Review of Ben-Hur (2016) by Hmf_47 — 24 Aug 2016

Ben-Hur is entertaining enough to spend a lazy weekend afternoon. There are some pretty cool action beats and visuals, and the acting is solid. Jack Huston and Toby Kebbel play each other well, and add depth to characters that can easily become stereotypes.

However, it suffers from a pacing that barely lets the story breathe, unearned cathartic moments (Jesus could be removed and it wouldn't make much of a difference), and a schizophrenic tone in the last 20 minutes or so (the character change there gives the "Martha" scene in Batman v Superman a run for its money).

It's not a great movie, but it's not the train wreck critics are making it out to be.