The Mystery of the Sphinx (1993)

Don't Believe the Hype

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

You know, there's a lot going for this documentary about one of the oldest an made structures on the face of this Earth. New revelations and new conclusions about the Egyptian Sphinx and a nearby temple are pretty amazing stuff. When I first saw this documentary back in the 90s I was riveted.That is, until the mumbo-jumbo pseudo science about ancient humans from a lost continent and aliens reared their head. I mean, why throw that in there as a serious contemplation to what had been a solid and serious documentary? Just why?But, never mind. John Anthony West puts his ideas forward, and Charlton Heston narrates what could have been one of the greatest historical documentaries of all time. But, even West himself says all the other kooky crap associated with his ideas is, just that, an unfortunate association, because all he's done is taken the science a few extra steps to really examine what the geological evidence states about the Egyptian Sphinx, and, form there, to draw likely conclusions about what that evidence states.And it is compelling beyond belief. It says that civilization may be older than we thought by many orders of magnitude, and that the cradle of civilization may be near the Sphinx itself, whose life may have started out as a simple temple to some local animist deity, but, through the eons, was transformed into what we have today.Really, if you can get by the junk science part, and just focus on West's research, you should have an enjoyable time of it.Give it a watch and see what you think.*EDIT* A more recent documentary aired by the Smithsonian examines the same evidence, draws some of the same hard factual inferences made in this documentary, but gives a more cogent and solid theory of conclusion, which holds up better to scrutiny, and gybes better with known facts regarding construction techniques: "Secrets - The Sphinx"

The mystery of the sphinx continues. See Supernatural Science (1999) episode Monumental Mysteries and Wikipedia (2010). Geology and Egyptology remain at loggerheads 17 years after Mystery of the Sphinx was released.The geological claims -- which I won't specify to avoid spoiling -- still stand. And the Egyptologists' objections also remain valid. The final 1/5 of the DVD is embarrassing rubbish about Mars and Atlantis, but the central tenet remains fascinating. And the geologist is accredited to Boston University. If anyone ever solves this mystery, it will be headline news.if you compare the erosion on the sphinx face to the erosion on its flanks, it becomes obvious the the face was sculpted thousands of years more recently than the body. so the face was re-carved -- perhaps from the head of a lion -- to the head of a 4th dynasty pharoah. but the main point of the documentary is far more sensational than that.

This is the Documentary that shook up Egyptian Archaeology when it was broadcast on NBC television. "The Mystery of the Sphinx," introduced American viewers to the discovery by John Anthony West and Robert Schoch that the Great Sphinx of Giza might be thousands of years older than its assumed date of 2500 BC. Narrated by Charlton Heston, the documentary provides evidence that the ancient Egyptians possessed scientific knowledge unknown to us and carried on the wisdom tradition of an earlier lost civilization. Finally this documentary been released on DVD.