It's easy to understand how a film about the Boxer Rebellion gets made, it's a major historical event in Chinese history. But why make a film about the Western imperialist viewpoint? Easy, this is a 1962 Hollywood extravaganza - where European actors still play Asian roles. It would be decades before moviegoing audiences would be interested in seeing a film from the Chinese viewpoint,(eg. Last Emperor). All I learned from this film is that the Chinese were devious, calculating barbarians who wanted to rid their nation from foreign interventionists. Aside from the script, which was interesting, if not factual,was the massive production of this film. This is worth viewing for that reason alone. This was a Samuel Bronston production, with an all-star cast, epic sets and costumes, Dmitri Tiomkin music score. In short, everything for a good epic. The big problem, is that we don't come away with a good understanding of the events that prompted this battle and the movie tends to go off on these unimportant character stories. I kept wanting for more Chinese politics. Heston, as always, takes command, however, he was only a major who acted like a general, I felt.
Review of 55 Days at Peking
