Pope Peter-Benedict summons John Storm to the Vatican.

The Ten Commandments is a 1956 American epic religious drama film produced, directed, and narrated by Cecil B. DeMille, shot in VistaVision (color by Technicolor), and released by Paramount Pictures. Based on the Bible's first five books and other sources, it dramatizes the story of the life of Moses, an adopted Egyptian prince who becomes the deliverer of his real brethren, the enslaved Hebrews, and thereafter leads the Exodus to Mount Sinai, where he receives, from God, the Ten Commandments. The film stars Charlton Heston in the lead role, Yul Brynner as Rameses, Anne Baxter as Nefretiri, Edward G. Robinson as Dathan, Yvonne De Carlo as Sephora, Debra Paget as Lilia, and John Derek as Joshua; and features Sir Cedric Hardwicke as Sethi I, Nina Foch as Bithiah, Martha Scott as Yochabel, Judith Anderson as Memnet, and Vincent Price as Baka, among others.

First announced in 1952, The Ten Commandments is a remake of the prologue of DeMille's 1923 silent film of the same title. Four screenwriters, three art directors, and five costume designers worked on the film. In 1954, it was filmed on location in Egypt, Mount Sinai, and the Sinai Peninsula, featuring one of the largest exterior sets ever created for a motion picture. In 1955, the interior sets were constructed on Paramount's Hollywood soundstages. The original roadshow version included an onscreen introduction by DeMille and was released to cinemas in the United States on November 8, 1956, and, at the time of its release, was the most expensive film ever made. It was DeMille's most successful work, his first widescreen film, his fourth biblical production, and his final directorial effort before his death in 1959.

In 1957, the film was nominated for seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture, winning the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects (John P. Fulton, A.S.C.). DeMille won the Foreign Language Press Film Critics Circle Award for Best Director. Charlton Heston was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture (Drama). Yul Brynner won the National Board of Review Award for Best Actor. Heston, Anne Baxter, and Yvonne De Carlo won Laurel Awards for Best Dramatic Actor, 5th Best Dramatic Actress, and 3rd Best Supporting Actress, respectively. It is also one of the most financially successful films ever made, grossing approximately $122.7 million at the box office during its initial release; it was the most successful film of 1956 and the second-highest-grossing film of the decade. According to Guinness World Records, in terms of theatrical exhibition, it is the eighth most successful film of all-time when the box office gross is adjusted for inflation.

In 1999, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In June 2008, the American Film Institute revealed its "Ten Top Ten"—the best ten films in ten American film genres—after polling over 1,500 people from the creative community. The film was listed as the tenth best film in the epic genre. The film has aired annually on U.S. network television in prime time during the Passover/Easter season since 1973.

The Last Supper, a painting by Leonardo da Vinci

PLOT

After hearing the prophecy of a Hebrew deliverer that would free the Hebrews from Egyptian bondage, Pharaoh Rameses I of Egypt ordered the death of all newborn Hebrew males. Yochabel saves her infant son by setting him adrift in a basket on the Nile. Rameses I's recently widowed daughter Bithiah finds the basket and decides to adopt the boy by naming him Moses, even though her servant Memnet recognizes the child's Hebrew heritage.

Prince Moses grows up to become a successful general, winning a war with Ethiopia and establishing an alliance. Moses falls in love with the princess Nefretiri. But, she is betrothed to whomever Sethi chooses to become the next Pharaoh. While working on the building of a city for Pharaoh Sethi's jubilee, Moses meets the stonecutter Joshua, who tells him of the Hebrew God. Moses saves an elderly woman from being crushed, not knowing that she is his biological mother, Yochabel, and he reprimands the master builder, Baka. Moses reforms the treatment of slaves on the project, but Prince Rameses, Moses's adoptive brother and Sethi's son, charges him with planning an insurrection. Moses says he is making his workers more productive, making Rameses wonder if Moses is the man the Hebrews are calling the Deliverer.

Nefretiri learns from Memnet that Moses is the son of Hebrew slaves. She kills Memnet, but reveals the story to Moses after he finds the piece of Levite cloth he was wrapped in as a baby, which Memnet had kept. Moses follows Bithiah to Yochabel's house, where he meets his biological mother, brother Aaron, and sister Miriam. Moses learns more about the slaves by working with them. Nefretiri urges him to return to the palace, so that he may help his people when he becomes pharaoh, to which he agrees after he completes a final task. Moses saves Joshua from death by killing Baka, telling Joshua that he, too, is Hebrew. The confession is witnessed by the Hebrew overseer Dathan, who then reports to Prince Rameses. After being arrested, Moses explains that he is not the Deliverer, but would free the slaves if he could. Sethi declares Prince Rameses his sole heir, and Rameses banishes Moses to the desert. At this time, Moses learns of the death of his mother. Moses makes his way across the desert to a well in Midian. After defending seven sisters from Amalekites, Moses is housed with the girls' father Jethro, a Bedouin sheik, who worships the God of Abraham. Moses marries Jethro's eldest daughter Sephora. Later, he finds Joshua, who has escaped from the hard labor imposed on the Hebrews in Egypt. While herding, Moses sees the burning bush on the summit of Mount Sinai and hears the voice of God. At God's command, Moses returns to Egypt to free the Hebrews.

Moses comes before Rameses, now Pharaoh Rameses II, to win the slaves' freedom, turning his staff into a cobra. Jannes performs the same trick with his staves, but Moses's snake swallows his. Rameses prohibits straw from being provided to the Hebrews to make their bricks. Nefretiri rescues Moses from being stoned to death by the Hebrews wherein he reveals that he is married. To convince Rameses of obliging to his wishes, Moses gets God to initiate plagues against Egypt. Moses turns the river Nile to blood at a festival of Khnum, and brings burning hail down upon Pharaoh's palace. Moses warns him that the next plague to fall upon Egypt will be summoned by Pharaoh himself. Enraged at the plagues, Rameses orders that all first-born sons of Hebrews will die, but a cloud of death instead kills all the first-born sons of Egypt, including the child of Rameses and Nefretiri. Despairing at the loss of his heir, Pharaoh exiles the Hebrews, who begin the Exodus from Egypt. Bithiah reunites with Moses and goes with the Hebrews. After being taunted by Nefretiri, Rameses takes his chariots and pursues the Hebrews to the Red Sea. Moses uses God's help to stop the Egyptians with a pillar of fire, and parts the Red Sea. After the Hebrews make it across to safety, Moses releases the walls of water, drowning the Egyptian army. A devastated Rameses returns empty-handed to Nefretiri, stating that he now acknowledges Moses's god as God.

Moses again ascends the mountain with Joshua. He sees the Ten Commandments created by God in two stone tablets. Meanwhile, Dathan exploits the people to gain power, claiming that Moses is dead and urging a reluctant Aaron to construct a golden calf idol. A wild Saturnalia occurs and a decadent orgy is held by most of the Hebrews. After God informs them of the Hebrews' sins, Moses and Joshua descend from the mountain. Enraged at his own people's betrayal of God, Moses deems the Hebrews unworthy and smashes the tablets at the golden calf, destroying it and sending Dathan and his cohorts to Hell. The remaining Hebrews are forced to wander in the wilderness for 40 years as punishment for their sins. An elderly Moses leads the Hebrews towards Canaan, though he cannot enter himself because he disobeyed God at the Water of Strife. Moses names Joshua as the new leader of the Hebrews, bidding farewell to them at Mount Nebo.

CASTING

In December 1952, Jeff Chandler sought the role of Moses in the upcoming DeMille epic. In October 1953, DeMille said his favorite choice was Charlton Heston, the star of his previous film, The Greatest Show on Earth. He also considered casting a middle-aged man. In December, DeMille offered the part to quinquagenarian actor William Boyd, who was famous for his portrayal of cowboy Hopalong Cassidy on television and had worked with DeMille in the silent era, but Boyd's representative said the actor was "worried that it will be out of character." In January 1954, Dan Dailey said he wanted to play Moses in DeMille's film. The following month, Heston and Kirk Douglas were reported to be two of the many top stars who wanted the role. In May, DeMille briefly considered Rock Hudson after he saw him in Magnificent Obsession. Interviewed twice by the director, Heston finally won the role when he impressed DeMille with his knowledge of Moses and ancient Egypt and his strong resemblance to Michelangelo's sculpture of Moses. Heston was later chosen to be the voice of God in the Burning Bush, toned down to a softer and lower register.

DeMille described the role of Rameses II as "a part equal in dramatic strength to that of Moses". Rory Calhoun, Jeff Chandler, Anthony Dexter, Mel Ferrer, Stewart Granger, William Holden, and Michael Rennie were considered to play Moses' opponent and rival for the Egyptian throne. In New York City, DeMille's granddaughter and his secretary convinced him to see the Broadway musical The King and I, starring Yul Brynner. DeMille recalled, "During the first act, they wondered why I said nothing. I couldn't. I was seeing a rare theatrical experience—a performance of dramatic integrity." The director went backstage to meet the star. He told Brynner the story of the film from Rameses' point of view, and offered him the role. "Nobody has ever been allowed backstage during intermission but everybody gets awed by DeMille," remembered Brynner. "I was fascinated by him. He showed me material for a picture and I agreed to do that and another film. We shook hands. It all happened in seven and a half minutes!" In April 1953, Brynner was already in Hollywood talking with DeMille about the part, and in October it was confirmed that he was the first actor to be cast in the film.

In October 1953, DeMille said he wanted Audrey Hepburn to play the role of Rameses' wife, Nefretiri. In February 1954, his office was said to be full of photographs of Hepburn, but he later noticed her figure was not curvaceous enough for Nefretiri's form-fitting gowns. In May, DeMille asked Vanessa Brown if she "could fill out the clinging, revealing Egyptian costumes". She assured him she could, but also warned him that she had "unattractive feet". Ann Blyth, Joan Evans, Rhonda Fleming, Coleen Gray, Jane Griffiths, Vivien Leigh, and Joan Taylor were also considered. In June, columnist Louella Parsons regarded the part of Nefretiri as "the most sought-after role of the year". That same month, DeMille chose Anne Baxter after he screened her film Carnival Story at home three times. His other top choice was Jane Russell, who wanted the part. "There was only one DeMille, and there wasn't an actor in the world who didn't want to work for him just once, however short the salary or tall the corn", Baxter wrote in her memoir.

Many actors were considered for the role of the evil overseer Dathan. DeMille was enthusiastic about Jack Palance as Dathan, but Palance's agent angered DeMille when he stole a part of the script and demanded that the part be rewritten. Raymond Massey was signed for the role, but later turned it down. In September 1954, DeMille cast Edward G. Robinson in the role of the "quisling who fights Moses all the way through the picture." Robinson had been blacklisted in Hollywood because of his "former political leanings" and needed "recognition again by a top figure in the industry." Someone had suggested him for the role but thought he could not be hired. In his autobiography, Robinson remembered: "Mr. DeMille wanted to know why, coldly reviewed the matter, felt I had been done an injustice, and told his people to offer me the part. Cecil B. DeMille returned me to films. Cecil B. DeMille restored my self-respect."

For the role of Sephora, the Midianite shepherdess who becomes Moses' wife, more than 20 actresses were under consideration. Grace Kelly, DeMille's first choice, was unavailable. In May 1954, television actress Maria Riva, Marlene Dietrich's daughter, was said to be the director's number-one choice for the role. In the process of casting the role of Bithiah, he screened the MGM film Sombrero and was "very much impressed" with Yvonne De Carlo's portrayal of a "saintly type of woman". DeMille said he "sensed in her a depth, an emotional power, a womanly strength which the part of Sephora needed and which she gave it." De Carlo had always wanted to play a starring role for DeMille, so she accepted the part and did not care how much he would pay her. She later thought, "Actually, that's probably why he got away with paying such low salaries. He did know that most dedicated actors would work for him for nothing."

In April 1955, columnist Erskine Johnson noticed: "Anne Baxter and Charlton Heston got top billing over some other very important stars (Yvonne De Carlo and Edward G. Robinson, for instance) in The Ten Commandments. So far, the others aren't squawking."

CAST

Spelling differences exist between the original screenplay characters and the actual biblical/historical persons the role is based upon. The screenplay character Nefretiri is based on the historical/biblical Nefertari. The character Pharaoh Sethi I is based on historical/biblical Pharaoh Seti I. And the character of Prince Rameses / Pharaoh Rameses II is not an inaccurate spelling; however Ramesses—a.k.a. Ramesses the Great—is the preferred translation.

Charlton Heston as Moses (and the voice of God at the Burning Bush)
Fraser Heston as the infant Moses
Yul Brynner as Rameses II
Anne Baxter as Nefretiri
Edward G Robinson as Dathan
Yvonne De Carlo as Sephora
Debra Paget as Lilia
John Derek as Joshua
Sir Cedric Hardwicke as Sethi
Nina Foch as Bithiah
Martha Scott as Yochabel
Judith Anderson as Memnet
Vincent Price as Baka
John Carradine as Aaron
Olive Deering as Miriam
Babette Bain as Young Miriam
Douglass Dumbrille as Jannes
Frank de Kova as Abiram
Henry Wilcoxon as Pentaur
Eduard Franz as Jethro
Donald Curtis as Mered
Lawrence Dobkin as Hur Ben Caleb
H. B. Warner as Amminadab
Julia Faye as Elisheba
Lisa Mitchell, Noelle Williams, Joanna Merlin, Pat Richard, Joyce Vanderveen, and Diane Hall as Jethro's daughters
Abbas El Boughdadly as Rameses' charioteer
Cavalry Corps, Egyptian Armed Forces as Pharaoh's chariot host
John Miljan as the Blind One
Francis J. McDonald as Simon
Ian Keith as Rameses I
Paul De Rolf as Eleazar
Robert Carson as Eleazar as an adult
Woodrow Strode as King of Ethiopia (and, later, as Bithiah's bearer)
Tommy Duran as Gershom
Eugene Mazzola as Rameses' son
Ramsay Hill as Korah
Joan Woodbury as Korah's wife
Esther Brown as Princess Tharbis


PRODUCTION

In July 1951, while he was working on his circus film The Greatest Show on Earth, producer-director Cecil B. DeMille chose Homer's Odyssey as the subject of his next epic. Several weeks later, he announced he was going to make a film about the Book of Esther, but then he changed his mind and said he was planning a new film about Helen of Troy, which he eventually canceled. For more than twenty years and especially after World War II, DeMille had received letters from people worldwide who asked him to make a new version of his 1923 silent film The Ten Commandments because the world "needs a reminder, they said, of the Law of God", which "is the essential bedrock of human freedom." DeMille talked about the idea with his staff and they initially considered producing it as a modern story with a biblical prologue, like the original film. A suggestion was to have the contemporary protagonist be an honest politician struggling with "forces aligned against him" and show through that conflict the effects of keeping or breaking the Ten Commandments. DeMille discarded the present-day storyline because he kept thinking about the first film's biblical section, which was "still not dated". Another early concept was to film the story of the Exodus, led by Moses, with interconnected subplots involving Israelites whose lives reflect each of the Ten Commandments. DeMille wrote that he thought the final choice—to let the biblical story "speak for itself"—was the "soundest". He said the biblical account was "timeless" and "timely", and that when "Moses led his people to Mount Sinai, they learned, as the world today must learn, that true freedom is freedom under God."

After The Greatest Show on Earth was released, DeMille went to Paramount Pictures to discuss his next film with the studio's executives, including Barney Balaban and Adolph Zukor. He had already made up his mind to direct a new version of The Ten Commandments that would incorporate Moses' life as an Egyptian prince. He had to "sell" the idea to them and, although only Zukor and Y. Frank Freeman championed it, all accepted it. Some Paramount businessmen were not too keen about another biblical film, and one of those even questioned the film's title, saying "You won't call it The Ten Commandments, of course." When he heard this, Zukor leapt from his seat and made it clear that there would be no other title for the film but that one.

In June 1952, DeMille formally informed the press that his next production would be a Technicolor remake of his successful silent film The Ten Commandments (1923). From the beginning, his plan was to produce the film on a "lavish scale" with "a cast of outstanding stars" and a budget that would allow it "to possess the quality and spectacular values that have earned for DeMille the title of 'Hollywood's master showman.'" DeMille explained why he decided to revisit Moses' story:

I feel that the subject of Moses and the Ten Commandments is particularly timely today. Not only does it provide all the ingredients for exciting and spectacular motion picture entertainment for mass audiences of all ages throughout the world, but it is in line with the spiritual reawakening of all nations of the free world in these troubled times. A constant stream of letters to me from all parts of America and from foreign countries for the past few years, and particularly of late, has proved this and has largely influenced me to the subject of Moses, the heroic figure revered by Jews and Christians alike.

In October 1952, DeMille told reporter Bob Thomas, "The actual shooting is the easiest part of making a picture. It is here in the production office that the picture is really created."

WRITING

As the on-screen credits declare, The Holy Scriptures are the predominant source of the film's narrative. DeMille chose to use the 17th-century King James Version, which he grew up reading. Moses' biography is found in the Hebrew Bible's Torah, also called the "Five Books of Moses". In order to depict Moses' early years in Egypt, DeMille searched for extrabiblical sources that expanded on Moses' life as a young man. He said, "There is a lapse of 26 years between two verses of the Bible. One verse tells of Moses being found among the bulrushes, or papyrus, by the Pharaoh's daughter and in the next verse he is grown and has killed a man. We have to find out what happened to him between those two events."

Henry Noerdlinger, the film's researcher, consulted ancient historical texts, such as On the Life of Moses by Philo, Antiquities of the Jews by Josephus, Preparation for the Gospel by Eusebius, the Midrash Rabbah on Exodus, and the Mishnah. Philo and Josephus describe the prince Moses as the heir to the throne of Egypt, and the Midrash states that both his adoptive mother (the Pharaoh's daughter) and the Pharaoh had great affection for him. Josephus and Eusebius also say that Moses, as the commander of the Egyptian army, prevented the Ethiopians from invading Egypt and conquered their nation; he was also the subject of court intrigues against him. Moses' concern for the overworked Hebrew slaves, his implementation of their weekly "day of rest", and Dathan as the witness to Moses' slaying of an Egyptian man were details taken from the Midrash.

DeMille also found and modified names for several people related to Moses. In the Book of Exodus, the Egyptian princess who adopted Moses is not named, but the Midrash identifies her as the woman "Bithiah the daughter of Pharaoh, which Mered took" mentioned in the Book of Chronicles. DeMille preferred the spelling "Sephora", found in the Douay–Rheims Bible, for the name of Moses' wife, originally Zipporah in the Hebrew Bible and King James version. To make it more euphonious, the name of Moses' Hebrew mother Jochebed was changed by DeMille to "Yochabel", which is a transliteration from Josephus' Greek text.

In 1952, DeMille bought the screen rights to Dorothy Clarke Wilson's best-selling novel Prince of Egypt (1949), from which he got several subplots and characters, including the "lively" Egyptian princess Nefretiri and her romance with Moses. In the book, Nefretiri is the heiress to the throne as the daughter of Pharaoh Sethi I and older sister of Rameses, while the adopted prince Moses is rumored to be the illegitimate child of an Egyptian princess and a Mitannian prince. Memnet, a character from the novel, is Nefretiri's old nurse who detests Moses and reveals the secret of his real Hebrew parentage; she is later "silenced" when Nefretiri pushes her off a balcony. Baka, a foreman commissioned by Sethi to build a new city in the Nile Delta, is Wilson's depiction of the Egyptian that Moses killed.

DeMille also found another novel about Moses titled On Eagle's Wings (1939) by English minister and author Arthur Eustace Southon, who sold the screen rights to the director in 1953. The film was also based on Pillar of Fire by Joseph Holt Ingraham.

To write the film's screenplay, DeMille chose Jewish screenwriters Jesse L. Lasky Jr. and Fredric M. Frank, who wrote the script of his previous biblical epic, Samson and Delilah. He also hired two writers he had never collaborated with before, Aeneas MacKenzie and Jack Gariss. DeMille said MacKenzie had "piercing insight into dramatic values" and a "fine sense of story construction", and he described Gariss as "deeply thoughtful and sensitively attuned to the spiritual no less the dramatic values of our theme". DeMille noted that, during their story conferences, he and the writers alternated "in the roles of hammer and anvil" and that when "sparks" flew, they "glow[ed] with the intelligence and wit" of the four who worked with him. According to Lasky Jr., the screenplay was divided into the four main phases of Moses' life as prince, shepherd, deliverer, lawgiver; the screenwriters worked individually and all wrote parts of each of the four sections. DeMille ultimately entrusted Lasky Jr. with the task of revising the screenplay "for consistency's sake". The script contained many scenes that were either cut or not filmed, including a longer prologue that depicted stories from the Book of Genesis. The screenplay was written over a period of three years.


BOX OFFICE RECEPTION

The Ten Commandments was the highest-grossing film of 1956, and the second most successful film of the decade. By April 1957, the film had earned an unprecedented $10 million from engagements at just eighty theaters, averaging about $1 million per week, with more than seven million people paying to watch it. It played for 70 weeks at the Criterion Theatre in New York, grossing $2.7 million. During its initial release, it earned theater rentals (the distributor's share of the box office gross) of $31.3 million in North America, and $23.9 million from the foreign markets, for a total of $55.2 million (equating to approximately $122.7 million in ticket sales). It was hugely profitable for its era, earning a net profit of $18,500,000, against a production budget of $13.27 million (the most a film had cost up to that point).

By the time of its withdrawal from distribution at the end of 1960, The Ten Commandments had overtaken Gone with the Wind at the box office in the North American territory, and mounted a serious challenge in the global market—the worldwide takings for Gone with the Wind were reported to stand at $59 million at the time. Gone with the Wind would be re-released the following year as part of the American Civil War Centennial, and re-asserted its supremacy at the box office by reclaiming the US record. Also at this time, Ben-Hur—another biblical epic starring Charlton Heston, released at the end of 1959—would go on to eclipse The Ten Commandments at the box office. A 1966 re-issue earned $6 million, and further re-releases brought the total American theater rentals to $43 million, equivalent to gross ticket sales of $89 million at the box office. Globally, it ultimately collected $90,066,230 in revenues up to 1979.

It remains one of the most popular films ever made. Adjusted for inflation, it has earned a box office gross equivalent to $2 billion at 2011 prices, according to Guinness World Records; only Gone with the Wind (1939), Avatar (2009), Star Wars (1977), Titanic (1997), The Sound of Music (1965), and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) have generated higher grosses in constant dollars. The Ten Commandments is estimated to have sold 262 million tickets at the worldwide box office.


CRITICS

The Ten Commandments received rave reviews after its test screening in October 1956. James Powers of The Hollywood Reporter declared the film to be "the summit of screen achievement. It is not just a great and powerful motion picture, although it is that; it is also a new human experience. If there were but one print of this Paramount picture, the place of its showing would be the focus of a world-wide pilgrimage." Philip K. Scheuer, reviewing for the Los Angeles Times, said the film served "almost as a religious experience as it is a theatrical one. C. B. remains, at 75, the ablest living director of spectacle in the grand manner. His production measures up to the best for which his admirers have hoped—and far from the worst that his detractors expected. That old-time religion has a new look." New York Daily News called it "an absorbing and exciting historical record, documented with excerpts from the Books of Exodus and Numbers of the Old Testament, the Psalms and from the works of such ancient historians as Josephus, Philo and Eusebius."

Variety described the "scenes of the greatness that was Egypt, and Hebrews by the thousands under the whip of the taskmasters" as "striking", and believed that the film "hits the peak of beauty with a sequence that is unelaborate, this being the Passover supper wherein Moses is shown with his family while the shadow of death falls on Egyptian first-borns". Bosley Crowther for The New York Times was also among those who lauded DeMille's work, acknowledging that "in its remarkable settings and décor, including an overwhelming facade of the Egyptian city from which the Exodus begins, and in the glowing Technicolor in which the picture is filmed—Mr. DeMille has worked photographic wonders".

The film's cast was also complimented. Variety called Charlton Heston an "adaptable performer" who, as Moses, reveals "inner glow as he is called by God to remove the chains of slavery that hold his people". Powers felt that Heston was "splendid, handsome, and princely (and human) in the scenes dealing with him as a young man, and majestic and terrible as his role demands it. He is the great Michelangelo conception of Moses, but rather as the inspiration for the sculptor might have been than as a derivation." Variety also considered Yul Brynner to be an "expert" as Rameses, too. Anne Baxter's performance as Nefretiri was criticized by Variety as leaning "close to old-school siren histrionics", but Crowther stated that it, along with Brynner's, is "unquestionably apt and complementary to a lusty and melodramatic romance". The performances of Yvonne De Carlo and John Derek were acclaimed by Crowther as "notably good". He also commended the film's "large cast of characters" as "very good, from Sir Cedric Hardwicke as a droll and urbane Pharaoh to Edward G. Robinson as a treacherous overlord".

There were some critics who gave the film mixed reviews and disapproved of the extrabiblical love story between Moses and Nefretiri. Time thought the film was "something roughly comparable to an eight-foot chorus girl—pretty well put together, but much too big and much too flashy." Newsweek commented, "Viewing his current three and a half hour work, [the public] may find a DeMille production a trying experience now and then, but a very educational one. They are bound to be, as their parents and grandparents were [by the 1923 version], impressed."

In November 1956, The Ten Commandments was named the "most popular entrant" for the Best Picture Oscar and Heston was considered a top contender for the Best Actor Oscar. In March 1957, the Academy's failure to nominate Heston was considered a great upset.

In his Movie Guide, film critic Leonard Maltin gave the film four out of four stars and wrote, "Vivid storytelling at its best. […] Parting of the Red Sea, writing of the holy tablets are unforgettable highlights." The critic Camille Paglia has called The Ten Commandments one of the ten greatest films of all time.

Rotten Tomatoes retrospectively collected 45 reviews, and reported that 84% of critics have given the film a positive review, with an average rating of 7.7/10. The site's critics consensus states: "Bombastic and occasionally silly, but extravagantly entertaining, Cecil B. DeMille's all-star spectacular is a muscular retelling of the great Bible story."

The Cup of Christ is the Holy Grail, that has never been found, in all searches through the ages.

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