Against the raw news of modern conflict between Egypt and Israel—a conflict that has its preamble in the Book of Exodus—Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments was given its world premiere last night at the Criterion Theatre, and the coincidence was profound. For Mr. DeMille's latest rendering of Biblical literature in the spectacular framing and colloquial idiom of the screen tells an arresting story of Moses, the ancient Israelite who was a slave with his people in Egypt and who struggled to set them free.

As Mr. DeMille presents it in this three-hour-and-thirty-nine-minute film, which is by far the largest and most expensive that he has ever made, it is a moving story of the spirit of freedom rising in a man, under the divine inspiration of his Maker. And, as such, it strikes a ringing note  today.

But aside from the timely arrival and contemporary context of this film, it is also a rather handsome romance in Mr. DeMille's best massive style. To the fundamental story of Moses, as told in the Old Testament and reflected in other ancient writings consulted by Mr. DeMille, he and his corps of screen playwrights have added some frank apocrypha which, while they may not be traceable in history (or even in legend), make for a robust tale.

In this imaginative recount, Moses is raised as a prince in the palace of Egypt's Pharaoh, after being found, as the Bible tells, by the Pharaoh's daughter in the bullrushes, where he was hidden by his mother, a Hebrew slave. And as a presumed Egyptian, he is a candidate for the Pharaoh's throne and a rival for the love of a luscious princess with the Pharaoh's own son, Rameses.

As one might well imagine, the plot-minded Mr. DeMille does not pass lightly or briefly over this phase of his tale. Moses, as played by Charlton Heston, is a handsome and haughty young prince who warrants considerable attention as a heroic man of the ancient world. And Anne Baxter as the sensual princess and Yul Brynner as the rival, Rameses, are unquestionably apt and complementary to a lusty and melodramatic romance.

But the story is brought back to contact with the Bible and with its inspirational trend when Moses discovers, acknowledges, and is exiled from Egypt because of his Hebraic birth. Then Mr. DeMille, who, incidentally, acts as narrator for his film in many of its more exalted stretches, takes him into the wilderness and establishes his contact with his Maker, which leads to the Exodus and the Covenant on Mount Sinai.

In the latter phases of the drama, wherein the impulse to set his people free from the bondage of Egypt flames in Moses, the spiritual and supernatural surge comes somewhat bluntly in the picture, and the performance of such awesome miracles as the crossing of the Red Sea and the burning of the Ten Commandments into the tablets of stone may strike the less devout viewer as a bit mechanical and abrupt.

Also, and with all due regard for the technical difficulties besetting Mr. DeMille, we must say his special effects department was not up to sets or costumes. The parting of the Red Sea is an obvious piece of camera trickery in which two churning walls of water frame a course as smooth and dry as a racetrack. And the striking off of the Ten Commandments by successive thunderbolts, while a deep voice intones their contents, is disconcertingly mechanical.

However, in its other technical aspects—in its remarkable settings and decor, including an overwhelming facade of the Egyptian city from which the Exodus begins, and in the glowing Technicolor in which the picture is filmed—Mr. DeMille has worked photographic wonders. And his large cast of characters is very good, from Sir Cedric Hardwicke as a droll and urbane Pharaoh to Edward G. Robinson as a treacherous overlord. Yvonne DeCarlo as the Midianite shepherdess to whom Moses is wed is notably good in a severe role, as is John Derek as a reckless Joshua.

This is unquestionably a picture to which one must bring something more than a mere wish for entertainment in order to get a full effect from it. But for those to whom its fundamentalism will be entirely credible, it should be altogether thrilling and perhaps even spiritually profound.

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (MOVIE)

Produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille; written by Aeneas MacKenzie, Jesse Lasky, Jr., Jack Gariss, and Fredric M. Frank, based on the novels The Prince of Egypt by Dorothy Clarke Wilson, Pillar of Fire by the Reverend J. H. Ingram, and On Eagle's Wings by the Reverend G. E. Southon, and on the text of the Bible and the ancient writings of Josephus, Eusebius, Philo, and The Midrash; cinematographers, Loyal Griggs, John F. Warren, W. Wallace Kelley, and Peverell Marley; edited by Anne Bauchens; music by Elmer Bernstein; art designers, Hal Pereira, Walter Tyler, and Albert Nozaki; released by Paramount Pictures. Running time: 219 minutes.