The life story of Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie (1892-1975) is combined with a look at the nation he helped to modernize in "The Lion of Judah," a BBC film produced three years before the Emperor's 1974 dethronement by the military. The program includes a genealogy of Ethiopian rulers back to King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba; scenes of Haile Selassie's birthplace and of his public and private life at Addis Ababa; and 1936 footage of a League of Nations assembly, where the Emperor's plea for help against Mussolini was rejected.