MartinHafer This 'unauthorized' (i.e., made without paying proper royalties) version of "Ben Hur" is exceptionally early. I say this because huge spectacle films were still in the near future--so I was not surprised that this one came off as VERY choppy and the big scenes came off as ridiculously simple (such as the chariot race--it is VERY underwhelming). And, because of this, it's an incredibly unappealing little film. In other words, instead of telling a coherent story, it's like a very brief highlights reel--filled with a few brief clips from the famed story by General Lew Wallace but not telling any sort of narrative. If you think about it, the famed 1959 version by William Wyler was about three hours long. This 1907 version is about 10 minutes!! Audiences at the time could have only enjoyed it if they knew the story already.

Michael_Elliott Ben Hur (1907) ** (out of 4) The first version of the classic novel has a bit of history behind it but the actual film doesn't hold up. We get Herman Rottger playing Ben Hur, the man who becomes a slave and will eventually revolt and go up against Messala (William S. Hart). For starters, if anyone tries comparing this to the 1925 or 1959 versions then they're really cheating all three films. This is a 13-minute short so there's a lot to get crammed in here and of course the story is going to have to bounce around and not spend too much time on one plot point. With that said, the end result here is pretty disappointing because none of the apparent five directors knew how to build any real suspense or to make us care about anything we're seeing. We can never really get into the actual story and it's hard to care for any of the characters. Another problem is that the film really doesn't even appear to try and do anything overly special. We get some very impressive costumes but that's about it. This movie remains entertaining as a curio if you've seen what films would follow. On the historic side, this was the first film to end up in court due to copyright violations so I guess all authors has this film to thank for filmmakers not being able to take their work without credit.

JoeytheBrit It's true that watching this, the first version of Lew Wallace's monumental tome is a bit like watching one of those 5-minute condensed versions of the entire Star Wars saga acted out by enthusiastic amateurs in their mum and dad's back garden, but complaining about how amateurish it all is seems a bit churlish to me.Sidney Olcott, who like the rest of the film-making community, was still feeling his way back in 1907, would go on to better things, but it's clear that he still has no real idea of how to handle such a massive challenge. Panning shots and close-ups had already been found in films before 1907, but neither are to be found here, which is a shame because you get the feeling that the filmmakers here are trying to create a spectacle of sorts. Even then, they were starting to realise that audiences were growing more discerning and didn't want to see endless variations on the same theme every time they sat in front of a screen.To give the filmmakers credit, the sets are quite extravagant for the time. It's not exactly clear what's going on a lot of the time, even with titles explaining each piece of action that is about to take place, but a lot of the cast seem to spend a lot of their time raising their arms. Sometimes you can tell they're doing it on cue because every arm goes up at the same time. The big chariot race is something of a let-down: the camera focuses on the crowd (about 12 of them) while every now and then we see the occasional chariot go flashing past. You've got to wonder whether Olcott watched this in his later years and rued the opportunity that he missed.Incidentally, this film was the subject of a landmark legal case when the estate of the late Lew Wallace took Kalem Pictures, the makers of the film, to court for failing to get permission from the copyright holder to film the story. Kalem, I believe, claimed it was based on the stage play (which also boasted a live chariot race with the horses running on a treadmill), but to no avail...

Fred Sivyer I saw the first (1907) Ben Hur about 25 years ago in a film society back to back double feature with the Charlton Heston version. My memories are therefore fragmentary.The film should be called "Illustrated scenes from the life of Ben Hur" as it really doesn't try to tell the story in the time available. If you hadn't read the book you wouldn't know what was going on. One of my recollections is my wife nudging me and saying "there's the tile that's going to fall". Above the rather pathetic and bored looking extras (showing off their knees in Roman army costume) one roof tile was very different from the rest - it wasn't painted onto the set!! Sure enough, Ben Hur leaned rather obviously on this brick.The chariot race sticks in my mind too. A bunch of extras starts jumping up and down and two chariots race by the camera. The extras calm down and look bored for a while then start jumping up and down for the next rapid pass of two chariots. I can't remember how many times this was repeated, we were all laughing so hard that tears were running down my face.It is mercifully short, and interesting to compare with the 1925 big budget spectacular (also silent of course) which foreshadows the third version with amazing special effects.