The Resurrection on FilmPart 3 - Luke's Gospel

This is the third in a series of short posts for Easter this year looking at film portrayals of the resurrection. The idea is to take each of the Gospels in turn and look at one or two films that have sought to portray the resurrection in a manner that fits with that particular Gospel. Yesterday I looked at the resurrection in Mark's Gospel and so today it's onto Luke.

There are three Jesus films that strike me as reflecting something of the ending to Luke's Gospel. Firstly there is the recent Lumo Project version The Gospel of Luke (2016). A few of the relevant scenes from this film can be viewed online. This time the narrator is Richard E. Grant, but it's obvious that much of the footage - at least of the initial resurrection is that we find in their version of Mark (and indeed John).

As I say in my review of Mark there's an interesting tension in this between reflecting the distinct portrait of these events that Mark provides and the purported historical events that stand behind them. But one of the disadvantages of this approach is the footage doesn't always act out clear stage directions from the text, so here there are no men in dazzling clothes and no-one puts their face to the ground.

The Road to Emmaus scene is new though and as with other films has Jesus half covering his face to explain why Cleopas and his companion don't recognise him. This seems to me to be a rather odd approach. If Jesus meant to conceal his identity surely he could have done it more effectively: If he meant to be visible then why not make it more plain and uncover his face?  This halfway house just makes it seem like a key test of faith is the ability to recognise faces in bad light.

The second film to mention when talking about Luke's resurrection is the Genesis Project's extended version of Luke's Gospel, from which the Jesus film (1979) was edited. This also employs the partial face covering tactic on the Road to Emmaus (pictured), but does present the other aspects more or less as directed. I don't really like the soft focus in the upper room scene though.

Lastly, as films go, I tend to think The Miracle Maker (2000), whilst a harmonised Jesus film is a fairly Lucan take on proceedings. That said after the resurrection the script seems to switch to John as the primary source, such that there are a further 3 episodes not found in Luke. However, the shape of the narrative at this point remains Lucan with the discovery by women, Simon seeing Jesus (24:34), the appearance on the Road to Emmaus, and then just a single appearance to the disciples in the upper room. The Johanine inclusions are more flourishes within that broader narrative than the text that defines the text of the narrative.

For whatever reason very few films feature the Road to Emmaus episode, although this has increased in recent years, but this is certainly the first film I think of when this episode comes to mind. Again we get the same tactic with face-covering. The one portrayal of this scene that does something different is the BBC's The Passion (2008) which uses a different actor in various parts of the resurrection episode - certainly a more interesting, and not necessarily a more controversial, way t solve the question of why Jesus was not recognised.

Miracle Maker Scene Guide

Having discussed The Miracle Maker before Easter, I thought I would just add this scene guide> I've done it a little differently this time. Firstly I've been able to add approximate times. Secondly, although I'm still broadly following my citation policy, I've also added references to Luke's gospel and have given it preference here over Matthew's.

[ 0 mins] Non-scriptural episodes
[ 7 mins] Birth of Jesus – (Luke 2:6-7)
[ 7 mins] †Shepherds – (Luke 2:16-17)
[ 8 mins] †Boy Jesus in the temple – (Luke 2:42-50)
[ 9 mins] Baptism of Jesus – (Mark 1:4-11)
[11 mins] Temptation of Jesus – (Luke 4:1-13)
[14 mins] †Mary and Martha – (Luke 10:38-42)
[18 mins] *House on The Rock – (Matt 7:24-27)
[21 mins] Miraculous Catch of Fish – (Luke 5:1-11)
[26 mins] Paralytic Through the Roof – (Mark 2:1-12 / Luke 5:17-26)
[30 mins] Choosing the 12 Disciples – (Mark 3:1-13 / Luke 6:12-26)
[36 mins] Bleeding Woman / Jairus’ Daughter – (Mark 5:21-43 / Luke 8:40-56)
[44 mins] Greatest like a child – (Matt 18:1-5)
[45 mins] †Good Samaritan – (Luke 10:25-37)
[48 mins] *Lazarus Raised From the Dead – (John 11:1-46)
[51 mins] Triumphal Entry – (Mark 11:7-10 / Luke 19:35-38)
[52 mins] *One Man to Die for all the People – (John 11:47-48)
[53 mins] Cleansing the Temple – (Mark 11:15-19 / Luke 19:45-48)
[54 mins] Taxes to Cesar? – (Mark 12:13-17 / Luke 20:20-26)
[56 mins] Judas' Betrayal – (Mark 14:10-11 / Luke 22:1-6)
[57 mins] The Last Supper – (Mark 14:17-31 / Luke 22:14-39)
[59 mins] The Garden of Gethsemene – (Mark 14:32-42 / Luke 22:40-46)
[63 mins] The Arrest – (Mark 14:43-50 / Luke 22:47-53)
[65 mins] Peter Denies Jesus – (Luke 22:54-62)
[66 mins] Sanhedrin Trial - (Mark 14:53-64 / Luke 22:66-71)
[67 mins] Pilate 1st trial - (Luke 23:1-7)
[68 mins] Before Herod - (Luke 23:8-12)
[69 mins] Pilate 2nd trial - (Luke 23:13-25)
[70 mins] Road to the Cross – (Mark 15:20-22 / Luke 23:26-27)
[72 mins] Crucifixion and Death – (Mark 5:22-41 / Luke 23:33-49)
[75 mins] Burial – (Mark 15:42-47 / Luke 15:50-56)
[76 mins] *Appearance to Mary – (John 20:1, 11-17)
[77 mins] *Mary Tells Peter – (John 20:18)
[78 mins] *Peter Goes To the Tomb – (John 20:3-10; ~21:15-19)
[79 mins] †The Upper Room – (Luke 24:33-35)
[80 mins] †Road to Emmaus – (Luke 24:13-32)
[81 mins] Jesus appears to the disciples – (Luke 26-38)
[82 mins] Jesus and Thomas – (John 20:25, 27-29)
[83 mins] †The Ascension – (Luke 24:48-53)

A Few Notes
The film is essentially a version of Luke's gospel, both in form and function. From a functional point of view it was created by Christians with a view of telling their story to those who don't know it. Luke's gospel is often called the "most evangelistic", and this seems to have been a key motivation for making this version.

From a form point of view, not only the does the film follow the synoptic order of events, it also prioritises texts from Luke. So prior to the resurrection, all but 3 episodes shown are found in Luke's gospel (indicated by an asterisk*). After the resurrection the script switches to John as the primary source, such that there are a further 3 episodes not found in Luke. However, the shape of the narrative at this point remains Lucan with the discovery by women, Simon seeing Jesus (24:34), the appearance on the Road to Emmaus, and then just a single appearance to the disciples in the upper room. The Johanine inclusions are more flourishes within that broader narrative than the text that defines the text of the narrative. This made it hard to cite the relevant texts for this part of the story!

Secondly, the story contains 7 episodes that are unique to Luke, with several others (such as the baptism scene) prioritising Luke's version over the other gospels. This is the most for any of the gospels, although a number of incidents are unique to John. Interestingly these are often moulded far more significantly by the screenwriter (Murray Watts - who deserves a great deal of credit for his skilful writing here).

This film is also the only film that shows the Road to Emmaus episode, although the Genesis Project's extended version of Luke (from which the Jesus film was edited - see scene guide) obviously had to include it.

The film shows more post-resurrection episodes than any other save perhaps the recent Gospel of John (2003)

The Passion - Part 4 Scene Guide

See all posts on this film.

The Passion has just reached its conclusion so it's time for me to blog my thoughts on the final episode. As with the previous three episodes I'm giving biblical references in my usual scene guide format (citation guide). Passages in square brackets are extra-biblical episodes. My overall review of this programme is here, though I hope to add some additional points now I have seen the whole series.

Joseph Asks for Jesus's Body - Mark 15:42-45
[EBE - Disciples Discuss Jesus's Death]
[EBE - Caiaphas Criticises Joseph's Decision]
Burial - Mark 15:46-47
[EBE - Holy Saturday - The Two Marys]
[EBE - Holy Saturday - Disciples Worry About What to do]
[EBE - Caiaphas's Wife Reassures him]
Soldiers at the Tomb - Matt 27:62-66
[EBE - Marys and the Disciples]
Magdalene at The Tomb - John 20:1
Caiaphas Told of the Empty Tomb - Matt 28:11
Mary, John and Peter Go to the Tomb - John 20:3-10
Jesus Appears to Mary - John 20:11-17
Mary Tells the Disciples - John 20:18
[EBE - Caiaphas and Joseph Argue]
Road to Emmaus - Luke 24:13-33
Jesus Appears in the Upper Room - Luke 24:36-49
[EBE - Pilate and his Wife Return Home]
[EBE - Caiaphas's Son is Born]
Jesus and Peter - John 21:15-19
I Will be with you Always - Matt 28:20

Spoilers follow:
I'd like to start by talking about the post-resurrection appearances, mainly because I've known about them for some time. I'd heard a good while back that this film was going to do something interesting with the resurrection, and I wondered then if it was going to use a different actor for the resurrected Jesus. My suspicions were confirmed at the première when Nigel Stafford-Clark accidentally let it slip that my hunch was correct. Fortunately, I managed to keep this all to myself, and settled for just giving it a passing mention in my review. But, suffice to say, I've been positively bursting to talk about it ever since.

What they did so well is keep the facts largely as they are. The gospels are nowhere more divergent than they are on the subject of Easter morning. Mark mentions some women, an angel and an empty tomb and precious little else (later additions aside). Matthew elaborates by having Jesus meet the woman and having a guard placed at the tomb. Luke omits Matthew's story about the seal, but adds the story about the Road to Emmaus, and an appearance to Peter, before bringing things to a climax with the resurrected Jesus appearing to all the disciples. Finally John gives an almost totally different account with Mary Magdalene alone finding the empty tomb, not seeing an angel, returning to tell Peter and John before she meets the risen Jesus for herself. We then two appearances to a room full of disciples and doubting Thomas, breakfast on the beach, restoration of Peter and a cryptic comment about John.

Of course many previous Jesus films omit the resurrection altogether, or give it a more spiritual interpretation, and even many of those that do include it skip by fairly quickly. Among those that do include it, a surprising number actually go on to show the one thing the gospels don't talk about - Jesus leaving the tomb. What we have here is the story as it is presented - albeit based on a harmonisation of the story - and not only that but it's one that seeks to offer not one, but several possible interpretations of what actually happened and leave the viewer to decide for themselves.The first such interpretation will be the one that pleases scholars such as Tom Wright. Wright holds that the failure to recognise the risen Jesus was because his resurrection body is a physical body, but one that is significantly different from his pre-resurrection body. This is the interpretation that I had been wondering if ever anyone would try.

But the other interpretation, that the filmmakers were keen to leave as a possibility was that actually Jesus wasn't resurrected. This is dealt with far more visually. Firstly the empty tomb, far from being somewhere that might require a gardener (John 20:16) is in the middle of the desert, and, at the crucial moment the soldiers leave their post. (Incidentally Matthew's account has the soldiers told to say that the body was stolen when they were asleep whereas here it occurs whilst they go off to buy food - a move that, in itself is open to various interpretations). Then we have the two appearances using the different actors which could be read to be fairly damning, and whilst Joseph Mawle eventually resumes the role these appearances are all shot from a particular character's point of view, rather than in a more objective setting.

A further interpretation is that the use of different actors is just to show the confusion in the disciples' minds and once they realise that Jesus has risen we see Joe Mawle back in more corporate settings. So there are at least three interpretations and I look forward to unearthing more over the next few days. Either way, it will be a talking point. Incidentally the two actors who appear here are listed in the credits as "Man at Tomb" and "Man on Road to Emmaus".There are a few other points to make. The final scenes are also very interesting, in particular the birth of a son to Caiaphas, and his evident relief and prayer of thanks. The point here is that Caiaphas, at least, seems to interpret this as confirmation of God's approval. He has done the right thing, his wife and child are safe and his line will continue. But other possibilities are possible. Perhaps it's just chance, or perhaps it is a reward from God for being a pawn in his master plan. What's interesting is the correlation between Caiaphas interpretation and those of viewers interpreting the rest of the story in accordance with their own beliefs. This also happens to a far lesser degree with Pilate whose house is beginning to take shape once more.

I also noticed a nice touch in one of the scenes between James and John. The portrayal of these two disciples has been one of the series' minor delights. John has for so long been played as a wet blanket, that it was great to see him acting more like he could be one of the sons of thunder. If I ever write up my Jesus Film Dream Team, Jamie Sives will be on it. Anyway, there's a nice irony at the point where a sceptical James tells warns his brother that if he carries on he's "going to get himself killed". Tradition has it that John was the only one of the disciples not to be martyred whereas James was one of the first to be killed..Following on from that, at the start of the episode John reports back on Jesus's death. It's interesting that this could be taken as the start of his traditional role as the disciple who wrote the fourth gospel. There's further intrigue, though, because John recalls Jesus's last words as "Your will is done" (variation on "it is accomplished" which appears only in John) whereas his last words were actually shown as being "I've loved you with all my heart". Whether this is intended to show John deliberately altering Jesus's words, or just that he didn't recall these things perfectly, or whether it was just a glitch in the production is, like much of this final episode, open very much to interpretation.

======

As with previous episodes a few others have blogged the final episode. Doug Chaplin at MetaCatholic continues his generally excellent coverage and Gerard O'Collins is the fourth author for Thinking Faith. I also came across Stephen Barton's Reformed Christian UK site which has also posted a few thoughts on all four parts (1, 2, 3 and 4). The BBC has also added an article on their portrayal of the crucifixion.

Open Heaven Jesus Films Workshop

This Sunday I'm going to be running a 45 minute session with Jesus films at my church Open Heaven. I don't often get a chance to play to the home crowd, so to speak, so it's something I'm looking forward to. (Actually, I like it this way. It means that when they do ask me to do something it's because it's really want it, rather than because they feel they have to).

Anyway, I'm going to be looking at how different films portray the end of the story of Jesus. It's an exercise I've run before as part of the Jesus Films course I ran a few years back (download notes), and it worked fairly well as I recall.

I'm going to show clips from the following seven films (chapters and timings included incase anyone wants to play along at home):

The King of Kings (1927 cut) - ch.26; start- 2:22:55; end- 2:25:50
Il Vangelo Secondo Matteo(1964) - ch.16; start- 2:06:36; end- 2:11:00
Son of Man (1969) - ch.10; start- 1:26:50; end- 1:28:55
Jesus Christ Superstar (1973) - ch.23; start- 1:36:39; end- 1:41:20
Last Temptation (1988) - ch.29; start- 2:39:28; end- 2:41:05
Passion of the Christ (2004) - ch.15; start- 1:53:10; end- 1:55:45
The Passion (2008) ep.4 - ch.1; start- 19:42; end- 22:42

There's a nice mix there of how the different films end the story, focussing on the different elements. Even the films that don't portray the resurrection bring out different aspects of the significance of Jesus' death. Son of Man is very depressing, whereas Last Temptation ends on a victorious note, even though it doesn't explore a bodily resurrection.

It's also nice to have the BBC's The Passion to add into the mix. It's one of the more controversial endings, and has been read in widely different ways. For some it suggests Jesus' followers were hallucinating, for others it nicely brought out the apparently changed nature of Jesus' physical body.

One of the things we will look at is the different biblical accounts of Jesus' resurrection which I've summarised below:

Matt	Mark
Women at the Tomb	Women at the Tomb
Empty Tomb	Empty Tomb
Jesus appears	(Res'n appearances)
Soldiers Bribed

Luke	John
Women at the Tomb	Mary at the Tomb
Empty Tomb	Pete & Jon at Tomb
Road to Emmaus	Mary sees Jesus
Appearance to 11	Appearance to 11
	2nd appearance to 11
	Fish for breakfast

What I find interesting is how the films that are more popular amongst more conservative Christians (The King of Kings, Passion of the Christtend to use the most artistic licence on this part of the story, whereas those that are more criticised by those groups (Last Temptation, The Passion) actually stick more closely to the text. It's also interesting that ending a Jesus film without showing the resurrection is often considered the product of modern scepticism even though it is actually continuing the traditions of the Easter passion plays.

Anyway, it'll be interesting to see what they all make of the different films. I'll report back next week.

A.D. (2015) - Part 2

This is part 2 of a series of posts covering A.D. episode by episode & are initial impressions not a review. You can read them all here.

As I noted in my initial post in this series A.D. doesn't rush straight into the book of Acts in the manner that I, at least, expected. This episode, for example, is the second in a series of only ten, and yet we've still not got into Acts yet - this episode ends with the Ascension. Whilst I imagine the filmmakers had hoped for further series, A.D. - The Bible Continues didn't; NBC cancelled it July 2015 and talk of a new channel which would carry content such as this has not (yet?) emerged. So for now the series looks to be left high and dry in Acts 11.

This episode is particularly strange in this respect. There's a great deal of weight put on the episode in Matthew 28 with the soldiers at the tomb and an early example of attempting to "control the narrative". Guards are dragged to and forth, examined and cross-examined, beaten and eventually murdered whilst Pilate and Caiaphas scheme. It all becomes a bit tiresome, with the only point of interest the way that Pilate gradually turns from the noble and indecisive-but-thoughtful leader of episode 1 to the throat-slitting, blood-thirsty tyrant he becomes here. Caiaphas eventually becomes appalled by the man he is doing business with, although it will be interesting to see how this turns out when Saul arrives on the scene.

Meanwhile though Jesus is still around making resurrection appearances. It's strange that some of plays second fiddle to the film's zealous attempts to hammer home Matthew's apologetic concerning the guarding of the tomb, to the extent that it skips over Luke's story of Jesus' appearance on the road to Emmaus. This has proved popular with other filmmakers and has led to some interesting interpretations.

That said we do get John's story of the appearance on the shores of Galilee. This was the episode's high point for me. The beach that Jesus appears on is busy relative to how it's portrayed in the handful of other films that include this episode, where it is often deserted other than Jesus and the disciples. Given the time of day I think the approach here is a bit more likely and whilst it loses something of the intimacy of a meeting alone, I think it emphasises Jesus being someone who was out among the individual people and like the relatively natural way in which it's portrayed.

If that's the best scene, it's equally clear which the worst scene and for the same kind of reason. The Ascension is something that is relatively rare, at least as something that is visualised rather than something that happens almost off screen. Relatively few films have portrayed this, though notable depictions include Pathé's Life and Passion of Jesus Christ (1907), where Jesus is hoisted up to painted, hardboard clouds; the Jesus film (1979) where we get Jesus's point of view as the crowd disappears below him; Dayasagar/ Karunamayudu (1978) where Jesus becomes a massive figure against the night sky; and the flashing light disappearance trick of The Miracle Maker (2000). Here it's poorly executed CGI, which will only get worse as the film ages, and took me right out of the film. It's typical of these two series use of special effects - rather than doing something simple their budget could stretch to, they went for something spectacular that it couldn't.

That said I'm kind of relieved to see the back of this episode's Jesus. Despite hanging around for two episodes the filmmakers haven't given him much to do, other than occasionally turning up smiling. Their interest mainly seems to lie in the fact that he is still around rather than in the person himself. It's not helped by the aesthetics. Whilst the dark-haired Jesus here is better than the blond from the original The Bible (2013) series, his look is far too bearded-Chippendale for my tastes. There's an attempt to roughen him up a little round the edges, but he's all oiled muscles, perfect teeth and shampoo-advert hair.

However it's not just the visuals that are problematic, some of the dialogue in this episode is particularly poor. "Stay in the water like the eel you are" is one of the finer examples of bizarre phrases that feels neither historical nor modern day. In the opposite corner - dialogue that is meant to sound profound, but is actually pretty empty - was this: "We found nothing...and everything."

In the next episode I'm hoping we get as far as Pentecost, either way I guess Peter will be the main character.  This is definitely a good thing as Adam Levy's performance so far has stood out in comparison to many of the others, and whilst this should be welcomed as a positive thing, it doesn't look too good if a humble fisherman is outshining the son of God incarnate.

Jesus Film Postponed After Coke Complain

I've just come across this bizarre story from Variety. An Italian film called 7km From Jerusalem was due to be released on Good Friday. It's difficult to decipher the synopsis that appears on the official website, because not only is it in Italian, but even its Google translation is very unclear. Nevertheless, it appears that the film is about a man who (physically) meets Jesus on a road near Emmaus. Initially the man doesn't believe it when Jesus reveals who he is. Ultimately however, Jesus explains that he said he would return and he sets the man three challenges. This would seem to be the main point of the plot, so it appears that the role of Jesus is at the very least pivotal, but may also be fairly substantial.

However, what really caused controversy, was the scene where the man offers Jesus a drink of Coke. Despite at least one Vatican insider seeming happy with it (Krystov Zanussi was part of a film festival jury that actually approved it), the soft drinks firm baulked at the inclusion of their product. They requested the scene be cut, and so the release of 7km was delayed at short notice in order to make the relevant cuts.

The film is based on an Italian book also called "7km from Jerusalem", and stars soap star Luca Ward and Rosalinda Celentano (Satan in The Passion of the Christ)

Story also covered by Cinnematical.

Golgotha - Additional Comments

I recently re-watched parts of Julian Duvivier's Golgotha and was really struck again by what an impressive film this is visually (see my earlier review of this film). So I thought I'd discuss a couple of the shots in particular, as some of them are more than worthy of note. The picture quality on these isn't brilliant, mainly as I only have a DVD archived copy of this film from VHS, but hopefully they are sufficient to give you the idea. Click on images to enlarge them (as ever).

This first shot is the crucifixion from the disciples point of view. The crosses are only just distinguishable on the horizon, as the camera focuses its attention on the disciples who stick together even though they have deserted their master. There's also significance to their location high up and just outside the city's boundary. They may have deserted Jesus (temporarily), but they have left Jerusalem and that which is related to it.

One of the most striking scenes in the film is the trial scene in front of a huge crowd. Whilst this scene is arguably problematic from an anti-Semitism point of view, the film's latter association of the Romans with the pre-WWII Nazis (see my review for details) is a significant mitigating factor. There are two particular highlights. The first is this shot of Jesus foregrounded with Pilate washing his hands. The water temporarily obscures our view of Jesus, and there are various association that could be made with this imagery - it implicates us in the action, as well as evoking ideas of cleansing and approach to Jesus through the waters of baptism.

The second shot is the one that ends the scene. Having filmed the action in close up on the stage, the camera reverse swoops back across the crowd - implicating them visually in the scene that has just unfolded. Given that this film was made in 1935, the technical prowess required for such a shot is breathtaking.

The film also makes very interesting use of point of view shots. Aside from this film, Jesus films tended to avoid taking a shot from Jesus's point of view until the 1970s. Here, however, the road to the cross scene is littered with significant examples of Jesus looking at members of the crowd, the path ahead of him etc. This shot is taken just after he has fallen, and is particularly interesting because of it's low angle, and the dominance of the soldier over Jesus that it suggests.

Another interesting point of view shot occurs on the Emmaus Road at the end of the film. Jesus's approach to the two walking along the road has been shown with varying degrees of success in Jesus films, mainly revolving around the question of where exactly did Jesus come from. Here the issue is circumvented by showing the shadows of the two people on the road, and the gradual approach of a third shadow - that of Jesus.

The final point of view shot I'd like to discuss is this one taken of the temple as the curtain is torn in two. Here it's not Jesus's point of view that the camera adopts, but that of his father. It's a high angle God-shot, which then cuts to the despair felt by the priests that are present. At least one of them interprets it as a sign of God's judgement, but again this scene gives a somewhat sympathetic portrayal of the Jewish faith.

In addition to this film being the first to included shots from Jesus's point of view, it also appears to be the first to show the nails being hammered through Jesus's wrists rather than his hands. Today this is the more popular approach, particularly since it has been supported by archaeological evidence, but then it's a startling case of going against the text (e.g. John 20:24-27). That said, I think that the case for the nails through the wrists rather than the hands is based on more than that particular archaeological discovery since that was the discovery of an ankle bone rather than a wrist. If memory serves it is more linked to the hands inability to support the body's weight sufficiently.

Finally, I couldn't help but note the similarity between this shot of Judas hanging himself and that from DeMille's 1927 film The King of Kings. This could of course be due to both directors paying tribute to an earlier painted work (DeMille was particularly keen on this), but I've not been able to find one that this shot mirrors as closely as it mirrors DeMille, so I suspect this is something of a nod to DeMille's film.

If so, it's an interesting choice. These two films are seen very differently by critics today. DeMille is frequently mocked for his excessive, gaudy style, whereas the handful of people who have been lucky enough to see this film usually praise it quite highly. It seems, though, that Duvivier, at least, didn't consider himself to be above DeMille, at least not at this stage in their respective careers. It could, of course, be argued that it was only after The King of Kings that DeMille really moved in that direction.

As an addendum, someone recently contacted me asking how the Last Supper scene was composed. As can hopefully be scene from this screen grab, it's clear that the scene is not meant to reference Da Vinci's famous painting, which is the usual touchstone on this particular moment in the story. I've chosen this shot in particular as it shows Judas outside of the group - shot as if he his hesitating to be certain this is really the decision he wishes to make. It also suggests his exclusion from the party, and hints that this existed prior to his decision to betray his master.

The Resurrection on FilmPart 4 - John's Gospel

This is the last in a series of short posts for Easter this year looking at film portrayals of the resurrection. The idea is to take each of the Gospels in turn and look at one or two films that have sought to portray the resurrection in a manner that fits with that particular Gospel. Yesterday I looked at the resurrection in Mark's Gospel and so today we end with the Gospel of John.

As is well known, John's Gospel is significantly different from the other three "synoptic" gospels. Whilst the resurrection scenes are not an exception we do see something interesting in how John essentially takes the basic plot structure from the other three gospels and expands it with the writer's own ideas as well as adding on a significant chunk of new material towards the end. This is essentially a microcosm of what John does with the Synoptic text as a whole. (I realise that some dispute whether John was even familiar with any of the synoptics).

What we have in John's gospel is Mary Magdalene visiting the tomb, finding it empty, running to tell the apostles, who run back to the tomb and find it empty. When they leave she comes face to face with Jesus, although initially she mistakes him for someone else. That evening Jesus appears to the disciples. John then adds a 2nd appearance eight days later, this time where the "doubting" disciple is present. Then we get a later incident, sometimes called an appendix or the epilogue where Jesus appears on a beach and cooks the disciples fish for breakfast before rehabilitating Simon Peter. One of the reasons this second chapter (21) is sometimes called an epilogue or appendix is because the text seems to have come to a close at 20:31, but then starts up again.

Overall these incidents are not that well represented in film, indeed when thinking about them the main two that spring to mind are the two word for word adaptations, one from the Visual Bible in 2003 and 2015's version from the Lumo Project. That said two versions of the appearance to Mary Magdalene - the episode from John's resurrection scenes that gets the most coverage in Jesus film - are worth a brief mention.

Brief Mentions
The first is in The Miracle Maker (2000) which as I alluded to yesterday gives better coverage to the events of the resurrection than practically any other film. Here we get a nice point-of-view shot as Mary first sees the risen Jesus, partially accounting for her failing to recognise him.

Also mentioned yesterday was the BBC's The Passion (2008). As with the Road to Emmaus scene in Luke's Gospel where Jesus isn't recognised by seemingly close friends, the film uses a different actor to portray Jesus as he meets Mary.

The Lumo Project's Gospel of John (2015)
So how do the word for word translations do? Some of the Lumo Project's Gospel of John of the resurrection  are available on YouTube. The Magdalene, Thomas and Simon Peter scenes are obviously filmed specifically for this instalment but there's quite a bit of footage that is recycled in the other films. Part of the disappointment with this version is that it doesn't really do anything particularly interesting with what it has available and conversely part of the disappointment is that, again, some of the nudges in the text are ignored. I suspect it's the practicalities of trying to create re-useable footage, more than a desire to minimise the distinctives of each gospel that is the driving consideration here, but the result is much the same.

The Visual Bible' Gospel of John (2003)
In contrast I find the Visual Bible' Gospel of John more moving and it uses a couple of nice filmic techniques to good effect. It actually spends fifteen minutes on these two chapters, not quite as long as The Passion, but still one of the longest treatments.

The first thing that really stands out here is that Magalene's case of mistaken identity is because Jesus is rather oddly crouched down behind a plant. This seems a little bit odd (what was he doing at that moment? Had he got distracted from his important business of making his debut post-resurrection appearance by a stray weed or something?), but is one way to deal with a somewhat odd bit of the story.

What really stands out about this film's resurrection sequence - memorable to me even before I watched it, is the very end of the film. As Jesus' conversation with Peter draws to a close, the group of them are walking along the beach. Peter gestures towards the disciple that Jesus loved and asks "What about this man?". Jesus replies "If I want him to live until I come, what is that to you". The "other" disciple is standing behind the two of them but compositionally he is in the middle of the frame between Jesus and Peter. Once Jesus has spoken the line he an Peter walk past the camera (which is tracking back very slowly) such that the other disciple is left alone in the middle of the frame and gradually moves closer to the camera looking more than a little taken aback. Then the footage freezes, the image turns sepia and then merges into a sketch -type version of the image (pictured above). At the same time, the music to the film - which I find to be one of it's strong points - swells in a particularly moving way. The freeze frame/sepia-ing/distorting of this image really conveys the passing of time and the sense that the live action we have been witnessing passed into history. It's my favourite moment in the entire film, poignantly placing an emphasis on what happened to these followers, and the church who followed in their wake, after the story we have seen has been completed. And when it comes to the resurrection, perhaps that is the most significant thing.

Further Reflections on Miracle Maker

We watched The Miracle Maker yesterday at our Palm Sunday church social, and even though it was perhaps the 5th or 6th time I have watched it, I was pleased to see a number of details that I hadn't noticed previously (see my review, scene guide, podcast or all my posts on this film). It did make it all the more disappointing that most of the adults present wrote it off as a kids film and went out for a chat instead, but it was a lovely sunny day so who can blame them?

The first thing I really noticed was the scene with Mary and Martha (and, in this case, the still alive, Lazarus). As with the gospel accounts, Mary sits and listens whilst Martha complains "Jesus don't you care that my sister has left me to do everything tell her to help me". But whereas the response recorded in the gospels rebukes Martha and exemplifies the behaviour of her sister, her Jesus solely focuses on Martha, saying to her "don't miss the one thing that matters for you". There's no mention of Mary choosing correctly. I'm not sure whether this reflects the film makers' desire not to draw attention to Mary, or whether they thought this lack of comparison with Martha's sister portrayed Jesus's actions as kinder, or whether it was something else entirely.

Of course the female character that we see following Jesus most closely is that of Tamar - Jairus's daughter - who gets raised from the dead about halfway through the film. Poignantly, however, the film follows this scene with the moment that Jesus hears that his cousin John the Baptist has been killed. The contrast between the joy of raising a child to life and the grief and fear of knowing his kin and forerunner has been killed, not to mention that between the person he was able to save from death and the person he wasn't, is nicely highlighted by the juxtaposition.Jairus ultimately becomes the unnamed follower of Jesus who is walking with Cleopas to Emmaus on the day of Jesus's resurrection. However, Jesus seemingly knows this in advance. When Jesus arrives in the Garden of Gethsemane the two of them are already present and ask Jesus to join with them so he can answer their questions (above). However, Jesus explains that he needs to go and pray but tells them "I will come and talk to you Cleopas. I promise I will come to you Jairus, very soon, and we will talk about many things".

After Gethsemane comes Jesus's trial and we're introduced to another figure from the Jewish establishment figure who the gospels suggest ultimately becomes one of Jesus's followers - Joseph of Arimathea. Initially Joseph is simply objecting to the unlawfulness of the trial, but when others there begin to turn on him, asking him if he too is a follower of Jesus, he goes quiet and admits he knows nothing. There's an abrupt cut to Peter who is likewise denying Jesus in the courtyard outside.

Once Jesus is condemned the film moves relatively quickly to his crucifixion. But whilst the film largely skips over Jesus's abuse at the hands of the various guards and soldiers, it does appear to show Herod pulling out a part of his beard. This is taken from Isaiah 50:6 ("I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard; I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting") which traditionally, has often been seen as a prediction of Jesus's suffering due to the other details it provides. Indeed even though there's no explicit mention of Jesus's beard being pulled out in the gospels, I believe that this interpretation was one of the reasons that depictions of Jesus began to give him a beard. From the various images that we have it wasn't until the 6th century that Jesus began to be shown with a beard.Of course the fact that Jesus was Jewish also suggests that it was likely he had a beard: the smooth faced paintings of the 4th-6th century were mainly attempts to reimagine Jesus in Roman culture. One of the things I like about this film is the way it puts things in their historical context. So this time aroundI noticed this little detail from the shot above, taken from the parable of the wise and foolish builders. Having sweated away digging foundations into the rock so he can build his house, the wise man finally gets to enter his house. But before he does so, he stops and touches something he's put on his doorpost. Whilst this could be a door bell, or even just an attractive feature, the safest bet is that this is a mezuzah a copy of the shema encased in a box and attached to the door post. This very Jewish image sets Jesus words in an interesting context, and highlights the way that Jesus is reinterpreting his Judaism around himself.

Another example of this is as the centurion at the foot of the cross witnesses Jesus's death. Instead of saying "surely this was was the Son of God" he says "surely this was was a son of god". It's been a long time since I studied NT Greek but I this is something of an alteration from how this passage is usually translated. Quite how you view such an alteration depends, I suppose, on how you interpret scripture. Some will, no doubt, be unhappy with this slight alteration from the actual words of the original. Personally though (assuming that there was an actual centurion who did indeed make such a proclamation), I think it's more realisitic that a roman soldier would have expressed himself in terms of his own pluralistic worldview, which by this point would have called the very much human Caesars sons of god.

A.D. (Anno Domini) - Episode 1

I've been trying to get a copy of the full version of 1985's AD for four or five years now and having finally got hold of it I'm going to share a few notes as I go. I'll post some details about the DVD a bit later, but for now I want to focus on episode 1 and in particular the parts concerning the trials and triumph of the early church.

The series actually begins before the start of The Acts of the Apostles" with a story from Luke's first volume, the Road to Emmaus (Luke 24). Cleopas and his companion are quickly joined by Jesus as they hide behind a tree from some Romans. Jesus is rather annoying. He's quite smug and speaks in an Eddie Izzard-esque "Hello, we are the Romans" voice. The incident is shown at some length across several scenes and leading in to Doubting Thomas confession. Thomas's portrayal is even more extreme than it is in most such films. Not only is he a sceptic, but he's also very grumpy.

Interestingly though there's no ascension scene. Thomas's confession is followed by Jesus' promise of Matt 28:20, and a final dose of bread and wine. The camera pans round the disciples who are sat in a circle but when it returns to Jesus' spot, he has disappeared. At first it appears that he has simply disappeared in a similar manner to his arrival. However he's never seen again, and the next scene involving the disciples is the day of Pentecost.

Before then however we get a very nicely done introduction to Gamaliel and New Testament ers Judaism. Gamaliel is holding some kind of discussion with a number of men representing a good swathe of Jewish sects from the period. Present is Paul who is somewhat likeable if detached from the others, and Stephen who is yet to be converted but is still well on the way. A zealot contingent is also present. It's obvious from this episode alone that this production is at pains to provide a sold context for its story. Scenes like this and little details here and there do well at educating without being teachy.

The portrayal of Pentecost isn't very satisfactory. There's a build up with a mysterious blowing wind (despite all being calm outside) and then some kind of orange lighting effect whilst the disciples dance around. The accompanying music is terrible too so it's all rather disappointing.

This is followed by some kind of spontaneous procession into the temple (replete with people waving palm branches) and Peter delivers his sermon. He gets another chance to preach to a crowd in the final incident from the Bible in this first part. Peter and John appear in the temple and heal the man there. Peter gets to speak, as watched by some of the high priests and Paul who does definitely not approve.

The final glance we see of characters from the Bible is Stephen (pictured) converting and being baptised in the river. In many ways this episode is as much about Stephen as it is about Peter or Paul. The majority of the programme follows a paranoid Tiberius at Capri and a bunch of zealots trying to free one of their number from Roman arrest. Stephen is not a zealot but is determined to free the man (Caleb) as the two were wrestling prior to Caleb's arrest. But having introduced us to Saul/Paul the porgramme has been set-up nicely to learn more about Paul and his conversion in part 2.

Golgotha (Ecce Homo, 1935)

During the Hundred Years War, the English soldiers, confronted with a French pope coined the (not-technically-accurate) chant "The Pope is French, but Jesus is English".1 Those who rallied to that particular call would no doubt have been horrified to find that the first words Jesus spoke from the silver screen were, in fact, in French. 

Eight years after Cecil B. DeMille’s definitive silent film about the life of Christ, The King of Kings, Julien Duvivier brought Jesus back to cinema screens. The difference between the two films, however, is far greater than mere language. The King of Kings typifies the stagey pseudo-piety that has typified most American cinematic Christs, whereas Golgotha like Pasolini’s more widely known Il Vangelo Secondo Matteo (Gospel According to Matthew) captures something deeper, mysterious and more spiritual with its simpler feel.

That is not to say that Golgotha has not been done a grand scale. The opening scenes of Jesus’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem are as vast as anything Hollywood has had to offer us; but the scene also typifies the difference. Jesus is almost entirely absent from it. Yet, even without subtitles or a knowledge of French it is clear what is happening. Duvivier teases the audience showing the hustle and bustle of the crowd, the Pharisee’s discussing what has been going on, the action at a distance, and even a shot of the crowd from Jesus’s point of view as he passes through, but delaying showing us Christ himself.2 It is an fascinating device, drawing the audience into the story, and making them part of a crowd that is straining to see Jesus.3

When Jesus (played by Robert Le Vigan) finally does appear, over ten minutes into the film, it is at a distance, and shot from a low angle. He is almost obscured by his disciples, and there is a moment of confusion as to whether this is really he. The effect is to give the viewer the impression of actually being there, and discovering Jesus for the first time. Caught in the crowd, nudging ineffectively towards the action to catch a glimpse of the man everyone is chattering about. Eventually you can make out his distant figure moments before he disappears through the temple doors.

Inside the temple Duvivier delivers the finest sequence in the entire film, and one of the most memorable scenes in any Jesus film to date, as Jesus drives out the money-changers. The sequence starts with several, quick, shots intercut in a way reminiscent of Hitchcock’s legendary shower scene in the later Psycho. The first shot prefigures the action to come as coins swept off an off-screen table crash onto the floor and scatter. It is quickly followed by swift series of action and reaction shots. The sequence culminates in a single long take, over 30 seconds long which is the most impressive of them all. The camera tracks through the palisades of the temple in Jesus’s wake, straining to catch up with him as he zigzags from stall to stall. However, the shot isn’t focussed on filming Jesus so much as capturing the moment. In fact, as the camera weaves its way around, Jesus is only occasionally in shot. The result of this shot is that it captures the action, and chaos of the incident, in a way that no other Jesus film, either before or after, has quite managed. Considering this scene was created 6 years before Wells supposedly revolutionised camerawork with Citizen Kane, it is all the more remarkable. It also, albeit unintentionally, created documentary style footage, years before the documentary genre would be invented.

Like Jesus Christ Superstar, and to a greater extent the most recent Jesus film - Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ - Golgotha returns to the roots of the Jesus film genre and focuses on the immediate events leading up to Jesus’s death. Hence the majority of the dialogue focuses on the political machinations both within the Sanhedrin, and between the Jewish leaders and Pilate. The centrepiece of the film is arguably the conversation between Pilate (played by French star Jean Gabin) and Jesus, culminating in the former declaring "Ecce Homo" (behold the man), which was actually the original title for the film.4

What is surprising is that despite this being the first Jesus film with sound, Duvivier focuses on these conversations, many of them fictional, and ignores nearly all of Jesus’s teaching. There are three main exceptions however. The first is at the culmination of the cleansing of the temple scene where Jesus offers his usual synoptic epitaph to the baying crowd. The action moves back to the disapproving Pharisees and follows their discussion, before cutting back to Jesus in mid-flow. We hear the well known dictum "render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." (Mark 12:17 and parallels) but miss the first part of the confrontation. This is arguably the most interesting of the three pieces of "teaching" that are encountered as the third piece, Jesus words during the Last Supper, is rendered fairly unimaginatively.

What is curious about the tax question scene is the way it pre-supposes audience acquaintance with the story, and then uses that to give the impression of real time. More importantly, it also illustrates that which we are told is happening – that the question is being set as a trap under the watchful eye of the squabbling Jewish Leaders. It also causes the viewer to interact with what is presented, and fill in the gaps in a way that few Jesus films do – stimulating the imagination, rather than laying it all on a plate for a passive audience.

This technique is also another method of Duvivier emphasising the mystery around Jesus, and as a whole his divinity is presented very well. As noted above this starts with the mystery around his entry into Jerusalem – not only the way it is filmed but that the scene where Jesus is hailed as a king forms one of the bookends for the film. It sets the tone of this man being someone special. The vast crowd adds to the effect. Perhaps the most obvious device used is the miraculous events that are included. By restricting itself to the events of Passion Week the screenplay truncates a good source of the accounts of miraculous happenings around the life of Christ. Given how other films have included these and converted them into kitsch set pieces then this may very well be deliberate.

Instead of these grand spectacles Duvivier again presents three beautifully understated events, but invests them with a deep sense of transcendence. Incredibly, the first does not occur right up until Jesus’s arrest. Even then Duvivier shuns the more crowd pleasing healing of Malchus’s ear in favour of the obscure words of John 18:6. As Jesus identifies himself as the man the soldiers seek he simply says "I am he". John then records that as he did so the soldiers "drew back and fell to the ground" (RSV). As far as I am aware, in over 100 years of films about the life of Christ, no other film has shown this incident. Even the recent word for word version of The Gospel of John (2003), inexplicably left the soldiers standing despite the narrator reading out those very words. By contrast Duvivier shows a range of responses, with some soldiers falling, and others remaining upright, but he films it so astonishingly that it somehow captures the truly phenomenal nature of such an event.

Once he has been arrested Jesus is as usual passed from pillar to post, in a fashion that is broadly similar to many of the other depictions of Jesus’s death. There are however a number of places where the way Golgotha has been filmed really stands out. In particular, with The Passion of the Christ still on the cultural horizon there are a number of places where the comparison between it and Golgotha are especially interesting.

One of the flaws with The Passion of the Christ was that it failed to round out the Roman soldiers who sadistically inflicted so much suffering during the films two hours. Despite a shorter run time, Golgothaimparts the relevant scenes with a far greater degree of realism than The Passion, capturing, as it does, the sadism, but also the underlying insecurity, that drives such bullying. Harry Baur’s Herod typifies the approach. Herod’s ruthless mocking is interspersed by subtler indications that he is desperately trying to gain the approval of his all-too-pliant courtiers.

Duvivier also uses these scenes to commentate on the very real political events of that time. As the soldiers beat and ridicule Christ one of them mockingly salutes him with his arm fully aloft in a manner clearly reminiscent of the fascist and Nazi salutes. Golgotha was released in 1935 during the rise of Nazism, (the very month in fact that the notorious Nuremberg Laws were enacted). The following year the world would fawningly ignore the regime’s explicit racism and attend the Olympic games it staged as a monument to it’s own self-importance. Given all this then, such a salute could not have failed to go unnoticed and as such it offered a powerful critique of the Nazi movement. Historically speaking, the beating of Jesus has been a universally condemned act, even though Jesus’s Jewishness has largely been toned down to allow that to happen. The film plays on this by comparing the condemned Romans with the celebrated Nazis; beating and bullying Jesus, a Jewish man. Such interplay exposing the hypocrisy of the tacit approval of anti-Semitism which would continue for several years unchecked along the road to the holocaust. Too often Bible films have pandered to political ideologies. (DeMille’s pseudo-midrashic reworking of The Ten Commandments into a story that supported the US stance in the Cold War being only one example among many). Golgotha on the other hand (dangerously) challenges an ideology in such a way that it embodies the risky and prophetic spirit of its central character.

The film makes the effort, however, to show a range of reactions to Jesus’s torture. Whilst many in the crowd stand by to enjoy watching him whipped, it causes one onlooker to faint. Again, there is an interesting comparison to The Passion here. Golgotha shows the horror of it through the reaction of someone we can sympathise with, rather than the more "in your face" approach of Mel Gibson. Duvivier also shows the mixed reaction of the people to Jesus on the via dolorosa. Hassled both by the children throwing small stones at him and the sick who press for healing even as he stumbles towards the cross. Once there he is crucified, dies and is buried. The viewer is shown the sealing of the tomb from the inside, thus ending the main segment of the passion story as the film began – from Jesus’s point of view5

Over the years, the resurrection has proved to be one of the most difficult scenes for filmmakers to portray, with most of the literal depictions sliding into kitsch. As a result some filmmakers have opted either to portray it more cinematically (such as Martin Scorsese’s Last Temptation of Christ),6 or to replace the biblical episodes with extrabiblical scenes (The Passion of the Christ), or to leave it out completely (From the Manger to the Cross).

As with the earlier scene in Gethsemane, Duvivier manages to get it just right, skilfully combining the early accounts in Luke (the woman at the tomb, and the road to Emmaus) with the later events in John (appearance amongst the disciples, Thomas, and Peter’s restoration). In so doing, the viewer is given a unique position, having neither seen the risen Jesus like the majority of the disciples, but being too familiar with the story to be in any doubt about the truth behind their testimony (from a narrative point of view at least). Yet there is also something special about the first appearance of the risen Jesus as he materialises in the middle of the upper room. It is simple and effective, yet it also manages to capture the otherness of it.

It is a fitting end to the work, embodying as it does, the way Duvivier combines the ordinary with the extra-ordinary throughout the film. By downplaying the moments where many other Jesus films have opted to turn up the spectacle, he has invested them with a believability which touches the reality of the world in which we live.

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1 - This line was in fact incorporated into the 2001 film A Knight’s Tale, which is set in the time of the crusades, although the comment is relegated to pre-joust banter.
2 This appears to be the first time that this device would be used to give Jesus’s point of view. Although it could be argued that The Greatest Commandment (1941) also uses this technique, the point of view shot in a film about Jesus (and it’s accompanying encouragement to see things as Jesus did) would not re-surface until much later – See Peter T. Chattaway 'Come and See: How Movies Encourage Us to Look at (and with) Jesus' inRe-Viewing The Passion: Mel Gibson's Film and Its Critics S. Brent Plate (Editor), Palgrave, Macmillan, 2004
3 Incidentally DeMille also delays showing us Jesus, and he makes us wait considerably longer. The similarities, however, are fairly superficial.
4 In fact, it appears that the film’s original release title was Ecce Homo, only being changed to Golgotha after it’s American release.
5 This also compares interestingly with The Passion of the Christ where we are seen the tomb opening from inside the tomb.
6 Unfortunately, some overly literal viewers have failed to grasp what Scorsese sort to do with his ending, and have accused him of leaving the resurrection out altogether.

Pontius Pilate (1962)

Ponzio Pilato (Pontius Pilate, dir: Irving Rapper and Gian Paolo Callegari, 1962) is best known as the film in which John Drew Barrymore plays the roles of both Judas and Nazareth, though he is uncredited for the latter. In truth his Jesus is largely shot from the rear (or the side as above) save for two extreme close-ups of his eyes in a manner reminiscent of similar shots in the previous year's King of Kings (Nicholas Ray). There are other similarities with Ray's film, the strawberry-blond hair the vibrancy of the red-robe Jesus wears before Pilate and the lengthy sub-plot involving Barabbas and his zealot troops.

Like La spada e la croce (The Sword and the Cross, 1958), the film sits somewhere between the Hollywood Jesus cameo epics of the 1950s and a typical American Jesus film. Jesus features a great deal more than he does in The Robe (1953) or Ben-Hur (1959) but the story is still mainly about those associated with his life than he himself. This focus on these minor gospel characters seems to be something Italian producers are far more interested in than their American counterparts.

At the start of the film it is Pilate who is on trial in front of the Senate, rather than Jesus before the Governor. Pilate (Jean Marais) has been recalled to Rome only to find the emperor who brought him to prominence, Tiberius, has been replaced by Gaius. The charge sheet is fairly lengthy, his disregarding Jewish traditions, his use of the Jewish temple tax to build an aqueduct and a charge that he "massacro un moltitudine di inermi che fuggivano sua ingiustizia" (massacred a defenceless multitude fleeing his injustice). This is all reasonably consistent with the accounts about Pilate we find about Pilate in the works of Josephus and Philo, indeed his acuser's summary that "è comporato come un tiranno dimostrando il suo odio al populo Giudeo" (he has shown tyranny and his hatred for the people of Judea by his governance), is remarkably close to Philo's description of a "merciless" man capable of great "wickedness".

The historical rooted opening device is not only unusual, but also rather significant in terms of how it frames the rest of Callegari's script. Too often Jesus films have perpetuated anti-Semitism by portraying a weak Pilate being pushed into condemning Jesus by the Jewish people and/or their leaders. The Pilate who we find in these roughly contemporary historical accounts, and indeed elsewhere in the New Testament (Luke 13:1) was a vicious, unpredictable, tyrant, not a thoughtful and impartial philosopher-in-waiting. Framing the story in this way - putting these accusations up front, rather than sneaking them in under the radar, or just ignoring them, has a significant effect on how we view Pilate throughout the film.

Sadly that historical credibility is rather undermined by the filmmakers next move however as Gaius whips out the sign that Pilate had nailed to Jesus' cross all those years ago and repeats the argument assigned to Caiaphas in John 19 that calling Jesus King of the Jesus amounted to treason, for the king of the Jews was Caesar. (We'll leave aside the unlikeliness of a sign nailed to a cross in a backwater in Galilee finding it's way, 10 years later, to the highest authority in the land). In answer to this, Pilate further heightens the parallels between his trial and Jesus' by remaining silent rather than answering his accusers.

There then follows a flashback to the incidents leading up to Jesus' execution which comprises the rest of the film, beginning with his arrival in Jerusalem. There's an attack by the zealots leading to the new prefect getting shot in hand with an arrow, a foreshadowing of the blood on his hands for Jesus' execution. Pilate quickly gets up to speed with the varied politics of the locals, from the sympathetic Nicodemus, who we wait to bloom into the character Jesus encounters, but who never quite gets there; to Basil Rathbone's relatively sympathetic and flexible Caiaphas; Gianni Garko's amiable rebel Gionata; through to the zealot hardliner Barabbas. There's also a rich and influential money man Aronne Ec Mezir and his beautiful daughter Sarah (Leticia Roman) whom Pilate falls for and has an affair with early in the picture.

The main elements of the plot though, do rotate around what the ancient sources, including the Bible, have to say. The construction of the aqueduct found in Josephus (Antiquities 18.3.2) and the troubles Pilate has with it takes up a lot of screen time early on and is always on hand for whenever the filmmakers need a dramatic al fresco Roman-looking backdrop. Not that the film is short of these, the impressive landscapes and the impressive looking sets give this film an epic feel. Another element from history that drives the plot on is the Jewish protestations at the Roman standards which Pilate erected in the temple precinct (Josephus Antiquities 18.3.1). Whilst this incident occurs in a number of Jesus films the version here seems to have influenced Roger Young's Jesus (1999). Faced with a high profile star to play Pilate (Gary Oldman) and the desire to put the blame for Jesus' death closer to Rome's door than Jerusalem's the incident is a great opportunity to put a bluster-filled Pilate in context. Various shots of this incident in Rapper's film also seem to have closish reproductions in Young's.

What is surprising though, given the opening to the film, is the way that Callegari's script uses these incidents to portray Pilate in a positive light. His desire for the hated aqueduct is to enable better irrigation for the region's poverty-stricken farmers. The eagle standards are only erected because Barabbas is beginning to run riot over Judea. A decisive moment occurs just before the film's halfway point. Pilate's wife Claudia returns to her adulterous husband having heard Jesus' teaching on forgiveness and turning the other cheek and she begins to influence him for the better.

This moment is contrasted with the following scene where the Jewish Sanhedrin vote to oppose Pilate with violence. They are not aware of the words Jesus has been speaking moments before, but they, too, recite the "Eye for eye, tooth for tooth" passage from Exodus 21:24. Unlike Jesus they accept it rather than refute it. Caiaphas, whose usually towering head wear is a little more practical here, seems to secretly disapprove of this course, and it's unclear what we are to make of the Jewish council voting to fight back in this way.

At the very least it represents a parting of the way with Jesus' message of peace. Parts of Jesus' teaching are scattered throughout the film. There's an odd moment early on when Gionata's friend Daniel recalls his personal and life-changing encounter with Jesus on, of all places, the Road to Emmaus. Jesus has healed him, and his predicts salvation at the cost of persecution. Claudia hears him speaking on the shores of Lake Tiberias. Later we hear one of his disciples sharing the beatitudes and recounting the story of Lazarus shortly before Barabbas kills him, quoting "turn the other cheek", and sacks the village where he was speaking.

But whereas the biblical material in the first hour of the film is largely incidental, in the final 30 minutes it forms the primary narrative. Aronne Ec Mezir increases the reward for capturing Barabbas and he finally gets arrested. With him seemingly out of the way, it is the teacher from Nazareth, fresh into Jerusalem and causing chaos in the temple, who becomes the authorities' biggest problem.

The difficulty is, however, that compared to Barabbas' antics, Jesus' minor disturbance seems very mild in comparison. When one of the Jewish leaders says "il sinhedrio non perdonerà il tuo Nazareno di aver scacciato i mercanti dal tempio" (The Sanhedrin will never forgive your Nazarene for driving the merchants out of the temple) it comes out of nowhere. The next shot sees Aronne Ec Mezir approach Judas and manipulate him to handing-over Jesus. Judas then appears after the Last Supper but doesn't convincingly betray Jesus. Jesus appears before Caiaphas but the high priest has neither the motive nor the passion to hand him over to Pilate. Pilate offers him to the crowd as an almost sarcastic riposte. Barabbas has been terrorising his own people as well as the Romans. He even sees Jesus' eyes reflecting off the water he uses to wash his hands of the affair, and yet still condemns him.

The crucifixion is interesting for two reasons. Firstly because like Barabbas (1961) it features footage from an actual eclipse, although the shot of the moon/sun is rather unconvincingly spliced in between the footage of crosses on the hill in the dark. This is a tactic the film uses elsewhere - a scene of crocodiles eating the unfortunate losers in a boat-based fight-to-the-death similarly seemed to use stock footage. But the moment of Jesus' death is also interesting because of the scale of destruction due to the earthquake accompanying it. As I have argued before scenes of spectacular destruction are one of the defining characteristics of the biblical epic. However, this is generally for the Hebrew Bible epics and the Roman/Christian epics, the tendency is far less prominent in those films based on the gospels and I can't think of another that has quite the scale of material destruction at this point in the story. As with many epics is implies divine judgement so it's curious to find it occurring at the moment when God's mercy was meant to be being unleashed, rather than his judgement.

The question though remains: who is the object of this judgement? The film struggles to suggest anyone person or group bore the responsibility for Jesus' death. Given the unfortunate history of Jesus films continuing the tradition of blaming the Jews for Jesus' death it's perhaps not the worst thing in the world for a film to struggle to find anyone to blame.The nature of the film requires a sympathetic Pilate. History, perhaps, requires a sympathetic portrayal of the Jewish population as a whole (and a sympathetic portrayal of Judas in particular). Rapper (who was Jewish) and Callegari really deliver on this - the diverse range of different, generally sympathetic, Jewish characters with their different beliefs and ways of putting those beliefs into action is certainly very worthy even if it doesn't deliver in other areas.

Ultimately the action returns to the senate, with Pilate standing before the assembly saying he will be judged by "la giustizia del regno dei cielli" (the justice of the Kingdom of Heaven). Like history and, indeed, theology, Pilate's fate is left open ended.

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Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 18.3.2
Philo, On The Embassy of Gauis Book XXXVIII 299–305

Still No Real News on The Passion of the Christ 2: The Resurrection

About a year ago a strange thing happened. Noticing IMDb had a poster image for a sequel to Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ (2004) I began preparing a blog post on the subject. After all despite the rumours of a sequel about the resurrection that have swirled for roughly the last fifteen years, none of them had ever really seemed substantive enough to actually write up. Yet when I sat down a couple of days to write the thing the page was empty. The body poster had gone. Actually it was probably a fake poster designed by a fan, which IMDb swiftly took down once they were alerted to the fact.

However, there has been a fresh flurry of headlines about the film in the last few weeks following an interview that Jim Cavaziel, the star of the original film (my review), gave to Fox Nation. It was Easter after all.

Sadly, I'm not able to comment on the interview as it's not available in the UK, but that didn't seem to be a problem for our tabloid The Daily Express who also published an article on it containing most of the pertinent parts and there were a few more bits in a piece by Fox News.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about this story is Caviezel is still lined up to play the title role. The Count of Monte Cristo (2002) star was 36 when The Passion came out in 2004; if the sequel - which has the working title The Resurrection - comes out as planned next Easter, then Caviezel will, by then, be 52. To put that in context, H.B. Warner, the oldest actor yet to play Jesus in a major biopic, was 51 when his role in DeMille's silent The King of Kings arrived in cinemas in 1927. While my long-time ally Peter Chattaway noted recently that actors playing Jesus have been getting older, this would still make Caviezel the oldest. And that's assuming that Easter 2021 is even remotely realistic. Given there's been no news of filming (certainly Caviezel doesn't mention it) and the current situation with the Coronavirus, it's starting to seem unlikely.

What Caviezel did say seemed somewhat underwhelming. He confirmed the script is on it's fifth draft and said he "It's going to be a masterpiece. It's gonna be the biggest film in world history, I believe it will be based on what I feel in my heart." He then made some comments about how easy it is to get super hero films made relative to Bible movies and that he will get "to play the greatest superhero there ever was."

All of which is much less interesting that the details Gibson himself has given. In an October 2016 interview with USA Today he said "We’re trying to craft this in a way that’s cinematically compelling and enlightening so that it shines new light, if possible, without creating some weird thing". Earlier that year Gibson was interviewed by megachurch pastor Greg Laurie and explained Randall Wallace, who wrote the Braveheart script, was looking at the screenplay. The relevant bit starts at 3:30. He also said:

"That's a very big subject and it needs to be looked at because we don't want to just do a simple rendering of it. We can all read what happened but in order to experience and explore probably deeper meanings of what's about, it's going to take some doing

Then in November 2016, he had this interview with Stephen Colbert where, explaining the scale of the film he was planning:

"It's more than a single event, it's an amazing event and to underpin that with the things around it, is really the story, to enlighten what that means. It's not just about the event, it's not some kind of chronological telling of just that event, that could be boring."

His interest isn't in a straight telling, but asking the question "what are the other things around it that happen?" When Colbert queried if there were any "bad guys" Gibson replied "There are. They're in another realm. Sure. You're going all over the place. What happened in three days?...I'm not sure but it's worth thinking about isn't it"

This seems to tie in with this interview with Raymond Arroyo from around the same time where Gibson explains

"It's not the Burnett version. It's not man comes back walks through walls, has holes in hands, eats a piece of fish. It's a vast theological experience and I think you need to delve into what that means in a way that you take that as the centrepiece and you juxtapose against many things that go on around it and in other realms so that...it gets pretty wild. It's like an acid trip."

When Arroyo asked if it was nearly ready, Gibson indicated not:

"It just keeps revealing itself more and more the further you get into it, everything from the fall of the angels to the... it's just crazy...It's opens up all these channels...It’s like, why didn’t they recognise him on the way to Emmaus, y'know?

Finally, in another Autumn 2016 interview (this was during the promotional tour for Gibson's Hacksaw Ridge) he gave an interview to Deadline where he explained The Resurrection as "Sort of a sequel, that moves on from the Resurrection, but jumps back before, after, back to the Old Testament. The Old Testament is a pre-figurement of everything and the New…you can correlate them in an uncanny way."

One of the things that always seemed odd to me growing up was the line in the Apostles Creed that says that Jesus "descended into Hell". The biblical justification for all this is fairly tenuous, but the "Harrowing of Hell" is an ancient tradition and it sounds to me like this is what Gibson is working on.

If so, that will be interesting for two reasons. Firstly, because in the run up to The Passion Gibson promised a film that would show events "just the way it happened", but actually delivered a whole load of supernatural (and some would say "horror") elements happening on another level. From the sounds of it, the sequel could either follow a similar pattern, or even largely abandon the pursuit of "realism" in favour of something more fantastical (for want of a better word).

Secondly, it looks from the megachurch clip above that this will be marketed heavily towards the evangelicals who turned out in spades to "support" The Passion. If so it will be interesting to see how well that works. Evangelicals don't tend to talk too much about the Harrowing of Hell - as I say the Bible doesn't talk about it much and so aside from a few hangover traditions from more traditional churches, and the agreement that Jesus' death beat the devil it's something no-one ever seems too keen to flesh out. Of course similar points were made about traditions about the stations of the cross and meditations on Christ's wounds, only for those who made them to be fairly surprised how the film did, so it will be interesting to see if something similar happens if, and indeed when, this film makes it to cinemas.