"Man Without a Star", rated as "a minor work" by biographer John Baxter, marks a philosophical transition in Vidor's outlook towards Hollywood: the Dempsey Rae figure, though retaining his personal integrity, “is a man without a star to follow; no ideal, no goal” reflecting a declining enthusiasm by the director for American topics. Vidor's final two movies, the epics "War and Peace" (an adaption of the novel by Russian author Leo Tolstoy), and "Solomon and Sheba", a story from the Old Testament, followed the director's realization that his self-conceived film proposals would not be welcomed by commercial movie enterprises. This pair of historical costume dramas were created outside Hollywood, both filmed and financed in Europe.