Prince of Egypt

Sunday, 17 January 1999

We finally got around to seeing Prince of Egypt today. Pretty good. Visually, it was excellent. I was especially impressed by the hieroglyphic dream sequence, the clever visual parallels drawn between Moses and Ramses's son against the drawing of the execution of the Hebrew first-borns, and the genuinely spooky tenth plague scene. I also really liked the character design; it's good to see American standards of beauty widening. My only complaint was that the computer-generated bits weren't integrated well into the traditional animation. The basket really stood out awkwardly during the opening.

For a movie with three different soundtrack albums being released, the songs were dull and generic. All I could think of during the "You're Playing With The Big Boys Now" sequence is how much better a job the late Howard Ashman (lyricist for Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, and Little Shop of Horrors) would have done. Well, one other thing: The magic of the Egyptian priests is portrayed in the film as trickery, all sleight-of-hand and smoke-and-mirrors. It's pretty clear to me that when Exodus was written, it was thought that the Egyptians at the very least had real magic, and probably real gods. In Exodus 12:12, God says he's going to pass judgment on the gods of Egypt.

Oh, and the movie draws a little too closely on The Ten Commandments in some places, which is probably because the typical American is more familiar with The Ten Commandments than with the book of Exodus.

Another nice touch: After the (many) credits were finished, the movie closes with quotes about Moses from Deuteronomy (Jewish scripture), Acts (Christian scripture), and the Koran (Islamic scripture).

This movie was the occasion of our first visit to the new United Artists theater at 13th and Broadway, and I have to say that it's a theater worth paying inflated Manhattan movie prices (US$9) for. The seats were the most comfortable theater seats that I've ever sat in, with headrests, moveable armrests, rockable motion, and adequate legroom. There were digital displays in the lobbies telling us how long till each movie started, whether the theater was being cleaned, the previews showing, etc. ("Movie now boarding at Gate 3," I commented to Chris.) Very nice. We did almost get lost trying to find our way out.

Eastern Athletics finally fixed their elevator today. It had been broken since at least Wednesday. I skipped going on Thursday, since I just couldn't bear the thought of going up six flights of stairs just to check in, followed by four more to get to the treadmills. By Saturday I was almost used to them. Today the elevator was back, so I celebrated by adding some more weight routines to develop my forearms, and doing lots of stretching.