I put up quite a few World War II films so I thought it was time for a film that is set in the immediate post-war period.

Exodus is a majestic piece of cinematic work by director Oscar Preminger made in 1960 and concerns the events surrounding the creation of the State of Israel by the United Nations in 1948.

The film starts with Jewish refugees from war-torn Europe heading for British Mandate Palestine just before the UN vote on Israeli statehood. These refugees have been interned by the British on Cyprus to prevent them from reaching Mandate Palestine because the UK was, at that time, trying to prevent Jewish immigration to the land of Israel. Some of the refugees manage by subterfuge to escape internment via trucks and eventually board a rust bucket ship that has been renamed Exodus.

The film then tells the story of the journey of the Exodus under the command of the Jewish resistance group the Haganah and the different experiences of the Exodus’s passengers once they have landed in Israel.

The main character in the film is Ari Ben Caanan, played by Paul Newman, a Palestinian Jew who grew up in a mixed community of Jews and Arab Muslims. Although Ari desperately wants to see a Jewish state, he wants to live in peace with the Muslim neighbours he had known since childhood.

Despite Ari’s desire for peace, prospects for it look bleak because of extremists on all sides. These extremists see no future in peaceful co-existence, and advocate and carry out acts of violence, most notably as shown in the film, the bombing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem.

This is an excellent historical epic shot on a grand scale with a cast that engages and a script that carries you though to the subdued but highly emotional ending.

This film is not available in one long chunk but is in parts which run automatically from one to the other.

Please click on the link below to start the film which is 208 minutes long.

http://youtu.be/ySvaWWYGbq0?list=PL8AADBFB624046868