Posted on 04/02/2013 5:23:14 AM PDT by cotton1706
According to Nielsen, ABC's annual rebroadcast of Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments (1956) pulled in 5.9 million viewers Saturday night. The religious epic, which stars Charlton Heston as Moses, has been a ratings winner for ABC every year since 1973 when the network first began its tradition of airing the classic over the Easter/Passover weekend. Last year the re-broadcast won its timeslot. This year, it was beat by NCAA basketball.
Context is what makes this 5.9 million number even more impressive. The Ten Commandments is not only 57 years-old, but it is also not an obscure film. In 1973, if you wanted to watch Heston step down from Mount Sinai holding laws written by God on two stone tablets, you were forced to wait for ABC to air it.
But even after two decades-plus of being widely available on home video (VHS, DVD, Blu-ray), DeMille's 220-minute VistaVision extravaganza still pulls nearly ten-times as many viewers as that of the HBO phenom Girls which flopped in its season two finale with 600,000 viewers.
Heston's rerun also blew bigoted Catholic-basher Bill Maher out of the ratings water. Late last year when Maher pulled in a measly 1.4 million viewers, that was seen as something to celebrate.
Dedicated Christian-basher and evangelical atheist Ricky Gervais ... well, his Life's Too Short didn't earn a second season on HBO.
Moreover, ABC adds over an hour of commercials to its broadcast. Still, more people tuned in to watch a 57 year-old religious film with commercials than tuned in on average for the last three or four seasons of the Tina Fey sitcom, 30 Rock.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Cue Nelson Muntz!
30 Rock lasted 7 seasons. I don’t think that is necessarily a failure. Most shows don’t last even that long. Girls is only for HBO subscribers and can’t compare with other channels that are automatic in the subscription. I know we find anything we can to bash liberals but we can certainly do better than this.
Girls is the most over-hyped over-rated show on television. Six-hundred thousand viewers? That gives me hope! Because if real twenty-somethings in America are as depicted in this show we are finished.
Ricky Gervais is one mean nasty vile wanker....
We were among that number Sat. Nite...tho I dozed thru a lot of it.[What? I knew how it came out!]
The remixed re mastered, HD version was stunning in its visual beauty. We almost thought we were waching a computer generated version for a minute.
And the story is timeless. Heston was great, even in the cheezy white beard and hair at the end...[i mean really?]
So its little wonder why folks are drawn to it they way they are.
Having just watched The Bible, comparisons were inevitable: I like De Mille’s Red Sea better!
There is a huge market for these types of films and there were a lot of them made, however cynical Hollywood was when they made them: The Robe, Quo Vadis, Barabus[not sure of the name but starred Anthony Quinn], King of Kings: they don’t even show that any more. [I recall the silent version!Used to play on Easter Sunday afternoons in Philly tv].
Take notes, producers. Folks want these and want to watch!
People hunger for the Truth. God cannot be denied nor can He be ignored. The forces of evil are working overtime to change their future, but God has already told us how things turn out. My family watched this movie, we watched the series “The Bible” and we watched some shows on another channel about the lives of the early Christians. I am so encouraged that so many people watched this movie and/or the mini-series and had their minds open to God, whether they realized it or not. Planting seeds...
Yes, it’s very encouraging.
Barabbas also featuring Jack Palance as one mean gladiator.
What impresses me MOST about this 57 year old epic is that the special effects..OBVIOUSLY NONE OF WHICH ARE COMPUTER GENERATED..are superb... and seem far more realistic than what you see in modern movies..
I wonder if it's a generational thing..how much of the 5.9 million audience is over the age of, say 40..
My MUST watches for Passover Season:
1. “10 Commandments” Cecil B DeMille’s 50s verson
2. “King of Kings” Jeffery Hunter’s 1961(what a GREAT YEAR) version
3. Mel Gibson’s “The Passion”
4. “Ben Hur” Charleson Heston
**** King of Kings: they don’t even show that any more. [I recall the silent version!Used to play on Easter Sunday afternoons in Philly tv].****
Many of the religious movies have been on TCM in the last few days, and many of the religious channels have had the 1960 King of Kings on it.
***What impresses me MOST about this 57 year old epic is that the special effects...****
Modern computers have helped clear up some of the flaws in the old special effects. In the old versions you could see the lines where scenes were spliced together to create them. Now those flaw lines are missing and them movie is absolutely gorgeous! I would love to see it on the big screen in all it’s glory!
Now if the movie makers would just give us a newer special effect and fix the old movie THE GIANT CLAW. ;-D
LOL..I remember that one...much better than Rodin...
Here’s why ‘30 Rock’ is a failure:
The show’s ratings were always low, but it won Emmy awards. So NBC kept it on the air, hoping critical buzz would finally translate into good numbers. A similar strategy finally helped ‘The Office’ climb into ratings respectability.
To make a profit on the money-losing ‘30 Rock,’ NBC gambled that once the show went into syndication, they would recoup their investment. After all, ‘Seinfeld’ is still in the Top Twenty in syndication all over the country. (You can probably watch it at ten or eleven o’clock at night, wherever you live.)
But NBC’s gamble didn’t pay off. ‘30 Rock’ ratings in syndication have been a disaster. Nobody’s watching it and syndicators won’t continue to buy it and air it. They’ll put ‘Friends’ or ‘Seinfeld’ on in those timeslots in upcoming months.
That means there’s no upside for NBC producing this show for seven years. If you’re a stockholder interested in profits, ‘30 Rock’ is the definition of a failed television show.
Chuck easily beats Jim even 5 years after his passing.
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