A Dangerous Man: Lawrence After Arabia

Interesting, but also uninteresting.

The key plotlines of 'A Dangerous Man: Lawrence After Arabia', an "unofficial sequel" to that 1962 movie, are actually fairly intriguing, though it's all kinda presented via quite underwhelming means. My personal interest in events onscreen dipped and piqued fairly often. A trimmed run time would've helped, I'd imagine.

On the cast, a debuting Ralph Fiennes makes for a solid Lawrence, though that is not a surprise given he is an excellent actor. Alexander Siddig (aka Siddig El Fadil, also basically debuting) is another noteworthy name, though I feel like he would've made a better Sherif Ali (not that he appears here) rather than Prince Faisal - Siddig is good, all the same.

Call me an elitist if you like, but this film is not for the general public; it is for the erudite, educated and well-informed only. All others will be hopelessly lost in an ocean of Western and Eastern stereotypes and suppositions. I enjoyed this triumphant tragedy more than most; of that I have no doubt. I have my own copy of "The Seven Pillars of Wisdom", the masterpiece of T. E. Lawrence's life's work. I found the age differential between the original film masterpiece character of Prince Feisal (played by a middle-aged Alec Guinness) and the young Prince Feisal of this film to be slightly disconcerting, but something that, ultimately, the viewer can overlook. Ralph Fiennes is, of course, superb; as is all of the supporting cast. I did not care much for the ending, which I will not reveal, but that too did not affect the overall tenor of the film. If you enjoyed the prequel, you will most likely enjoy the sequel; despite the absence of special effects, a cast of thousands, and an epic budget. This is a thinking man's film, and not one to be enjoyed by someone looking for eye candy. Anyone who does not appreciate the content of this film would be, in my opinion, be ignorant and ill-informed. So to all those romantics out there who love T. E. Lawrence; enjoy every minute.

Ralph Fiennes takes on the dangerous Peter O'Toole role of T. E. Lawrence in "A Dangerous Man," about Lawrence of Arabia, who knew his way around the desert in World War I, bewildered by red tape in the 1919 Paris Peace Conference that eventually helped give us World War II and possibly World War III (though the 1921 Cairo Conference actually divided the former Ottoman Empire into lines in the sand).

Notable are Denis Quiley as Lord Curzon and Michael Cochrane as Winston Churchill, though the whole cast is fine.

Don't think of this as a sequel to David Lean's masterpiece. In "Lawrence of Arabia" O'Toole played Lawrence as the tragic archetype of a liberator no longer needed once "his" chosen people had their freedom.

Fiennes' Lawrence is up against a worse adversary than the Ottoman Empire: entrenched bureaucracy (what today we call the swamp). British civil servants who probably spent their War years in Whitehall smugly do their best to hamper Lawrence's delegation and cut his legs off before his friends. All in the name of aiding the French.

The ins and outs of governmental duplicity (it existed on medieval China, the British Empire and modern America amongst these same breed of bureaucrats) are easy to follow as they do their best to sideline Lawrence and the Arabs as the British and the French gaily scheme.

This movie has a good cast but shares no production values with Lean's magnum opus. Consider them two separate types of beast.

BTW, it takes all the rumors of Lawrence's private life as gospel. That will fascinate rather than irritate the viewers it's most likely to attract.

Ralph Fiennes makes a very convincing impersonation of the enigmatical T.E.Lawrence with all the complications of his case, especially concerning his integrity and political departure from the public scene, Ever since he made his career that brought him world fame and interest, it has been wondered who he really was, he became an enigma from the start, and that enigma has never been solved, while the main result of this film is to add to the enigma. Alexander Siddig makes as memorable a figure of Prince Feisal as Omar Sharif did of Sherif Auda, while the characters of Curzon, Clemenceau, Churchill, Wilson and the others enrich the film with political interest. The main story of the film is the account of how everything went wrong in the peace conference of Paris as Lawrence and the Arabs got practically nothing as a result of their efforts but mainly only were driven over and Lawrence even practically driven into exile, at least forced into disappearing anonymity, The film is therefore most like a documentary and extremely interesting as such, since it is impartial, tells the truth and is meticulous about it. Nothing can vie with or excel the splendour of David Lean's great epic, but one almost feels inclined to regard Ralph Fiennes' characterisation of Lawrence as more real and convincing than Peter O'Toole's.

I have seen the film again, read the other reviews and I too consider this movie excellent in its own right, the stars are spot on and the acting very believable. It is a definite companion piece to Lean's "Lawrence of Arabia", I have the 2 DVDs side by side in my collection at home. It might not have the trainwrecks and the battles with the Turks, but the politics of the time are very important, also very interesting, emphasised more strongly in this film than "Lawrence of Arabia". History buffs will lean toward this film I feel, as I have done. You will not even notice it was made for TV, the story is so gripping. Ralph Fiennes is remarkable in the role of T.E.Lawrence, working as translator and for the Arab cause, King Feisal perfectly portrayed by the young actor Alexander Siddiq, the others the politicians including Michael Cochrane as Winston Churchill are first rate, Nicholas Jones as Lord Dyson is chilling. To sum up, extremely good, an important and interesting film (not dry as someone said, the translation scenes, the speeches for world leaders had me on the edge of my seat) One has to look back at history to understand what is going on today. In the main, all the historical facts are in place here, and therefore one can at least, partially understand the complex situation in the region in our present age as we tune in to the News. Comment from Malcolm in Toronto, May 27th 2007