''Land of the Pharaohs'' has become a film maudit. A french term for films which are considered cursed for reasons having to do with everything save the film. Hawks is famed for comedy, while this film is humourless. His films are also regarded as idealized portraits of camaraderie while this film is bereft of much of that(save for Greek chorus like workers, subjects and parades) and also because his film is a big budget epic on a non-Biblical and non-Roman theme. The biggest reason, cited by Hawks himself, is that this is a lone Hawks film where the characters are distanced and unlikable and the audience isn't encouraged to identify with them. It is this last quality that has served as the reason why this film has suffered neglect over the years.
The story of ''Land of the Pharaohs'' deals with the reign of the Pharoah Khufu(Jack Hawkins, excellent as always) who after a long campaign decides to build a pyramid by which he can sail into the afterlife with his gold and jewels. However the Pharaoh is displeased by the designs suggested by his staff architects as they had previously been broken and tombs were robbed. To this end, the Pharaoh appoints a new architect among a conquered enemy tribe named Vashtar(James Robertson Justice) to create a pyramid that would remain permanently sealed. In exchange for making the Pharaoh his crypt, Vashtar forfeits his life but gives his people a chance to be freed.
This is the main plot but the beauty of this film is that as in ''Red River'' and later ''Hatari!'', Hawks portrays a society of Egypt with enough fixed details in vignettes, asides that suggests a world and community of intertwined relationships, achieving something of a character of a documentary, to the extent that plot disappears and incidents take their character on the basis of point and counterpoint. During the montage of the pyramid construction(including an astonishing semi-circular pan) one gets the effect of watching a newsreel recently excavated. Hawks' film isn't realistic but it has a keen eye on how things function and work and about human relations.
''Land of the Pharaohs'' was made in 1955, the high point of Eisenhower's administration and post-war prosperity. Bearing this in mind(and from Heymar's intonation at the beginning that the story is set in the time that Egypt was the most powerful nation in the world), one can see this is an allegory about American expansion and capitalism. Hawks himself described the Pharaoh as an ancient predecessor to an American tycoon perhaps modeled on Howard Hughes, whom Hawks knew well. Jack Hawkins' domineering performance as the Pharaoh is also an extension of previous Hawksian figures, John Wayne in ''Red River'' obviously but also and less obviously John Barrymore in ''Twentieth Century''(the climactic scene of Nellifer's come-uppance is a repeat of the plot device at the end of that film) and according to reports, on Hawks himself, except one wonders if Hawks would have been as objective as he is if he shared it one hundred percent.
''Land of the Pharaohs'' isn't a perfect film but it is a film that offers patient audiences rich cinematic rewards. Technically it's a work of high craftsmanship, featuring spectacular sets from the legendary Alexandre Trauner, wonderful use of the CinemaScope frame and also one of Hawks' best and most briskly edited films. Unlike other epics which drag on for 3hrs or close to that, this film clocks in at 15mins short of two hours and yet it has more depth and riches than the other films. A lot happens in ''Land of the Pharoahs'', palace intrigues, sexual power-plays(in a debased parody of the usual Hawksian clash of sexes), murders and deaths. In fact by the end of the film, the Pharaoh himself disappears and the story continues after him, one of the most innovative aspects of Hawks' film.
The commercial failure of ''Land of the Pharaohs'' sent Hawks in a personal crisis and it took four years before he returned with ''Rio Bravo''. It also marked the final time he collaborated with William Faulkner on the screenplay(he's one of three credited with the screenplay) and some of the darker aspects of this film, the ones dealing with death, and survival convey(for the first time) Faulkner's own personality. The last shot of Vashtar's tribe leaving Egypt after the pyramid is sealed contains the same weight as that page in one of his books which ends with "they endured."
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