Lipizzan Association of North America
Lipizzan Lover Gifts and Merchandise
Ben-Hur Digitally Remastered DVD Set
Ben-Hur (Digitally Remastered, 4 disk set)
Starring: Charlton Heston, Stephen Boyd, Jack Hawkins and Hugh Griffith (with Lipizzans and Lipizzan-Arab crossbreds starring in the Chariot Races)
This epic features Lipizzans and Lipizzan-Arab crossbreds as Ben-Hur’s horses in the Chariot Races. Today’s films use computer effects for their battles scenes, backgrounds and stunts. But this classic film, Ben-Hur, did it all without computers and still won 11 Academy Awards. Never, in film history, has anything matched the depth and excitement of the chariot race, done live, with real horses, including Lipizzans as Ben-Hur’s team of white horses.
This is the story of two boys who grew up as best friends but become enemies as powerful adults, both seeking revenge. This classic film is set in the Holy Land, during the First Century. The sea battle, the chariot races, lepers, galley slaves and encounters with Jesus Christ are all part of this epic.
This four-disc set includes the 1925 silent version, starring Ramon Novarro as Ben-Hur and Francis X. Bushman as Messala, also featuring a chariot race.
[Trivia: The horses used in the film were brought in from Lipica, Slovenia. Charlton Heston was taught to drive a chariot by the stunt crew. At the beginning of the chariot race, when he shook the reins, nothing happened and the horses remained motionless. Finally someone way up on top of the set yelled, “Giddy-up!” The horses then roared into action, and Heston was flung backward off of the chariot into the dust.]