I, of all people, know that it is unfair to compare a movie to a book. Since this film was viewed as an extension of a book study, it's hard not to do so. So I will try to be fair. I believe that Par Lagerqvist's work has an overwhelming existentialist vent to it. Barrabas witnesses the Crucifixion. He can do this because he has been spared his life due to the fact that once a year, a prisoner can be pardoned. Of course, the people call for him and reject Christ. All this follows the plot and Barabbas find himself back in his old ways. He is a subversive, but really all about himself. The book was written in 1951 by a man who had rejected Christianity. The problem with the movie is that it sucks so much humanity out of its main character. The subtle moments that show he is on a course of self discovery, don't, for me, match the book's character. I also found the whole gladiator thing, which never appears in the book, to be strictly fodder for the lowest common denominator. It is probably because this was competing with the other Biblical epics of that time. I will give Jack Palance credit. He is about as mean spirited as anyone ever in film, a true psychotic presence with his almost maniacal grin. I think at that point the subtleties went out the window. It's not a terrible movie (it's quite decent in its own way), but I think with a director and some writers that could have embraced the novel a bit more (and kept the original characters as they are described) and not bowed to popular culture, it would have been much better.
