How much do you know about Lawrence Of Arabia? | Quiz

Answer: riding a motorbike

The movie opens with Lawrence's death in a motorbike accident, shortly after his retirement from the military in 1935. We see him swerve to avoid two boys on bicycles, then get a closeup shot of his goggles hanging from a bush. After a number of the major characters from the Desert Revolt are interviewed at his funeral, the film flashes back to 1916, at military intelligence headquarters in Cairo, where we see him coloring a map, and later lighting a cigarette for William Potter. Lawrence does not blow out the match, he extinguishes it with his fingers. Potter tries to emulate the feat, burns his fingers, and asks what the trick is. Lawrence replies, "The trick, William Potter, is not minding that it hurts." Peter O'Toole's delivery of this line introduces us to some of the complexity of the character he is going to be portraying.

Peter O'Toole was unknown as a film actor at the time, was about a foot taller than the man he was chosen to portray, and was left-handed whereas Lawrence had been right-handed. His performance as Lawrence as been judged one of the most compelling screen performances of all time, and propelled him to the status of movie superstar.

Answer: Sherif Ali

Lawrence and Tafas stop to drink at a well owned by Ali's tribe, the Harith, as Tafas is guiding Lawrence to find Feisal. Ali's arrival leads to his execution of Tafas, and an extended interchange with Lawrence that establishes the dynamic, antagonistic yet respectful, relationship between the two men, bringing the Egyptian-born actor Omar Sharif instant international attention. To film Omar Sharif's appearance through a mirage, Freddie Young used a special 482mm lens from Panavision which is known among cinematographers as "the David Lean lens".

Answer: Colonel Brighton

Brighton's sarcastic clapping interrupts Lawrence's song. He leads Lawrence to Feisal's camp, where they arrive at the same time as the camp is under attack by Turkish planes.

Anthony Quayle is said to have been unhappy with the character of Colonel Brighton, considering him a fool, until David Lean told him to approach Brighton as one of the few honorable men in the movie.

Answer: challenging the airplanes from horseback

The cultural clash between European and Arab attitudes is firmly established in this scene, and will be one of the recurring themes of the movie. Feisal's frustration at the inability of his men to cope with modern warfare is abundantly clear as he rides frantically up and down the lines of his troops brandishing his sword at the airplanes which are bombing his tents.

Alec Guinness was a big fan of TE Lawrence, and had played him onstage in the controversial play "Ross", which explored Lawrence's alleged homosexuality. He was eager to play Lawrence, but was deemed to be too old for the part, and was instead offered the role of Prince Feisal after it had been turned down by Laurence Olivier. He brought a world-weary cynicism to the part of Feisal which contrasted beautifully with the intensity of the others involved in the Arab Revolt.

Answer: Gasim

The sequence involving the rescue of Gasim is one of the film's most powerful evocations of the desert as an active presence in the lives of men. When Lawrence returns, half dead but triumphant, Ali concedes that he may be a man who can write his own destiny. Ironically, Lawrence will later be forced to shoot Gasim to avoid the outbreak of warfare between the Harith and the Howitat tribes that threatens the Aqaba venture. Farraj and Daud are the two urchins who accompany Lawrence as servants. Tafas was the guide killed by Ali at the well in an earlier scene.

Answer: Auda abu Tayi

Auda arrives on horseback to interrupt Lawrence, followed shortly afterwards by his son. This is Lawrence's first meeting with the Arab leader whose men are one of the critical ingredients of his plan for taking Aqaba.

The film shows Auda as a virtual brigand, whose pragmatic goals are in stark contrast to the idealism of Lawrence. Auda's desire to be seen as a selfless leader, despite his selfish behavior, is manipulated by Lawrence to gain his participation in attacking Aqaba, in a scene with the memorable climactic line (from Auda to Lawrence), "Thy mother mated with a scorpion."

The part of Auda was played by Anthony Quinn, who was born in Mexico, and played movie characters with a wide range of ethnicities, including the Native American Crazy Horse in "They Died with Their Boots On" (1941), a variety of Mexicans in a number of Westerns, Attila the Hun in "Attila" (1954) and, the role for which he is probably most widely remembered, Alexis Zorba in "Zorba the Greek" (1964).

Answer: the death of Daud in quicksand

Daud dies in quicksand on the way to Cairo; Farraj completes the journey to Cairo with Lawrence, and is involved in the memorable scene in which the bartender exclaims, "This is a bar for British officers!" to which Lawrence replies, "That's all right; we're not particular." After they have been sent back to the desert, Farraj is wounded by a detonator exploding in his clothes during a train raid, and Lawrence has to shoot him because he is too seriously injured to travel with them, and cannot be left to be taken by the Turks. Gasim is executed before the attack on Aqaba. Quite a number of camels are seen to die in the film, but not during this episode.

Answer: Jackson Bentley

The character of Jackson Bentley in the movie was an amalgam of the journalist Lowell Thomas and his cameraman Harry Chase, who spent much of 1918 filming Lawrence and promoting him internationally. Thomas toured extensively after the end of the war with his lecture/film show about Lawrence's campaign, creating the original legend of Lawrence of Arabia.

The role of Bentley was played by Arthur Kennedy.

Answer: All of these occur before Ali can rescue him.

The scene in Deraa is controversial because it suggests that Lawrence was sexually assaulted by the Bey, an incident in Lawrence's memoirs with little external verifying evidence. It has also been suggested by some reviewers that the movie's treatment of Lawrence's reaction to the incident leads the filmgoer to consider that Lawrence was homosexual, a matter of extended debate.

This gives the alleged assault a higher profile than my original allusion to it. But the implication in the movie that Lawrence enjoyed the incident altogether too much due to his own sexual deviancy (lengthy discussions out there about the self-flagellation and putative homosexuality!) was mentioned by a number of reviewers, and is at least part of the reason why that scene was considered controversial.

The part of the Bey was played by Jose Ferrer, a Puerto Rican-born actor who had previously featured in a number of memorable roles, including Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec in "Moulin Rouge" (1952) and Lt. Barney Greenwald in "The Caine Mutiny" (1954).

Answer: Prince Feisal

These four are present as Lawrence is promoted and dismissed, after which Feisal, Dryden and Allenby settle down to the serious negotiations. Brighton is clearly offended by their unscrupulous cynicism, and the fact that they have all been manipulating Lawrence, and races off to say a personal farewell, but is too late.

Mr Dryden of the Foreign Office, the original architect of the plan to use Lawrence and the Arabs to further the British cause in the war, was played by Claud Rains, who had earlier starred in "The Invisible Man" (1933).

General Allenby, to whom Feisal makes this comment, was played by Jack Hawkins. The original choice for the part of Allenby was Cary Grant, but David Lean wanted to cast Hawkins after their work together in "The Bridge on the River Kwai" (1957).