Jesus Christ, Movie Star

	.	by Robert Fontenot
		iscussing Elvis Presley’s notoriously surreal and yet somehow dull Sixties films, music critic Dave Marsh once remarked that they would “tax the patience of God’s own messenger.” The spring of 2004 invites similar comparisons, bogged down as it’s been by a crushing series of bad ideas (Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights), botch jobs (Welcome to Mooseport), and blown-up babies (The Butterfly Effect). This time, however, God’s own messenger stuck around, if only to catch the midnight February 25th showing of The Passion of the Christ, now the 13th most popular film of all time in the United States. And it’s not done yet. Of course, the juggernaut that is Passion engendered controversy big enough to match its gargantuan box-office receipts. Now that the Christian holiday of Easter (or, if you like, Resurrection Sunday) is upon us, saints and sinners alike may be on the lookout for Jesus movies that, like Passion, stay relatively close to the Gospels. Hence, this guide, which grades the most famous of these movies on the criteria that many folks applied to Gibson’s movie, as well as on their sheer entertainment value. (Note that films which stray far from the original source material, like The Last Temptation of Christ, are not included; neither are those films like The Robe or Ben-Hur which are only peripherally connected to the actual story of Jesus. TV miniseries are included, simply because the advent of DVD makes the playing field quite level these days.) The King of Kings (1927) Historical Authenticity: B- Violence: B Treatment of Jews: B Overall presentation: C ertainly the ultimate silent-film version of the story, which means it has an internal rhythm and visual language that can be truly appreciated only by those who understand the art of the silent epic. No one knows more about said epics than director Cecil B. DeMille, and so you watch this one—when you can find it—for the grandiosity, such as the earthquake that shakes Golgotha when Jesus is crucified. The pacing leaves a lot to be desired, which makes this a trying experience for some, but the best moments are truly transcendent. Judas’s suicide may be the most harrowing version ever committed to film. King of Kings (1961) Historical Authenticity: C Violence: A Treatment of Jews: B Overall presentation: C- rriving as it did at a time when Hollywood epics were starting to gag on their own excess, this film was clearly an attempt to take the template of the recent smash success Ben-Hur and apply it to the actual story of Christ; this three-hour gasbag therefore takes pains to utilize every element of all four Gospels. Jeffrey Hunter made for a rather dull and deracinated Jesus, however, paving the way for decades of blue-eyed Jesus dolls to come, and so the long runtime becomes more oppressive than edifying. Also, while Gibson’s Passion got low marks for fixating on the violence of the era, this movie errs in the exact opposite direction, leaving the viewer with a literally and figuratively bloodless tale. The Gospel According to Matthew (1964) Historical Authenticity: A+ Violence: B Treatment of Jews: C Overall presentation: A+ ddly enough, it took an art-house iconoclast like director Pier Paolo Pasolini to lense one of the most, er, catholic retellings of the Gospels. Or in this case, just the one—the book of Matthew, which is adhered to in an utterly faithful fashion, word for word. What’s most remarkable about this movie is how Pasolini applies the fundamentals of black-and-white Italian neorealism to what is too often a very Americanized subject, right down to his casting of amateurs. The result is an experience that somehow manages to feel otherworldly and legitimate at once. Bonus: the excellent secondhand musical score, taken from sources as diverse as Odetta and Prokofiev. A truly haunting experience. The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965) Historical Authenticity: B Violence: A Treatment of Jews: A Overall presentation: C ot quite the failure that the ’61 King of Kings was, but not far off, either. Director George Stevens (Giant, The Diary of Anne Frank) had no idea how to shoot on such a grand scale, and while the exteriors are often gorgeous, the emotional impact of the story is constantly undercut by a turgid script and what seems like several hundred unnecessary star cameos. One in particular doomed this picture from the start: John Wayne as the Roman soldier who declares “Truly this man was the Son of God!” Unfortunately, he couldn’t sound like anything but the Duke, and the contrast is hilarious. Charlton Heston was born to play John the Baptist, though. Jesus Christ Superstar (1973) Historical Authenticity: B- Violence: C Treatment of Jews: A Overall presentation: A ated and silly as it is in spots, this musical (one of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s earliest, but don’t hold that against it) nevertheless performs remarkable feats most Jesus films don’t. It doesn’t stick to the letter of the Gospels, but it expands on the spirits of its characters, revealing a very possible motivation for Judas’ behavior and recasting the power struggle that led to Christ’s death in explicitly post-Sixties terms, i.e., was Jesus killed by bureaucracy and fame? Either way, this version portrays Jesus as a very human character, but one still not of this Earth. The Gethsemane scene remains the finest ever filmed. Godspell (1973) Historical Authenticity: C- Violence: A Treatment of Jews: A Overall presentation: C he other hippie Jesus-freak musical, released in the same year, fashions the Gospel of Matthew into a feel-good polemic about the power of love, effectively dulling the edges of Christ’s more radical tendencies. It’s entertaining for what it is, however, and definitely the Jesus film to watch if you (heart) New York, set as it is in Nixon-era Gotham. Try and ignore the fact that Jesus wears a Superman t-shirt or that one of the major dance numbers is set on top an as-yet-incomplete World Trade Center. And in the middle of a deserted Manhattan, yet. Sigh. Jesus of Nazareth (1977) Historical Authenticity: A Violence: A Treatment of Jews: B Overall presentation: A miniseries created at the height of the art form, this six-hour version of the Gospels could have easily slipped into Greatest Story-style ludicrousness with its giant all-star cast. However, the casting this time is nearly perfect—with the ironic exception of Robert Powell’s Jesus, who has a commanding presence that seems a bit too alien at times. Director Franco Zeffirelli does a fine job with the landscape, too (unlike too many Biblical productions, this one was actually filmed on location near Galilee). If you’re looking for a basic yet thorough synthesis of the four books, undiluted by artistic license, this is definitely the one to rent. Pay close attention to the note-perfect cameos, especially Ernest Borgnine’s gently moving scene as the centurion who beseeches Jesus for a miracle. Jesus (1979) Historical Authenticity: A+ Violence: C Treatment of Jews: B Overall presentation: B upposedly the most watched film of all time, this production was specifically created by the Church as a conversion tool, and as such, there are no attempts at political correctness or modernization here. However, that also makes this the most authentic recreation of the Christ tale ever filmed—the dialogue here is taken directly from the Gospel of Luke, and is completely untouched. The result is a refreshingly noncondescending film that makes it easy to overlook the rather amateurish quality of the acting and technical details. Also filmed on location, it has a ring of truth most other films of its kind are too timid to convey. Jesus (1999) Historical Authenticity: B Violence: C- Treatment of Jews: A Overall presentation: B- espite the title, this TV miniseries is not in any way related to the ’79 work—in fact, it veers from the Gospels at several points in order to flesh out the characters a bit. The writing isn’t very incisive, though, and that leads to several pointless dramatic detours during the full version’s three-hour runtime. Jeremy Sisto gets points for attempting a smiling, flesh-and-blood Christ figure, but he remains rather dull (and, unlike James Caviezel, rather non-Semitic looking). The crucifixion scenes are appealingly (appallingly?) realistic, though, and devoid of the leering masochism in Gibson’s version. Why are cinema’s Jesus figures almost always portrayed as dolls or whipping posts? God only knows.