In the early 1960s, many of the great American filmmakers we love today were still learning the language of film. In Hollywood’s classical era, movies tended to emphasize dialogue and star power, often featuring uncomplicated heroes. And while widescreen formats existed, they weren’t often used to their full potential. That is, until a certain groundbreaking historical epic arrived in theaters on December 16th, 1962, inspiring every generation of storytellers since.
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Lawrence of Arabia was directed by David Lean and shot by Freddie Young in Super Panavision 70. It birthed a new visual aesthetic, making the landscape a character with sweeping on-location wides, natural light, negative space, and deep focus. Peter O’Toole’s T. E. Lawrence, based on the real historical figure, was a conflicted protagonist who challenged the classic good-versus-evil narrative. A massive commercial and critical hit upon release, Lawrence of Arabia became the new blueprint for making a masterpiece, influencing everyone from Stanley Kubrick to Martin Scorsese and Ridley Scott to Steven Spielberg.
Lawrence of Arabia Changed How Movies Are Made
At the time, Lawrence of Arabia was nearly unmatched in its sense of scale, and that’s because Lean and Young used long lenses and extended wide shots to place Lawrence himself as a small, vulnerable figure within the vast desert, rather than an infallible hero. This may seem obvious today, but using geography to help tell the story was largely unprecedented at the time. The technique directly influenced filmmakers like George Lucas, who took inspiration for the desert shots in Star Wars, and Ridley Scott, whose hits Gladiator and Kingdom of Heaven use the environment to place the audience in the minds of the characters.
It was also the synchronicity of the cinematography with the editing that blew everyone’s minds, and editor Anne V. Coates even won an Oscar for her work. Cutting Lawrence extinguishing a match into the desert sunrise is arguably the most famous match cut of all time. The simple visual association was enough to collapse time without losing continuity, and to add meaning to what would otherwise be an uninteresting transition. While the technique had been around before Lawrence of Arabia, it was suddenly everywhere after 1962. Stanley Kubrick drew direct inspiration for his equally famous match-cut in 2001: A Space Odyssey, and later experimented with transitions in films like Barry Lyndon. Thriller master Brian De Palma is another who has drawn heavily on Coates’ editing in Lawrence of Arabia.
Steven Spielberg has spoken directly about the film’s impact on him. According to Top10Films, he even called it a “miracle” that “pulverized” him, and credited it with inspiring him to become a filmmaker after he saw it four times in four weeks. He recalls being mesmerized by the real locations and distinct visual style, adding that when he eventually met Lean, it was like meeting his “guru.”
Lean’s depiction of Lawrence as a contradictory, self-mythologizing colonizer rather than a straightforward hero was highly influential as well. Sam Peckinpah and Oliver Stone drew on the film’s moral greyness and themes of violence. Martin Scorsese has cited both the film’s editing rhythms and visual scope as formative. More recently, Denis Villeneuve’s Dune films bear the clear marks of Lawrence of Arabia’s influence in the vast desert landscapes and flawed messianic protagonist. In essence, Lawrence of Arabia and its creators built on the work of legends like Orson Welles to create the cinematic language we are all familiar with today. More than six decades later, Lean’s epic continues to inspire.
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