I’m posting this a week after we watched it, which coincided with the start of Abraham’s story in Rabbinic Liturgical Calendar for Torah reading.
Right off the bat, I’ll say this was a very different viewing experience than Genesis: Creation and Flood. Whereas Genesis was an inventive film, this one is a more straight forward adaptation of the source material. Preceding Genesis by one year, Abraham (1993) was the first film in Turner’s The Bible Collection, and I think for a first film they do an admirable, if uneven, job.
The film focuses on the story of married couple Abram (Richard Harris) and Sarai (Barabara Hershey) as they leave their home in Haran at the urging of a strange and unknown god who Abram usually calls The Most High. The film follows the basic beats of the narrative as found in Genesis 12-22. They move south with their family, leaving behind the familiarity of their home and the security of the wealth that Abram had built up in his father’s household. They travel to Canaan, which Abram believes is the Land of his new god’s Promise, but are only able to to stay until a famine strikes and they are driven into Egypt.
The film takes the ups and downs of the original narrative, and like the Genesis film, makes them feel more human than simply the text alone can. Narrative beats that feel like the “reasons for a story” in the mythic version, lacking emotional punch, are transformed as you see and feel what it means that Abram’s people experienced a famine, and you see the cost of them going further south to Egypt.
During the Egyptian portion of the narrative, where Abram and Sarai pretend they are siblings rather than spouses, hoping to protect themselves from the licentiousness of the Egyption Pharaoh, I noticed some echoes of later stories involving Egypt.
When Sarai is discovered and named the “most beautiful woman to come out of anywhere” she is made one of the Pharaoh’s concubines. This leads to his whole household being cursed, and Sarai and Abram being expelled, along with the slaves and servants gifted to Sarai and the food and flocks gifted to Abram on account of his “sister.”
The famine that drove them into Egypt sees its echo later when famine forces Abram’s grandson Jacob and his family into Egypt, and the curse from The Most High (aka El Elyon) upon Pharoah is echoed with the plagues that are visited upon Egypt centuries later by YHWH and Moses. Whether the written Genesis is echoing Exodus or vice-versa, this film presented the narrative in a way that I could see the dramatic echoing, which I appreciated.
Once Abram and Sarai’s tribe leaves Egypt they return to Canaan, and eventually the Patriarch and Matriarch are promised Children. Anyone familiar with this narrative will know that Sarai sends her Egyptian handmade Hagar/Hajar to Abram to get pregnant by him. The child would be Abram’s and by Hajar giving birth on Sarai’s knees, the child would be legally hers, not Hajar’s. I’m grateful that Sarai’s humanness is fully present during this part of the story, where she could easily be presented as cruel and unfeeling, here she weeps at the thought of hurting Hagar and Abram, and later when sending Ishmael away, she isn’t portrayed as hating him, as she easily could have been.
The extra-biblical material around this family is abundant and I can imagine why they chose to stick only to the biblical text, yet I do think the story of Hajar and Ishmael is impoverished by this choice. It is portrayed humanly yes, but the details of their expulsion by Sarah and their ongoing relationship with Abraham are so limited in the biblical text, that by not expanding it, the final part of their story felt like a footnote.
This directly leads to my biggest frustration with the film, it ends with the Binding of Isaac, shortly after Hajar and Ishmael’s expulsion . I shouldn’t have hoped for anything more complex than what we got, but I was disappointed by how straightforwardly the film played this part of the story. Abraham hears his god’s command to sacrifice Isaac, and just goes along with it. In such a human film, the lack of any real response from Abraham here was startling.
At the start of the film when the king of Haran was overcharging his father for land rental, Abram spoke out against the injustice. When he encountered Eleazar, a runaway slave, he purchased the man’s price and freed him. When his god said he was going to destroy the people of Sodom for their lack of hospitality, Abram bartered with his god for the city’s salvation. But when he is asked to kill his son, we don’t even get an agonized scream or the question Why?
This is a point widely debated in extra-biblical literature. Many wonder what was going on in Abraham’s head here, and this film squandered the opportunity to address this in a truly human way. The ending of the film was simply Abraham and Isaac walking back to their tribe after Isaac has been rescued from being “sacrificed”.
It was frustrating that during the last hour or so much conversation was spent discussing what would happen when Abraham and Sarah were gone and yet we never saw either of them die. Concern over Isaac’s fate if Abraham wasn’t around to intervene in any sibling squabbles was behind why Sarah sent Ishmael away. The final section of the film leading up to the Binding opened with yet another discussion of Abraham’s concern about what would happen to Isaac. And yet the only reference to their deaths was some scrolling text over Moroccan scenery right before the credits rolled.
As a result the film didn’t feel like its narrative thrusts were fully addressed. Throughout Abram and Sarah had been asking how their god would fulfill his promises when they were gone, and by not showing how they are fulfilled in their absence, we’re left narratively unsatisfied. And it wasn’t as if they needed to move outside the Bible for the material, as the next two chapters cover Sarah’s death, Isaac’s marriage, Abraham’s death and the funeral performed by both Ishmael and Isaac.
I did enjoy the film, I did not like it’s ending, and unfortunately I think it brought the entire experience down.
Would I recommend this? Yes, my wife still found it a good way to engage with the narrative of the Torah, and it’s straightforwardness regarding the Expulsion of Ishmael and the Binding of Isaac, while frustrating from our perspective, may be boons if you are looking for a straightforward page-to-screen adaptation. Just know it may not stick the landing.
Next time: We’ll be watching Jacob. I hope you’ll join us!