Cecil B. DeMille

Hollywood Hist-o-rama: Cecil B. DeMille (1962)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Lasting anywhere between three and four minutes, the Hollywood HIST-O-RAMA series shouldn't be looked at as some sort of documentary that's going to tell you everything about the subject. After all, with such a short running time it would be impossible to go into great details about anything but I'm sure people back when this was made would have at least enjoyed them.

This episode takes a brief look at the very long career of Cecil B. DeMille. We start off by hearing that the director was the reason Hollywood and New York stopped fighting in the early days and we also learn that he developed the movie star. From here we get a rundown of his silent and sound pictures and learn that he was a great showman. Again, trying to capture DeMille's career in just two-minutes is an impossible task but I always enjoy watching these episodes when they're on. I think for the most part they're a pretty good education when you considering that I'm sure many people in 1962 weren't following silent movies so there were probably many people who learned about film history from something like this and then went out to do more research. Today there are much better documentaries on DeMille but film buffs will still want to check this out.