The Story Archive

The Ten Commandments (1923)

Cecil B. DeMille · 1923 CE · Film · Modern / American · Modernist

A Technicolor prologue takes the Israelites out of Egypt, parts the Red Sea and brings the tablets down from Sinai; the rest is set in modern San Francisco, where one brother builds a church out of cheap concrete while the other quotes scripture at him. DeMille's method is to show the sin at length before condemning it. The parted sea was made from a gelatin slab shot in reverse, and the cost nearly sank the studio.

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