acting may be campy (“Oh, Moses, Moses, you stubborn, splendid, adorable fool!”) but she makes for one of the era’s classic bitchy vixens. “Better to die in battle with a God than live in shame,” he says, as demanding of himself as of others. Still, though: I always liked Yul Brynner’s Rameses, the epitome of an antagonist who inspires respect because he sticks to his sense of honor. And those special effects, which were cutting-edge when the film was released, came to look ridiculous over time. Robinson) from the Canarsie section of Cairo? Is there a worse actress than Anne Baxter as Nefretiri? Could they have found a less Jewish actor than Charlton Heston to play the Deliverer of the Hebrews? Why is God turning Moses’s staff into a cobra that devours two other snakes, anyway? That sounds more like a Satan kind of thing. Is the double-crossing Hebrew Dathan (Edward G. As a young adult, I found the movie a bit.

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