The Prodigal
List Price:
Our Price: $2.77
You Save: $3.20 (54%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $1.88 (click here)
Category: DVD
See more DVD details
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
DVD details
Actor: Ann Cameron, EDMUND PURDOM, LANA TURNER, Louis Calhern, Paul BryarBrand: Warner Brothers
Cinematographer: Joseph Ruttenberg
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo; English (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: Widescreen, 2.35:1
Running Time: 112 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-06-26
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Model: 79729
Studio: Warner Home Video
DVD Reviews of The Prodigal
DVD Review: Hollywood's Golden Trash: Kitsh in full force
Summary: 3 Stars
This movie is neither historical nor Biblical. It barely relates to a story of a prodigal son in the New Testament and the rest is Hollywood at its best producing cheap thrills, fantasy sets, and innocuous dialogue.
If you are looking for some delicious trash, soft-porn, hilarious accidental comedy, this is it. This movie has no relation whatsoever with the ancient goddess Astarte, the iconography is wrong, the rites also, the depiction of Baal is also mistaken, the costumes completely off, vaguely Babylonian, which is somewhere about 1000 years off in time and 500 miles to the East of location.
It is all ABOUT Lana Turner as Samarra, a pagan 'priestess of the flesh' possibility. The first time she appears, it's in a cream colored dress designed to make her look more naked than dressed, for the fashion conscious it should be noted that this outfit is a direct ancestor of the Cher fashion statement of the 80's when she had her TV show. Within the context of a retrograde period in American culture, of racial repression and Hollywood black lists I for one consider the wearing of this revealing costume an act of heroism, not to mention deserving of the purple heart equivalent of fashion bravery.
In an America before Jackie, where people actually thought that fashion pertained to the weird hats on Mamie Eisenhower, Lana's appearance as the priestess of sex must have been like an atomic explosion of sensory overload: She sashays her way into a ritual for the purpose of seducing Micah (Edmund Perdum) who apparently found a niche as Mr. Nice guy with a weakness for the femme fatale (he played a very similar role in the famous fiasco, "The Egyptian") holding her hands together in a gesture as empty of ritualistic significance as if she were holding her eyeliner, she lights candles and walks the walk around the faithful mainly for the purpose of giving Micah a saucy side glance that could burn a hole into a stone and set an entire stallion stable on fire.
At the time it was released, despite its huge $5 million budget it was panned as a vulgar extravaganza. It is, every inch of it, but it has enormous entertainment value, which leads me to believe a Broadway musical version of this material could make a fortune now if Nicole Kidman decided to play the high priestess role that Lana plays to the hilt, I sincerely believe it is the best performance of her entire career, and she never looked more ravishing. She looks exquisite in yards of fabric in a series of gowns that almost include all the colors of the rainbow. Her hair is piled up in a do that makes her look like she has small horns, a most becoming devilish look that is anything but accidental. She wears more jewelry than a Harry Winston window display the week before Christmas and she has the role of her life: This priestess is as vapid as a high fashion super-model of today, she is so self centered and infatuated with her beauty that she can barely walk straight, but she fills that screen totally with her garish sex appeal, like melting chocolate with mocha syrup covering a sundae cup.
Micah's family looks so weird with the most synthetic beards in Hollywood history, that you can't really blame him for shaving and playing it up in Damascus with the pagans. However he is in trouble from the start as he played good Samaritan and recued the escaped slave of Nahreeb, high priest of Baal, here played by Louis Calhern in a permanently sadistic mood, pierced ears included. I hope his outfits were re-cycled as sofa cushions for vinyl sofas in LA, such precious polyesters are not produced anymore and they looked synthetically dyed enough to last till the Second Coming, intact in their blinding splendor.
In her big temple scene Lana is perfectly devoid of any expression as a gorgeous athlete-sacrifice victim, much looking like a Swede than a middle eastener, is pushed into the holy fire by her sacred kiss.
For that matter no one in the movie is remotely in tune with the ethnicity of the region, and that includes Lana herself and her own version of Mini-me, a little blonde girl Lana look-alike- brat, that she is educating to to be the future priestess of Astarte, a creature so annoying and overbearing, one wishes they would have applied the true sacrifice to Astarte which were first born children...But my favorite moment is when Lana is attending a performance of a fable by her brat disciple and other children in the magnificent temple halls and yet one has the strange sensation that she is watching a television program somewhere in Staten Island with her favorite niece. How she can manage to transform that expensive pseudo-architecture into a suburban home atmosphere with her gesturing and sexy whispering is perhaps one of the outstanding miracle performances of Hollywood history and she should have been getting two Oscars for that scene alone: One for special effects and another for Lifetime Illusion technique.
But this movie must be seen, not discussed. It's main value is in the uniquely barbaric splendor of its plaster creations, the lavish yet empty spectacle, the unnecessary and inaccurate baroque details that are all at the very essence of camp, and high kitsh style, unmatched anywherelse. As a reference for this genre it is extremely useful, and unsurpassed.
Description of The Prodigal
PRODIGAL - DVD MovieBestsellers in DVD
![The Story of Jeremiah [VHS] Image](/images/noimg.gif)
The Story of Jeremiah [VHS]Vision Video; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Wresting With God [VHS]by Vision Video
Vision Video; Published: 1990-10-01; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Price in other shops:
Study Bible Video with Workbook [VHS]Spring Arbor Distributors; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Best price: $7.95
Price in other shops:
Tempo:Childrens TV Favourites Video [VHS]HarperCollins Audio; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Best price: $9.17
Price in other shops:
Tempo.Herbs:Parseley'Sb/ Party Video [VHS]HarperCollins Audio; VHS Tape; VHS Video
![Strike the Original Match [VHS] Image](/images/Strike-the-Original-Match-VHS-0001374079-X.jpg)
Strike the Original Match [VHS]New Liberty Films; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Price in other shops:
![Medjugorje The Miracles and the Message [VHS] Image](/images/Medjugorje-The-Miracles-and-the-Message-VHS-0001373293-X.jpg)
Medjugorje The Miracles and the Message [VHS]JPN Film Production; Release date: 1995-12-15; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Best price: $29.99
Mayo Clinic Echocardiography Review Course for Boards and Recertification DVD 2008by Mayo
DVD
Price in other shops:
Pediatric Diagnostic Imaging DVD: Single Userby Oakstone
DVD
Price in other shops:
Cost Accounting [VHS]by Charles T. Horngren, George Foster, Srikant M. Datar, Howard Teall
Pearson Canada, Toronto; VHS Tape; VHS Video
Similar DVDs, VHS Video, Audio CDs
Peyton PlaceFox; Release date: 2004-03-02; DVD
Best price: $7.14
Price in other shops:
David and BathshebaFox; Release date: 2006-03-14; DVD
Best price: $7.16
Price in other shops:
The Story of RuthRELIGIOSA; Release date: 2006-03-14; DVD
Best price: $5.46
Price in other shops:
Demetrius and the GladiatorsFOX Home Entertainment; Release date: 2001-02-27; DVD
Best price: $4.33
Price in other shops:
Solomon & ShebaSony; Release date: 2008-03-25; DVD
Best price: $6.97
Price in other shops:
Last Days of Sodom & GomorrahRelease date: 2007-09-11; DVD
Best price: $9.49
Portrait In Black / Madame X (Double Feature)Universal Studios; Release date: 2008-02-05; DVD
Best price: $8.31
Price in other shops:
Queen Of The NileRelease date: 2008-05-27; DVD
Best price: $8.99
Land of the PharaohsWarner Brothers; Release date: 2007-06-26; DVD
Best price: $24.98
![The Egyptian (1954) [DVD] Image](/images/The-Egyptian-1954-DVD-B005DSGD7S-X.jpg)
The Egyptian (1954) [DVD]DVD
Best price: $22.95