Samson and Delilah Review (1949) (Throwback Thursday #17)
Director: Cecil B. DeMille
Screenplay: Jesse L. Lasky Jr., Fredric M. Frank
Based on: The Biblical account of Samson and Delilah in the Book of Judges (Chapters 13–16), with additional fictionalized elements
Starring: Victor Mature, Hedy Lamarr, George Sanders, Angela Lansbury, Henry Wilcoxon, Olive Deering, Russ Tamblyn
Release Date: December 21, 1949 (U.S.)
Rating: Not Rated (released before the modern MPAA ratings system)
Samson is a well-known Biblical figure from the Book of Judges, but his story is just four chapters of that book. In the Bible, we don’t spend much time with Samson and only the last chapter of his story includes Delilah. Her small, but important, portion of his tale however is a big part of why it’s so memorable to people. This movie, one of Cecil B. DeMille’s epics, is based on the tale of Samson in Judges, but only loosely. Because the tale is so constrained within the Book of Judges, Cecil takes a lot of liberties here. That’s acceptable to me given the length of the material and needing to stretch the brief tale into an over two hour movie. Just as long as you recognize that it’s loosely based on the tale and not documentary level accurate film. The biggest liberty taken is of course that Delilah was the sister of Samson’s Philistine wife and actually loved Samson and felt remorse for betraying him.
In that sense, DeMille managed to make Delilah (played by the lovely Hedy Lamarr) into a somewhat sympathetic character who herself was betrayed by her fellow Philistines after turning Samson over to them. That’s a pretty big liberty to take with a Biblical story as far as I’m concerned, especially when it involves inventing so much of a backstory and motivation for Delilah that has no Biblical basis. It’s worth noting for people who want a purely Scripture based telling, but ultimately doesn’t change the fact that the movie itself is really quite good.
The story of Samson is probably familiar to at least half of you reading this, but for the benefit of those who aren’t familiar with it, here’s what DeMille’s movie is about.
Samson (Victor Mature) is a powerful (in terms of physical strength) judge of the Israelites who is under Nazirite vows (one of which is to refrain from cutting the hair on your head). Despite having a perfectly fine Israelite woman wanting to marry him, Samson turns his attention to a blonde-haired Philistine beauty named Semadar (Angela Lansbury). It’s important to note that this is another liberty, as the Philistine woman isn’t named in the Bible. At this time, the Philistines are ruling over the Israelites, and Samson isn’t the only one after Semadar. She is also being pursued by Ahtur (Henry Wilcoxon), the governor of Gaza.
Samson goes to visit Semadar, who is getting ready to go hunt a lion with Ahtur and some other Philistine soldiers. Naturally, Samson wants to go hunt the lion too, but he’s going to have to ride with Semadar’s sister, Delilah. Samson and Delilah arrive at the lion’s location first, and Samson wrestles the beast and kills it with his bare hands. Delilah is very impressed with Samson, and she wants him. This is, again, perfectly fine for a cinematic experience, but at this point we’re simply using a Biblical tale as the backdrop for an invented romantic drama set in Biblical Zorah and Gaza.
After being convinced of Samson’s strength, the Saran of Gaza (George Sanders) gives Samson the hunter’s ring for killing the beast, but Samson says he’d rather take a Philistine bride instead. The Saran agrees, and Delilah is happy, thinking Samson is going to choose her. Instead, he chooses Semadar and this angers both Delilah and Ahtur in the process. The wedding is set, and some scheming goes on between Delilah and Ahtur. Samson presents a riddle to 30 Philistines where he promises each a garment if they can answer it correctly. If they can’t, however, they’ll each have to give him a garment. Ahtur threatens Semadar and pressures her into getting the answer from Samson, which she then passes along to Ahtur.
Samson is enraged, all hell breaks loose, and he storms out and steals 30 garments from the Philistines before returning. When he gets back, he discovers that Semadar’s father Tubal (William Farnum) has given her to Ahtur and that the two have already wed. As a bit of a make good, Tubal offers Delilah in her place, but Samson wants none of that. Delilah then admits that she was behind the plotting because she wants Samson for herself. Then all hell really breaks loose; Semadar and her father are killed in the ensuing fight, which only makes Samson even angrier.
So, Samson and Delilah are both furious. Samson causes a lot of pain for the Philistines, and they respond by increasing taxes on and looting the Israelites. Samson allows himself to be bound by the Israelites and turned over to the Philistines. They mock him, and eventually he calls out to God, who answers with a lightning storm. Samson uses that as his cue to bust loose and go on a killing rampage. Using the jawbone of an ass, Samson kills somewhere between 100 and 1,000 Philistine soldiers.
The Philistines have a meeting about what to do about Samson, and Delilah says she can capture him, find out the secret to his strength, and hand him over to the Saran (you’d think they would have noticed the lightning storm when he called out to God). In return, Delilah wants 1,100 silver pieces from each of the men at the council and the Saran’s promise that no blade touches Samson’s skin (she’s greedy, but not completely heartless). The Saran and the council agree to the terms.
It’s here that it becomes apparent that Samson has all the brawn in the world but no brain to speak of. When he comes across Delilah, he shows some smarts by recognizing that she is there as bait from the Philistines to capture him. Indeed, Delilah tells him repeatedly that she is there to betray him. Even still, with Semadar now dead and because he has a completely unreasonable desire to be with a Philistine woman, he falls for Delilah. She asks him three times what the secret to his strength is, and three times he gives a false answer. And that was smart, because Delilah tests his answers everytime by screaming, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!” and watching him snap the ropes that bind him, which should set off red flags.
Those flags weren’t raised though, and Samson finally goes to tell her the truth, but Delilah loves him and so now she doesn’t want to know. Instead, she wants to flee to Egypt with Samson and live happily ever after. Samson agrees. Lo and behold, Miriam (Olive Deering), the Israelite woman who loves Samson, and Saul (Russ Tamblyn), an Israelite kid, show up and inform Samson that the Philistines have killed his father, have his mother tied up, and that she is calling out for him. Naturally, Samson wants to go bust some skulls, and who could blame him?
Delilah is once again angered that Samson is turning toward another woman (even though it’s his mother and he’s going to rescue her, not marry her), and she asks him to drink with her before heading out. She has poured something into his drink, and Samson isn’t completely stupid and figures that she has done something to it, so he switches the cups. Delilah is a smart, and rather illogically vindictive, woman and figures that Samson would do that, so she was holding the tainted cup all along. Before this, though, she asks Samson what the source of his strength is, and naturally he tells her of the Nazirite vows, how his head has never been shaved, and that this is where his strength comes from. Common sense should have told him something was wrong. She didn’t want to know his secret when they were planning to run away to Egypt, but now that he’s leaving to rescue his mother, suddenly she wants to know. After drinking from the cup, Samson passes out, and Delilah gets to cutting all that hair off.
The Philistines come in and bind Samson, and Delilah leaves. The Saran doesn’t kill Samson, keeping his word to Delilah, but he gets around it by using a hot blade to blind him. They take Samson to Gaza to grind wheat and be mocked by the Philistine people. Delilah comes to see him and is devastated to discover that Samson has been blinded and is being treated poorly (what exactly did she expect them to do with him?). Later, she calls out to Samson’s God, asking for forgiveness and for Samson to regain his strength. Quite some time has passed, and Samson’s hair has grown back out, and thus his strength returns.
Delilah goes to Samson again, wanting to free him, and after a few minutes the two embrace and once again talk of fleeing to Egypt, with Delilah being his eyes. But when Delilah tells Samson what the Philistines are planning to do to him that day, he tells her he must stay (but why?).
So Samson is brought to the great temple of Dagon and humiliated before the people. Delilah pretends that she wants to whip Samson and ultimately leads him to the pillars of the temple so that he can feel them. Samson tells Delilah to get out of the temple, and she pretends to at first but ultimately does honor Samson’s wish. Samson then uses his strength to push the pillars off their foundations, bringing the temple down, killing himself and most of the Philistines present.
The destruction of the temple was very good considering this movie was made in 1949; by that, I mean there were some pretty impressive effects.
I think Cecil made a pretty big leap, or assumption, with the idea that Delilah ever loved Samson or felt remorse for what she did. As a straight-up movie, I think it’s fine for the story and portrays Delilah in a real and conflicted manner. But as a telling of a Biblical tale, I would have preferred the film not go so far out of its way to present her as a somewhat sympathetic character. And that’s just because nothing in the Book of Judges presents her that way. So, as a romantic drama, it works great. As a Biblical epic, it doesn’t work as well.
Having said that, movie or not, I suppose you ultimately can’t place all the blame for Samson’s fate on Delilah. After all, his failing was his weakness for women and his failure to uphold his religious vows to God (although I understand that he didn’t cut his own hair), even though he did ultimately return to God. Samson is yet another victim of lust, as so many in the Bible (and most of us at some point or another) were.
This was the first movie starring Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr that I’d ever seen, and I really enjoyed the performances from both of them. Victor especially made a great Samson, because it’s so easy to buy him as a somewhat dumb brute with an unreasonable weakness for Philistine women. Judging him from the film and the liberties taken (and even in the source material, too), Samson was an idiot for not marrying his fellow Israelite woman Miriam. In the film, Miriam was both very pretty and quite wholesome. Why wouldn’t he want her? I mean sure, Hedy’s Delilah was rather gorgeous, but Olive’s Miriam was much more of a complete package as far as I’m concerned. Of course, had he chosen Miriam, then that would’ve been taking liberties too, and would have made for a less exciting movie.
The film is also only the second Cecil B. DeMille movie that I’d ever seen. The other one was another Biblical epic, The Ten Commandments (his remake with Charlton Heston, not his 1923 version). As a film, I don’t think Samson and Delilah holds a candle to The Ten Commandments, but then how could it? Moses’ story is far larger than Samson’s, and as such provided much more Biblically sound ground to cover (not to say that liberties weren’t taken with it either, because they were).
As a movie, I think Samson and Delilah is a great romantic drama. I understand the liberties, so I don’t hold them against the film too much because it is a loose adaptation, not a faithful retelling (if it were, it probably wouldn’t make for a good movie considering how relatively thin the source tale is). So that’s what I’m judging this movie based on the Book of Judges tale on. And yes, I just wanted to say judging and Judge in the same sentence.
If you’ve never seen this 1949 epic, then I highly suggest you do so. It’s available to rent or buy on streaming platforms, and I would also recommend picking up a physical copy, whether that be VHS, DVD, or Blu-ray.
Samson and Delilah gets a four out of five: TRIUMPHANT.
If you enjoyed this one, there are plenty more old favorites, forgotten gems, childhood classics, and the occasional movie I probably have no business defending in the Throwback Thursday archives.
