Sunday, December 18, 2011

Nativity Scenes Revisited - Part 2:Life and Passion of Jesus Christ

Having started with Pasolini's nativity scene a few days ago, I thought we'd go back to the beginning and look at The Life and Passion of Jesus Christ. My kids have watched silent films before, mainly Buster Keaton, so it wasn't so much of an education. That said the real advantage for them of watching this film was that it kind of predates intertitles, or rather it still has title cards, but not the cards which tell you what the characters are saying. In many ways this is very good for young kids who know the story, but wouldn't necessarily grasp the dialogue, and it helps me talk get used to the idea of interpreting film, and thinking about what they watch.

The other thing it gave me the chance to talk to them about was the fact that moving images are in fact a series of still images. I didn't go too far with this one, but as Nina asked some very interesting questions about the black and white to colour process here, it was a good chance to talk about hand colouring and how laborious that was because it was frame by frame and so on.

To my mind it"s still rather unclear about which parts of this film emerged when. In the early days the content of this film wasn't fixed in the way that is universal today. There was a catalogue of the available tableaux (scenes) that distributors/theatre owners could choose from, so the content of this film was fluid from the start, which explains why there are so many versions of this film available today, in very different cuts, some scenes hand coloured by nuns, some not, and so on. And this film appears to have been doing the rounds for a long time. Parts of the material appear to date from the nineteenth century, one widely available version of the film with a few sound effects dates from 1933 (I seem to recall. Don't quote me on that).

One of the reasons I mention that is because whilst the date of this film is usually cited as around 1905 (give or take a few years) some of the techniques are quite advanced. Take for example the faded in appearance of the angel to Mary. My knowledge of early techniques is limited to things like double exposures, shielding and so on, but I don't know how exactly they get the angel to fade in so smoothly. Feel free to fill me in below!

Likewise when the wise men (who have previously been filmed using a blue filter) arrive in the stable (hand coloured), there is a certain amount of camera panning here (very rare in its day, perhaps one of the earliest example?) and for a while it's unclear how the two colour styles are going to resolved. In the end the right hand side of the screen is filtered blue whilst the coloured characters against the black and white background are on the left. It's an ugly shot, but it's fascinating seeing the filmmakers wrestle with these questions, develop processes, and develop solutions, even if they are not entirely satisfactory a hundred years later. It breaks our visual code, but was, in a way, part of creating such a visual code to begin with.

I was also reminded in watching these scenes about something I've been meaning to say since seeing this film in a proper cinema a couple of years ago: Pathé have placed their logo on a number of the film's sets. I'm not sure whether this was merely crass advertising, or some form of early copyright (meaning that either the film, or the sets could be easily identified in case someone tried to use them without permission), but it seems Incredibly crass here. Less noticeable on the small screen, but certainly obtrusive when seen in a cinema,

I mentioned a few years back how this film misses out the innkeeper, and this scene retains a good deal of interest. For one thing when a couple with a donkey arrive on the scene right at the start many will expect that they are Mary and Joseph, but in fact they are just two of the extras who disappear off screen moments later. The arrival of the real Mary and Joseph is heralded by the clearing of the set, but their arrival on foot strikes a real contrast with the bedonkeyed couple that have preceded them. It also adds a sense of unease. Is that Mary and Joseph or just someone else?

There's also a nice piece of paralleling between the shepherd scene and the Ascension. Both feature a horizontally split screen to reveal heaven above and earth below, and whereas in this scene the good news is coming from heaven, later the subject of that good news will be making the return trip.

Monday, December 12, 2011

Nativity Scenes Revisited - Part 1:Il Vangelo Secondo Matteo

I thought a good way to resurrect this blog would be to revisit some of the film portrayals of the Nativity story in the run up to Christmas. It's a good way to attempt to ensure that the kids don't get so focussed on the fat guy in the red suit that they forget about why we celebrate Christmas in the first place.

In many ways Il Vangelo Secondo Matteo (The Gospel According to St. Matthew) is not an obvious place to start with a 3 year old and a 5 year old, but the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like an interesting idea. Firstly I occasionally hear some of my friends complain that all their kids ever watch is cartoons. That's always seemed a shame to me, so we've always tried to give them a mix of cartoons/CGI with films with people. The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938) and Singin' in the Rain (1952) have long been favourites and there are plenty of others.

Secondly, I also want to broaden their horizons so they are not just limited to Anglo-American fare. Studio Ghibli is a great place to start, and the more I thought about it the more I could see Pasolini's film as being another easy access point. After all they are already familiar with the Nativity story, and this part of the film has relatively little dialogue. As it happens Nina has all kinds of snippets of language under her belt that are unknown to me: just the other day she was saying hello in Romanian or Albanian (she wasn't quite sure which) that she had picked up from a Romanian/ Albanian friend at school.

There's a third reason as well that Il Vangelo is good place to start. Most images of the nativity picture it rather laviously. Mary wears royal blue and salmon pink robes, the wise men are dressed as kings, even the shepherds are relatively handsome. Pasolini cuts his images from a more basic fabric. His wise men - clearly rich due to their substantial entourages - are ordinary looking. They have time weathered faces and their dress is - compared to their rivals from other films - relatively threadbare. When they bring their gifts they are not conveniently smelted lumps of gold nicely packaged in a decorative case, they are a selection of jugs and goblets held in a blanket (I have Nina to thank for drawing my attention to that).

Whilst there are many anachronisms in Pasolini's images, clothes and backgrounds, his locating of the story primarily in a peasant culture, in a poorer, less luxurious age is quite striking, and a nice antidote to the typical religious Christmas card image.

Aside from the educational advantages that Pasolini's film provides, it's also just a great piece of filmmaking. One of my favourite moments in all cinema is the silent arrival of the magi accompanied by the haunting sounds of Odetta's "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child". It's remarkably moving and poignant and captures the holiness and spirituality of the moment, whilst simultaneously highlighting the relative loneliness of Jesus' birth and calling compared to most these days.

The other major segment of this part of the film is, of course, the annunciation. This is also simply wonderful. The opening dialogue-free scenes convey far more in their close-ups and images than most films with dialogue. Mary has, presumably, just told Joseph of her pregnancy and is at a loss for any further explanation. Joseph is similarly speechless. When the angel appears in a dream there are no flashing lights, just a girl in a white dress against a toned down background sound. The reconciliation is similarly wordless. In a sense little has changed - neither can find the words to express what is going on. Yet clearly, in another sense everything has changed. Margherita Caruso (Mary) allows the corners of her mouth to flicker the smallest bit at Joseph's return, and then Pasolini makes us wait for what feels like an age before allowing her a proper smile. The delay triggers a far greater emotional response than such a flicker of happiness would normally provide.

Around these two scenes we get Herod and his cronies, again ordinary looking, but with a nicely underplayed hint of the sinister, and the girl angel appearing again to Joseph and the magi to warn them of the impending attack from Herod. The later is again wordless. The angel stands in their path, looks in one direction and then leas them in another.

The gamble worked. The kids enjoyed it, even the three year old Digory managed sat relatively engrossed, and Nina declared at the end "I like watching Italian film". As a lover of Pasolini and Rossellini's neo-realist cinema I can't wait until she can read well enough to be able to introduce her to some more.

Monday, October 24, 2011

Friday Night, Saturday Morning: Monty Python vs The Church

Having been waiting to see this for years now, it was very pleasing to discover that the show had been re-broadcast by BBC4 to coincide with the broadcast of Holy Flying Circus last Wednesday. It's available on iPlayer for two more days.

For those unfamiliar with the details, in the run up to the release of Life of Brian the BBC's late night talk show in hosted the now infamous debate between John Cleese, Michael Palin, Malcolm Muggeridge and Mervyn Stockwood, the then Bishop of Southwark. It must have made a big impact then as well: shortly afterwards the TV comedy sketch show "Not the Nine O'Clock News" produced a well-executed spoof.

Having seen numerous clips of this debate over the years, almost whenever the film is discussed in fact, I have long wanted to see the whole thing, and have wondered why the full version hadn't appeared on any of the many special edition DVDs of Life of Brian.

The most likely reason for this it now appears is length. Given that most comparable programmes today usually restrict such items to 15 minutes; that I always seem to see the same few excerpts; and from what I'd gleaned from various discussions of the programme, I'd always assumed it was about 10-15 minutes. In fact the programme spends over 52 minutes on the subject, briefly squeezing in a song from Paul Jones and a chat with Norris McWhirter before it ended 15 minutes later.

Something else also became fairly clear: the reason that these same few excerpts are repeated again and again (despite the quantity of material) is that the debate was incredibly poor. Leaving aside the fact that Stockwood and Muggeridge, and to a much lesser extent Cleese and Palin, fail to listen to what their opponents are saying, chairman Tim Rice, just lets the church representatives drone on and on about irrelevant side issues. No wonder modern day programmes tend to keep things shorter.

Part of this is perhaps because they missed the crucial opening scenes of the film which established that Brian was not Jesus, but it was mainly due to the pair being allowed to bring notes, and Rice's deferential attitude to them. The 1970s were a very different time, with the authority of the church having a far greater hold - for instance the first ever "Question Time" featured a bishop, but I can only remember that happening once when I've watched it and I'm an avid fan. Stockwood in particular seemed to think the he was entitled to go on and on rather tangentially, and Rice seems too intimidated to step in.

I suppose this was also due in part to the fact that Palin and Cleese were interviewed on their own first, and so, to a certain extent, had already had their say. Yet the subjects being discussed were far less controversial in this section. They talked about the process of raising the finance, and how they develop the script and so on. There were even a couple of interesting points around Bible films. Incredibly for a man who only a few years before had contributed to a hit film about Jesus, Rice had never heard of Rossellini, or Il Messia, which was released just two years after Jesus Christ, Superstar. Secondly Cleese makes the point that three more biblical comedy films were in production, which makes me wonder which one. Wholly Moses (1980) would seem obvious, but it tries so hard to cash in on Life of Brian that it's hard to imagine that it was close to completion much before Brian's welease. Mel Brooks' History of the World: Part 1 (1981) would be the other likely choice, but as to a third, all I can think of is the French film Deux heures moins le quart avant Jésus-Christ, released in 1982.

That said, it was this section of the show that contained what was, for me, one of the most interesting parts of the show.
Rice
"Is there anything that could offend you on screen"

Cleese (shrugs, then pauses)
"I have one tiny quibble and I think that Terry Jones and Graham Chapman would no doubt disagree with me, but I think the crucifixion thing at the end is not about pain, it's about death and they are very separate."

Rice
"So what's your beef?" [i.e. what's your problem?]

Cleese
My beef is that there are one or two close-ups of one or two people registering pain and I think that that confuses what the last thing's about. 'Cos I mean one's not really making fun of the fact that someone has been flayed to this flesh hung down and then nailed up. The point of that last thing is that it's about death, y'know it's about attitudes to death, and it's quite possible, to be relatively cheery about death, quite possible. I'm not saying it's easy.
Cleese elaborates on this later on including talking about how if Christianity is true then death does have a bright side. I must admit that I've never really thought about that final scene in that way. I'm not sure the latter point holds up that well, but I'm certainly intrigued by the part of his answer quoted above.

The above exchange is typical, actually, of Cleese's attitude throughout the debate. It's often been said that he and Palin were trying to have a serious debate and the two non-comedians were playing for, and getting, the laughs. Indeed one point that really stood out to me is when Cleese is trying to make a serious point but because his answer sounds like something out of a Python sketch the audience laugh, and Cleese looks almost aggrieved that his serious point has been lost because it was mistaken for a joke. Cleese steals the show actually. Stockwood and Muggeridge are two smug and too entrenched to really get their point across, indeed it could be argued that this debate was the defining moment of the established church's weakening grip on authority. Palin for his part is clearly furious and insulted and whilst his restraint is impressive, it hampers his contribution to the discussion.

One final thing that I found interesting was how little these debates have changed in some ways. Whenever some perceived "outrage" is perpetuated against Christianity, someone will always object that "they" would dare to do this kind of thing about Islam. This argument is put to Cleese and he demolishes fairly well, by explaining about the dominance, authority, history and impact on the culture that Christianity has had and how this is why they set their sights on it. So it's surprising that 30+ years later the argument is still trotted out overlooking the fact that people do satirise Islam, and that Jesus is also considered a prophet in Islam.

Secondly Stockwood/Muggeridge also lament the declining standards in biblical understanding. Perhaps this is even worse now than it was, but it was interesting to note that this was a point of debate even then. Other things are different though. The opening credits are far racier than any you see today - a couple seemingly naked and in bed stop to turn on the show. It wasn't clear if this was during, after or instead of having sex, but whichever way there would probably be a fair amount of complaint about increasing sexualisation of our culture were this to happen today.

Overall then, the debate was a bit of a disappointment. The best bits have obviously been shown many times before and what is usually left out was fairly dreary. If only Rice had been David Dimbleby. At least Dimble might have heard of Rossellini.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Holy Flying Circus

There have been many controversial films, books and television programmes over the years, but there's something completely different about Monty Python's Life of Brian: people actually like it. Many defend the right of Martin Scorsese to have made Last Temptation of Christ, or Salman Rushdie to have written "The Satanic Verses", but few people have the strength of feeling for them as they do for the anarchic tale of a man who was mistaken for the Messiah.

It's no doubt because of this strength of feeling that BBC4 commissioned Holy Flying Circus about the events leading up to the release of the film. The programme is the latest in a long series of fictional recreations of the off screen lives of 60s and 70s entertainers and focuses on the, now infamous, TV debate between Michael Palin and John Cleese on the one hand, and the Bishop of Southwark and Malcolm Muggeridge on the other. The story is told from three sides, that of the Pythons, that of the programme's production team, and a group of Christians (distinct from Muggeridge and the bishop) who object to the film.

All of which makes it sound rather dull, except for the fact that the story is told in a surreal and Pythonesque way. In addition to the general atmosphere of silliness we also have over-the-top characters, men playing women, animated sequences, John Cleese played as Basil Fawlty, obscure interludes and even a scene inside an alien spaceship. In short Holy Flying Circus tries to make the medium the message.

One further similarity is the way which both films have Jesus speaking at the start of the film and then not really again. Life of Brian famously shows Jesus giving the Sermon on the Mount before the camera pans out to those at the back who can't quite hear what's being said. But Holy Flying Circus has Jesus explain in Aramaic - a clear nod to The Passion of the Christ, another controversial religious film - that the story is largely fictional, and just to make the point it has the supposed Jesus-figure fart.

I suspect that many people, were they to see the film, would find that pretty offensive and will also be unhappy with the language and the nudity. I suspect the programme-makers would defend it on the grounds that doing so re-ignites the same battle now that the Pythons were fighting then. Sadly I don't think that's true. Is using the C word, doing Tourette's jokes and showing a penis for the sake of it really edgy, or just a bit like the kind of jokes Cambridge students might do "on a damp Tuesday afternoon"?

That's not to say it isn't funny. Parts of it are very funny, particularly Mark Heap's turn as the head of the Christian protesters. But overall it's rather hit and miss; the odd laugh out loud moment interspersed with mediocre jokes and self-indulgent rubbish.

But in the final quarter of an hour, the film changes gear and actually gives a reasonable and extensive portrayal of the talk show debate. This was particularly interesting to me as there are still parts of the debate that I have ever seen (indeed I was reflecting earlier that if Holy Flying Circus ever gets released as a DVD this would be an excellent special feature.

This last part of the film, interspersed with the occasional deviation into Michael Palin's mind, is clearly the strongest part as the gags are refined a little and the drama takes over a little. Much of this is also due to a stronger focus on the better portrayed characters. Charles Edwards's take on Palin is outstanding. Complex and nuanced Edwards manages to play the domestic scenes touchingly despite the fact he is playing opposite Rufus Jones in drag. Darren Boyd also does a great job playing Basil Fawlty even if the concept he was given is a bit odd, but the others are rather weak. Punt is hopeless as Eric Idle and he and the three of the other Pythons are all rather two-dimensional. Lastly Stephen Fry's turn as God demonstrated precisely why his status as national treasure is beginning to drift.

So whilst the concept of telling a story about Python in the style of Python is good, and whilst some of the performances are very impressive indeed, the overall effect is rather like the sketch shows described by Palin's taxi driver home - "very hit and miss".

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Dim Recollections - Moses und Aron

Over on the Bible Films Facebook page - which is where you should go for latest news, and other people's reviews about Bible Films (you don't have to "do" Facebook to read it!) - Peter Chattaway has posted news that Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet's 1973 adaptation of Moses und Aron was recently screened in New York. It's been a long time since I saw the film, but it's one of those films that has stuck with me if for no other reason than it's the only feature length film I've seen that is anything like it.

The film is an adaptation of Arnold Schönberg's unfinished opera, Moses und Aron. Two other versions of Schönberg's piece have been released in the last few years, neither of which I've managed to see, but both of which I am keen to see. If nothing else I feel they might help me get a better understanding of Schönberg's work to enable me to grapple with what Straub and Huillet are doing with the material.

In other words, then, Moses und Aron is not for the faint-hearted; I would class it as the least accessible film I have ever seen. Schönberg's opera is a complex exploration of how hearing God speak is an ineffable experience. It works on the interplay between Moses and Aaron. Moses is able to hear God's voice, but is unable to express what God has said correctly. Aaron on the other hand has the task of disseminating what Moses tells him for the sake of the masses. In the process much is lost, and essentially it's that which the libretto is trying to explore. What gets lost in translation?

Schönberg never finished the third act and so only his lyrics remain, which shows that even the great man never quite got a hold on his subject matter, which makes me feel a little better for never managing to write down my thoughts on watching the film. He also pioneered in the field of atonal music - which uses notes independently of the standard scales with a single central tone. This means that even the music to the opera is not easy to appreciate and enjoy.

Filming such material was never going to result in box office gold, but Straub and Huillet also have their own set of complex ideas that they wish to explore by adapting Schönberg's material. The majority of their work was, in fact, adapting established works. Indeed, the only other piece of theirs I have seen is Toute révolution est un coup de dés (Every Revolution Is a Throw of the Dice - 1977) was an adaptation of Stéphane Mallarmé's poem. I'm sure that in this day and age there are several others available to watch online, and so I should really watch more. Not to mention my need to read the two booksI have about their work.

Their style is so cinematically austere, that it makes your standard Dogme film look like Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. They use long, long shots, with very little movement. The image that is most prominent in my mind of this film is such a shot of the back of Moses head. There's also a lack of dramatic action. The focus of the film is the relationship between Moses and his brother, but there are occasional scenes with the rest of the Israelites (the chorus). But they remain stationary in the kind of rigid formation you expect from watching a choir perform live, rather than how you would expect a crowd to act - even in an opera.

The austerity has a point however: it's pushing questions about cinema's form to an extreme. As David Thomson puts it in his essay on Straub 1.
What we think of as story is invariably the effect of a chosen way of filming. The medium is intensely decision based, and thus there has always been an abiding formal element to it.

...There is a further, inevitable kind of order in the sequence of shots within a film. And although Straub's work has alarmed audiences and been enjoyed by relatively few, it is built upon the assertion that in cinema we respond to those sequences; that composition; light, movement, and sound play upon our thoughts and feelings."
I'm not sure I fully understand that, but it's the most succinctly clear summary I have to hand!

The final act is just read out - no music exists and so in some ways the final act is less accessible for more conservative opera fans, although conversely it does mean that the film becomes a little less accessible for the average film-goer.

In Straub and Huillet's hands the opera also explores the question of word vs image, which is very in-keeping with the second commandment's ban on graven images, often understood as a ban on using images to gain a greater intellectual or spiritual understanding of God.

So that's about it really, like I said, dim recollections. There are more perceptive comments from Richard Brody at the New Yorker.

1 - David Thomson, "The New Biographical Dictionary of Film", LONDON (Little Brown), 2002, Fourth Edition, p.843.

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Doubt in the Gospels

I've been reflecting a little bit on the subject of doubt in the Gospels, and I thought I'd share some of what has been going through my mind.

In my experience at least, doubt is not often something that is welcomed in church contexts. It's sometimes accepted, but often a cause for concern. Occasionally someone makes the point that we need to have doubt in order to have faith.

There are at least four passages in the canonical gospels where they record someone/some people doubting in the face of the miraculous. I suppose there are far more if you count the enemies and opponents of Jesus, but in most of these cases the doubt is a result of their predetermined decision not to believe in Jesus.

The most famous one is, of course, the disciple Thomas in John 20. I don't want to dwell on him too much. Firstly because being the obvious one I am sure that everything that can be said about him has been somewhere by someone. But secondly, some scholars suggest that this is actually the author(s) of John trying to smear the growing sect springing up around the (emerging) Gospel of Thomas. From a Bible films point of view however, it's noticeable that he nearly always gets a raw deal. If this scene is to be included then you can bet your bottom dollar that Thomas will express some doubts earlier in the film as well.

It's possible that this incident is also referred to in passing by Matthew. The second passage I want to cover comes from Matthew 28:16-17
Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them and when they saw him they worshiped him; but some doubted
Matthew's "some" suggests that Thomas was not alone. Perhaps John focussed in on him to increase the drama of his narrative (though I suppose Thomas's doubts were before he had seen the risen Christ). What I find interesting though is the way the comment is casually thrown in and remains without comment. These people are seeing the risen Jesus, and yet still they doubt. But there's no shock horror, no rebuke. They were there, they saw everything everybody else did, they just still had their doubts.

What's also interesting is that the suggestion is that these people worshipped in spite of their doubts. Furthermore the next verse is even more telling because Jesus includes them in his commissioning. They have their doubts but Jesus still values them and their contribution. It's significant that these other doubters never appear in a Jesus film.

The third passage I want to look seems to be evading me for the minute. I think it is also in Matthew, and as it's the one that I noticed most recently.

Lastly there is John 12:27-30. Jesus asks God to glorify his name, and God replies "I have glorified it and I will glorify it again". We're told the crowd heard it but whilst some attributed it to an angel some said it was just thunder. Again this is intriguing because it seems like the kind of occasion when it should have been easy to draw a consensus. And yet some heard the voice of God or an angel; others just heard thunder. This passage appears in 2003's "Gospel of John" but nowhere else as I recall.

What's I find intriguing is firstly the way that Jesus seems to be fine with the doubts, at least on these occasions. But more striking is that the case is often made by atheists today that people in Jesus' day were likely to misattribute unusual natural occurrences to the hand of God. But the Bible provides evidence several times that people were both willing and able to suggest alternative explanations for supernatural events. Scepticism isn't new, but significantly, in the latter two/three cases it also doesn't seem to be a barrier for following Jesus and being included by him.

Thursday, September 8, 2011

The Sermon on the Mount in Film

Next weekend I'm due to do a talk on "Blessed are the poor in spirit" which has got me thinking about portrayals of the Sermon on the Mount in film. The different films emphasise different parts of the sermon, although obviously the Beatitudes get a good showing in a lot of different films. Anyway, I thought I'd list some of my favourite portrayals and give a brief explanation.

King of Kings (1961)[Pictured above]
In contrast to Matthew's arrangement, Ray uses the Sermon on the Mount as the climax of the movie's first half. The buzz has been building about Jesus so everyone gathers to hear him preach and check him out. It's a spectacular build up and the idea of Jesus moving through the crowd is good, if lacking in realism. Sadly the post-production overdubbing of Jeffrey Hunter's original vocals leaves this feeling stiff and forced. But the build up and the colours are spectacular.

Gospel According to St. Matthew (1964)
Pasolini's filming of this part of the gospel is perhaps the most interesting, certainly from a scholarly angle. Most scholars believe that rather than their being a single key sermon Matthew 5-7 is a compilation of Jesus' teaching. Some films reflect this by simply splitting up the sermon into different parts and placing them throughout the film. But Pasolini stays true to the gospel by leaving all the material, but also acknowledges the scholarly angle by changing the setting, weather and background Jesus is speaking against as well his clothes and hair. Sadly whilst it's clever, it's also a little dull.

Son of Man (1969)
Dennis Potter's take on the Sermon is to excise the Beatitudes and focus on the "Love your enemy" part of the Sermon. The previous scene is critical here: a group of Roman soldiers have just attacked a local Jewish village and there is a seething contempt in the crowd Jesus addresses. Potter plays fast and loose with the wording, but certainly stays true to the spirit of the text. And Colin Blakely delivery is incredible. One of my favourite clips from a Bible Films ever.

Life of Brian (1979)
Life of Brian's take on the Sermon on the Mount is so well known that I knew all the best jokes before I'd even seen it. Still the timing and delivery are so perfect that even after all the times I've seen it, I'm still amused by "Blessed are the cheesemakers". It was perhaps the first time that anyone had ever considered what it was like to be someone at the edge of one of Jesus' sermons. We often wonder how he would have been able to address such a large crowd, but never consider what it was like for those on the edge. What's also impressive about the scene is how it nails so much of biblical interpretation: "obviously it applies to all makers of dairy produce". Of course if you missed it you may very well not understand the whole film. Not normally a problem unless you're about to be interviewed about it on national television as happened to Malcolm Muggeridge.

Last Temptation of Christ (1988)
Like Potter before him, Paul Schrader plays a little loose with the original wording, and gets brilliant results, again thanks to the lead actor's delivery. Last Temptation opts for Luke's Sermon on the Plain rather than Matthew's Mount, and it fits well with the confrontational prophet that Scorsese portrays in certain parts of the film. The spontaneity of this portrayal has a real vitality about it, and the ending, which makes it a little controversial for church use, nevertheless highlights the issue that occurs again and again in the gospels of Jesus' original audience failing to understand him.

The Miracle Maker (2000)
The Miracle Maker makes little attempt to depict the Sermon on the Mount although it does include a few extracts of some of the less famous passages, at least two of which are animated. The "why, then, do you look at the speck in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the log in your own eye?" is played for great comic effect with the audience laughing in the background. But the best part is Jesus' twin similes contrasting the wise man building his house upon rock with the foolish man building on sand. It's a nicely stylised piece of animation, and rather memorable.

I have a sneaking suspicion that Rossellini's Il Messia also includes a segment of Jesus teaching the disciples the words from the sermon whilst they go about their everyday tasks, but I haven't got the time to check it out just now. Does anyone else have any favourites that I've missed?

And I'm Back

Thanks to all of you who have been in touch over the last few months to offer your condolences or ask me if I was OK. It's certainly the longest I've ever gone without posting since I started this blog, and I appreciate the emails, comments and Facebook posts.

A lot has been going on for me. Obviously the death of my mother-in-law has been hard, both in terms of my own grief but also the need to be available to comfort my wife, and the headspace required to do that. I also started a new job the day before Jane died, and so that has also been taking headspace, as well as raising the question as to whether I still want to do this now that my vocation seems to be pointing in a different direction. I think I do, but my enthusiasm has waned somewhat over the last few months. We'll see how it goes.

The other thing with the new job is a new routine to get used to, and that's been tough as well. Hopefully I'll be able to work something out with this to find the time to keep writing about and watching Bible Films and pass my thoughts on for what they're worth. That said, I do really think the Facebook page is a really good development, and I've been really pleased to see a greater number of people posting there over the last few months. If you're thinking about posting something up yourself, please do. There are a lot of people interested in this area and I'd much rather be facilitating a wider ranging discussion / flow of information than just boring people with my own chatter.

Anyway that's enough of that, except to add that I'm afraid I probably won't be able to reply to everyone who has contacted me over the last 4 months. Sorry. And what's that? You want me to tell you about my job? Well I'm the Church Relationships Manager for the Church Urban Fund in the Central Region. The Church Urban Fund do a fantastic job tackling poverty in England by funding and resourcing activist from the poorest 10% of communities. It was a job I really wanted working for a fantastic organisation. If you'd like to find out more there's plenty of into on our website, and one of my side projects has been our new Facebook page. And if you're a vicar in the Midlands then I'd be keen to meet up to talk to you about what we're doing and how you can get involved. Don't worry we can talk about Bible Films to.

And now, on with the show.

Thursday, May 26, 2011

Jane Paine (1954-2011)

My wife's mum died on Tuesday after a long, long battle with cancer. I've often heard people described as bravely fighting cancer, and often wondered if it was just something people said. But Jane left me in no doubt. It was about 4-5 years ago when she discovered that she had had cancer and throughout the last half-decade she utterly refused to let her illness take over her life. She continued to always look on the bright side, being as active as she could, never making a fuss and continuing to pour out her love to those around her. Even a short time before her death, as she drifted in and out of consciousness and fought for every breath she pulled herself up to give a comforting touch to my wife as she cried.

Jane was also a very encouraging person. The first time her death really hit me was as I drew up to the house after being away in London. I was dressed in a suit - rare for me - and I began to imagine going in to the house and the reaction being smartly dressed might bring. "You look nice Matt" I heard her say in my head. And then it hit me.

Then there was her sense of compassion, always looking after people. My wife has often spoken of Jane comforting her frequently when she grew up. There are various stories of her supporting people she didn't really even know, and standing with them through their difficult times.

It was no doubt these qualities that led her into Art Therapy. She studied for her BA and her MA in the subject, but the cancer meant that she never got to go into practise. She would have been brilliant. So much of my wife's artistic talent was nurtured by Jane (and came through her genes no doubt) and she leaves behind a vast array of painting and drawings.

And on top of all of this, she also had an incredible gift with children. All four of her grandchildren adored her, and she always seemed to know what to say and how to interest and engage them. And numerous other children have been blessed by her presence in their life.

She leaves behind her husband Dave - her true love of forty years, who has looked after her over the last few weeks, months and years like you wouldn't think possible - four adult children - who live out so many of her best qualities in all that they do - and four grandchildren. It was a privilege knowing her and she will be most sorely missed.

Monday, May 16, 2011

Scene Guide: The Passover Plot

Having reviewed The Passover Plot a couple of Mondays back, I thought it would be good to post a scene guide for the film. It's been a while since I did one of these (see all) so a reminder (for me if no-one else) of the reasoning behind my citations from the gospels.
[EBE - Text intro explaining political situation]
[EBE - Arrest of messianic/zealot preacher]
Jeremiah 33:15-16 cited
Teshua in the desert - Mark 1:12-13
Baptism of Yeshua - Mark 1:9-11
[EBE - Introduction to Pilate]
Healing of a blind man - Mark 8:22-25
Yeshua teaches - Mark 8:12, 11:22-24
Greatest Commandment - Mark 12:28-31
Beatitudes - Matt 5:3-12
Rejection at Nazareth - Mark 6:1-5
Yeshua recites the Shema - Deut 6:4
Are you the one? - Matt 11:2-6
Calling the disciples - Mark 3:13-19
[EBE - Romans in Zealot Meeting]
[EBE - Zealots and Yeshua's brothers]
Parable of the Sower - Mark 4:1-20]
Death of John - Mark 6:17-29
[EBE - Pilate and Herod]
Isaiah 53:7 cited
[EBE - Bartholomew's baby]
News of John's death - Mark 6:30-32
[EBE - The disciples complain]
[EBE - Jesus preaching]
Jesus fails to heal - Mark 6:5
[EBE - Yeshua meets the Zealots]
Isaiah 53:5 cited
[EBE - Yeshua Plans his Death]
[EBE - Pilate and Herod collude]
Triumphal entry - Mark 11:1-11
[EBE - Fire stars]
Cleansing the temple - Mark 11:15-19
[EBE - Temple uprising]
[EBE - Death of Bartholomew]
Last Supper - Mark 14:22-31
Gethsemane and Arrest - Mark 14:32-50
[EBE - Pilate and Herod collude]
Jewish hearing - Mark 14:53-65
Trial by Pilate - Mark 15:1-20
Crucifixion - Mark 15:22-39
"Burial" - Mark 15:40-47
The Empty Tomb - Mark 16:1-8
[EBE - Death of Jesus]
A Few Notes
The first that is noticeable from looking at this scene guide is how heavily the film uses the Gospel of Mark. Aside from a token nod to the Beatitudes, the extra-biblical episodes added to fill out the story and a few citations of the prophets, all the incidents in this film are found in Mark's gospel. Whilst this is highlighted by my policy of citing Mark even if the event occurs in all of the synoptic gospels, it's nevertheless fair to say that Millard Cohana and Patricia Knop's screenplay, which is presumably largely based on Schonfield's book, uses Mark the most.

There are a number of potential reasons for this. Firstly, close adherence to Mark gives Schonfield's work an air of authenticity. If Mark is the oldest gospel, then a supposedly subversive alternative version of the life of Jesus should probably look more like Mark than anything else. The film pre-supposes that at a very early stage there was a parting of the ways between its real history and the history told by traditional Christianity. Mark would be the most in touch with those traditions, and, from the film's perspective, the gospel least bent away from "what really happened". It's significant that the text at the end of the film stresses that Mark was written over 40 years after the events it portrays, and gives dates for the other gospels as Luke 85AD, Matthew 90AD and John 110/120AD.

Secondly, of all the gospels Mark is the one that is usually seen as portraying Jesus as a man of action. Certainly there are fewer words and those tend to consist of pithy sayings rather than long teaching discourses as found in Matthew and John in particular.

Thirdly, Mark's gospel does not so much include a resurrection as an empty tomb. The additional, and almost certainly forged, endings try to patch over this embarrassing omission (which may be deliberate or the result of damage to an early copy of the manuscript), but the genuine ending, in the form we now have it, only includes accounts of the empty tomb. (spoiler) The film also gives us an empty tomb - Jesus is woken up and taken away - but, as he dies shortly afterwards, no resurrection appearances. The film shows a single attempt to demonstrate this to someone not in on Yeshua's plot, but it fails.

Having said all that the film does not really portray a Marcan Jesus. Mark's Jesus may be a man of action, but his action is not so much a quest to be hailed as the messiah but as a healer and exorcist. There is only one "healing" in this film, and there's more about that below, and no exorcisms. I was struck in a recent read through of Mark quite how prominent the dealing with the demons aspect of Mark's gospel is. One of the things that is strange about the film is that Jesus does so very little. He's not a miracle worker, he's not a teacher and he doesn't rise from the dead. The film's alternative history fails to offer a compelling reason for why the Jesus story lived on and for why he didn't simply fall into the all-too-heavily populated category of failed Jewish messiahs. At least bar Kokhba minted his own coins. There's also relatively little talk of the Kingdom of God. This is Jesus' obsession in Mark, but is overshadowed by the film's emphasis on Jesus being the messiah. Indeed faced with Pilate's questioning Yeshua conspicuously does not even say "my kingdom is not of this world".

The one miracle that the film does portray is the healing of the blind man from Mark 8:22-25. It's this single miracle that persuades people to follow him and proclaim him the messiah. But the film suggests that Jesus does not perform a miracle at all. The blind man is in fact a fraud, seemingly pretending he is blind to make his appeal for money more compelling. Jesus sees through it and so spits in his face. The man momentarily gives himself away, and before he can cover it up, the disciples have declared a miracle and the crowd joins in. There are shades of "penny for an ex-leper" here. It's an intriguing reinterpretation of an odd text - after all, why does Jesus spit in the man's face - but if this was Jesus' sole miracle (and we later see him fail to bring Bartholomew back to life), it again raises the question of why anyone really found Jesus worth following.

There are two main asides from the time Jesus spends with his disciples. The first is the role of the zealot movement. They are seen as very prominent in Jerusalem and around, and there's an uneasy relationship between them and the followers of Jesus. In a key scene the two groups meet and Jesus lays out his agenda of peaceful revolution as opposed to violent overthrow. The result is a plan to have Jesus ride into Jerusalem on a donkey and then disappear to avoid capture by the Romans, reappearing in the temple shortly afterwards to re-take the city peacefully by sheer numbers alone. Recent situations in the Middle East at the moment come to mind as we have seen attempts at a similar peaceful movements result in varying degrees of success. There are certainly echoes of 1961's King of Kings whether intentional or not.

The other aside is the story from the perspective of the authorities. Donald Pleasance's role as Pilate is particularly to the fore, and its clear he is pulling all the strings, shown scheming with Herod, Caiaphas and his own soldiers. There's also a good deal of screen time given over to Caiaphas, reminiscent of BBC's The Passion. Caiaphas is hated by the zealots who mock him as corrupt, and pushed about by Pilate. Hugh Griffith's portrayal of Caiaphas taps into numerous aspects of the worst of Jewish stereotypes over the centuries and so its hard to sympathise with him. Yet, surprisingly, the body he convenes to hear Yeshua's case find "no cause" for a charge of blasphemy, and returns him to Pilate to see if he can get him under Roman law.

At the end of the film there is a lengthy note, the first part of which is as follows:
Yeshua of Nazareth died with his faith undimmed. Those who shared his faith were convinced that death could not hold him, and that he had gone to God until the day when the prophecies would finally be fulfilled.

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Biblical Studies Carnival: Apr. 2011

Photo by Tim Parkinson, used under a Creative Commons Licence

Where does the time go? It barely seems like a fortnight since I realised I was late posting the last Biblical Studies carnival and now here I am being late posting this one.

Anyway Jim Linville has done a great job with April's Biblical Studies Carnival, adding a generous (and most welcome) dash of his typically irreverent humour, not to mention so many links that it could possibly take more than a month to read. Towards the end - where he finally gets onto what is really, lets face it, the most important stuff - there are a couple of extra links to reviews on last month's BBC series The Bible's Buried Secrets.

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Some Obscure Paul Films

Recently I've come across a number of lesser-known films about St. Paul so I thought I'd post a few bits and pieces about them here.

The first is Damascus (pictured above). It's a docudrama made in 2008 as part of a collaboration between Agape 4 Media (the team who distribute the Jesus film), Youth Arise and one or two others as part of the Pope's Year of St. Paul. It's shot in and around Damacus itself and uses actors from the region and at some point I should hopefully get around to reviewing it.

The next is Life of St. Paul (1949). According to the IMDb it starred DeForest Kelley, best known for his role as Dr "Bones" McCoy in Star Trek. Paul was played by Nelson Leigh who would reprise the role 8 years later in The Living Bible Series: Acts of the Apostles. Life of St. Paul was made the same year as The Pilgrimmage Play which also starred Leigh (as Jesus). Both films were made by the same director, John T. Coyle.

Then there is I Paul from 1980. IMDb contains a good synopsis of this one. It was essentially a soliloquy given by Fred J. Scollay as Paul delivers his final message from prison to Timothy using the words of the King James Bible. It's available on DVD in the States, but seemingly not in the UK, which is a shame given that this is the 400th anniversary of the KJV.

Dayamayudu appears to be a sequel to the Jesus film Dayasagar. It's about Peter and Paul and can be seen on YouTube in its entirety. (I assume given the advert that plays at the start and that its there in full that it's legitimate to watch it on YouTube). Sadly there are no subtitles.

Also online is Paul the Emissary which I've discussed in passing before and a long time ago at Arts and Faith. It's available through the producer's website TBN (you have to scroll down a bit as there are a number of other films you can view online including The Revolutionary.

Lastly, I posted a link on the Bible Films Facebook page to a piece on 1960's Paul of Tarsus. There's an article all about the 10 part series at Roobarb's Forum. According to Ian K McLachlan it still exists in its entirety in the BBC archives (as does 1956's Jesus of Nazareth. Another poster adds that there is a clip from the series in the Roger Delgado documentary on the Doctor Who Dalek War set. I'm not a great fan of Dr. Who these days, but I know a couple of readers of this site who are. Has anyone seen this documentary?

Whilst I'm mentioning the Facebook page, just a quick plug to encourage you to "like" it (which means all the news bits will appear in your News Feed) and to post your own links / opinions there. I really want the page to become much more communal and as so many of you know things that I don't it would be great to have your contributions direct.

Monday, May 2, 2011

The Passover Plot (1976)

The 1970s were a time when the traditional aura of respect for Jesus was beginning to be tested, and following the relative success of Jesus Christ, Superstar and Godspell in 1973 the rights were secured to adapt Hugh Schonfield's 1965 book "The Passover Plot". Essentially both the novel and the film were a previous generation's The Da Vinci Code - a best-selling but trashy and implausible book making controversial claims and later getting adapted into a similarly poor movie. The main contrast is that whereas The Da Vinci Code claimed Jesus died at the crucifixion, but that his blood line lived on, The Passover Plot suggested that Jesus tried to fake his death on the cross so he could appear to have been resurrected.

The film itself is not nearly as bad as might be expected. For one thing it's the Jesus film most steeped in the Jewish origins of the gospel narratives. Jesus is known as Yeshua, and his disciples also take on the Jewish versions of their names (John reverts to Yohanan, James reverts to Jacob, Judas to Judah and so on). The prayers around the Last Supper have a strongly Jewish feel to them, and rely more on traditional seders than the New Testament for their dialogue. Other Jewish rituals are shown such as the celebration of the birth of Bartholomew's son, the recital of the Shema and we even see Jesus and his disciples wearing tefillin at one stage. There's a strong emphasis on the hopes for a Jewish messiah (which in actual fact many doubt was the case) and Jesus' emphasis is repeatedly stressed as being on reformation and fulfilment of the Jewish faith, rather than starting a new movement.

Another plus is its well-rounded portrayal of Jesus' humanity, at least up until he reveals his plan to convince everyone he is the messiah by faking his own death. It's hard to imagine whether most Christians would find this mentally unstable Jesus more palatable than the one from Last Temptation of Christ. There he is wrestling with the possibility that he might be the Messiah from the start, such that its difficult to ever really like that film's Jesus, even if ultimately the film affirms traditional Christian theology. Here however there's plenty of time to appreciate a Jesus that is devout, dances, smiles, whispers and shouts, but in the end he's not the messiah, just deluded enough to believe he is.

Jesus communicates his message with such diverse styles that it tends to gives the film a surreal and other-worldly feel. At times Jesus chats with his friends, the volume is so low that the audience is straining its ears to catch what he is saying. Shortly after, he is yelling with all his might to a crowd in the open air. This combined with long periods of quiet whilst the camera pans round to capture the mood give the piece a rhythm and mood quite unlike any other Jesus film I can think of. Its good to encounter something new like this: it makes you think in fresh ways about the original source material.

One result of the lingering quiet periods is that the film includes relatively little action. With a running time of over two hours we nevertheless encounter only one miracle - and even then the implication is clearly that it was not actually Jesus' doing - and relatively little teaching. And there lies one of the main problems with the message of Schonfield, director Michael Campus and producer Wolf Schmidt: without the resurrection, Jesus is just a miracle worker and teacher. Without the miracles Jesus is just a teacher. Without much in the way of teaching Jesus is just a nice, but deluded man whose ideals of loving your enemies may well just be a part of his delusion. Telling a story about a sower, and correctly identifying the greatest commandment are hardly the marks of an interesting person, let alone one who was so significant that his followers founded one of the world's great religions.

Spoilers ahead.
This becomes even stranger when we discover that not only was Jesus crazy enough to try and fake his own death and resurrection, not only was he unable to see that if you have to fake it the chances are that you're not who you think you are, but he ends up dying shortly after the crucifixion anyway. Whilst this might explain some of the resurrection appearances, and Jesus apparently leaving this world after a period of time, it's still unconvincing. Several of the disciples knew what Jesus was doing, the others are unlikely to be convinced that Jesus had in fact entered the life of the world to come whilst he was still looking like he was at death's door. It's interesting that by making Peter a fairly minor character, and bringing to greater prominence those we don't hear of again, such as Bartholomew and Judas, it leaves the door open for the suggestion that Peter genuinely believed it, whilst the disillusioned others left the movement, but Yakov (Jesus' brother James) is pivotal in misguided plot, but still goes on to lead the church in Jerusalem.
Spoilers end.

So despite a few notable strengths, The Passover Plot is ultimately a silly and highly implausible piece of filmmaking, which is certainly not dissipated by learning that the actor playing Jesus, Zalman King, would go on to be called "the high priest of erotic filmmaking". Whilst I suspect that overall King's films have little to commend them, I imagine few have quite such a preposterous plot as this one.

Thursday, April 28, 2011

Digging Out the Talpiot Tomb Debate

Back in 2007 there was a documentary and a great deal of subsequent discussion about the so-called Jesus Tomb at Talpiot. I wrote a few posts on the claims here, as well as a couple at ReJesus, but Mark Goodacre provided the most coverage.

I was reminded of these discussions today when listening to the podcast for the BBC Radio 4 maths show "More or Less". Towards the end they discuss the probability of five people meeting whose fathers all had the first names John Charles. The initial calculation comes out to be one in several billion billions, but what's significant in this case is that this is not theoretical, "but" as the narrator says in Magnolia "it did happen".

The team however quickly whittle down this astounding statistic down to something much more reasonable, and you can hear their reasoning about 23 minutes into the podcast (actual file here).

A number of these reasons are also relevant to the Talpiot Tomb question. Firstly it was an actual discovery, so that changes the statistical calculations altogether, secondly the location appears significant, but various other locations would have given rise to a similarly apparent significance. Thirdly, the smaller and smaller the probabilities get the more likely it that a reality blip changes everything.

Coincidentally I was also musing on a related point again this weekend, how we tend to find names cluster together rather than occur at random. I once commented on Mark Goodacre's blog that a modern day example might be the cluster of names Seumas, Mary and Patrick. Individually the probability wouldn't be that high, purely on the basis of their popularity in the population as a whole. But in reality because they are all Catholic names the likelihood of finding such a cluster would be much higher than this simple basis for the calculation. If you searched for it in a Catholic part of Belfast you'd get a much higher number of families than if you searched in Kent, or a Protestant part of Belfast. Given how sectarian Judaism was at the time, it's reasonable to want to know about these names relate to each other before assuming the probabilities are all independent.

Which leads me onto another question. During the Radio 4 podcast the expert says that looking at the 40s and 50s he had difficulty finding "the distribution" even though they had the rankings. So if we're lacking this key piece of data for just 60 years ago, how accurate is the data that was used to calculate the probability regarding the Jesus Tomb? If I remember rightly, the overall figure was calculated my multiplying the assumed probability for each name individually. Now the probability for each name was drawn from other ossuaries found in the region from around the same period of time. The problem with this is that it's not representative of the whole, at best its representative of those rich enough to have a bone box. But Jesus and his family were not rich. Were this to be their tomb then it would only exist because Jesus' life had elected their status. We have no reliable information of the distribution and occurrence of names of people within Jesus' social class and so this is another flaw (amongst many) that the programme makes.

Monday, April 25, 2011

The Story of Jesus (BBC)

This Easter's biggest piece of religious programming was BBC1's two-part documentary The Story of Jesus.

In a break from what has become the standard format for such documentaries, rather than having one (usually photogenic) expert both narrating and interviewing other experts, this programme was narrated by David Suchet (Poirot, minus the accent) but the on-screen camera work was performed by nine different scholars who occasionally met to pass on the baton to the next there were other experts involved as well (I counted 19-20 in total) but these nine had a far greater screen time than their counterparts. After years of seeing the same, increasingly tired, old format, it was good to see a new approach being tried and the hand-overs, which took a bit of getting used too, were an effective way of moving things on.

Part 1 of the series began by looking at the textual evidence for the gospels and their reliability. Tom Wright was very much to the fore here, explaining how the earliest scraps of the scriptures and far more contemporary with the originals than other written sources from the time.

After that Simon Gathercole was introduced and he guided us through the nativity story. There's talk of Herod and the Magi and rather than giving an astrological answer to questions about the Star of Bethlehem, a textual one is given: it's evoking a quotation from Numbers 24:17 "a star has come out of Jacob". The discussion begins to be illustrated with dramatised footage and it's rather good. The lighting, filters and film stock result in high quality footage and the choice of predominantly near / middle-eastern actors (or those of near / middle eastern descent) gives an extra sense of realism. Mary here is perhaps the most convincing looking Mary I've seen, and her performance is pretty decent as well.

The impressive casting also extends to Jesus himself, played by Big Book Media's Selva Raslingam who is almost as far from the traditional Hollywood Jesus as one can get. Having been taken briefly through archaeological finds in Sephoris and Nazareth by James Strange we come to Jesus' ministry. There's talk of John the Baptist (featuring nicely-restrained use of time-lapse photography), and the symbolism that flows out of the story of the Wedding at Cana. We're told that there are two Greek words translated as "miracle", one of which means "sign". In the story of the Wedding at Cana the miracle is called Jesus' first "sign" and alludes to passages from the prophets predicting that water flowing down the mountains will turn to wine. Greg Carey is leading things through now and he highlights the abundance theme in many of the miracles, pointing to God's new kingdom, a place of abundance. There's a brief mention of the roughly contemporary Jewish miracle worker Honi. The first episode comes to a close with Greg Carey discussing the Transfiguration and it's perhaps the first time that the dramatised footage has been a little disappointing.

Whilst from a narrative angle part two picks up from more or less where the opening episode left off, thematically things are very different. It's the turn of Obery Hendricks to present now and his focus is very much on Jesus' radical, political message, rather than this spiritual one. There are small sections on the synagogue at Magdala, and his parables and teaching, and then we're into the events of Holy Week.

The leading expert for this section is Ben Witherington III, although occasionally the location footage oscillates between him and Helen Bond (whose focus is mainly on Jesus' death). It's here that the information being presented is most well known, and as a result least interesting for those who know the subject well. This isn't improved by limiting the viewpoints that are expressed to produce a reasonably conservative position. This is as much in the editing of the experts' soundbites as their viewpoints. Bond is not nearly as conservative as Witherington, but the quotations that are left don't really demonstrate the difference. There's also no more sceptical voices such as that of John Dominic Crossan who claims (incorrectly in my opinion) that most of what is contained in the passion narratives is prophecy being historicised.

Finally we return to Wright again who nicely summarises his defence of the bodily resurrection of Jesus. People in those days knew that dead people stayed dead, Jesus undoubtedly died because the Romans were expert executioners and that when first century Jews talked about resurrection they solely meant bodily resurrection. Suchet wraps things up, though his closing summary is rather poor. Overall however, this is a solid introduction to Jesus' life, handsomely photographed (barring the flyovers of models which were a bit distracting) and well acted, defly providing a traditional view of the story of Jesus and his extraordinary life.

Thursday, April 21, 2011

A Few Thoughts on The Passion

My wife and I are working through the BBC/HBO version of The Passion (2008) this week. I think it's the first time I've seen it since the year it aired, so it was interesting to see it again properly. One of the things that's interesting about watching so long after it aired is that some of the actors have moved on and become much more well known for their roles in other programmes.

Take, for example, Tom Ellis, playing Philip here. Since recording The Passion Ellis has gone on to star as the love interest in Miranda (a hilarious sitcom simultaneously sending up and revelling in the style of 80s sitcoms). As a result it's impossible to take him seriously in this. Likewise, I'm much more familiar with Bleak House than I was back then (which features Annas and the captain of the temple guard in different roles), and I've seen Paloma Baezan in 1998's Far From the Madding Crowd as well. All of these roles change the perception of these actors and the roles they fill here.

One thing I've noticed this time around is how manipulative the character of Caiaphas is. Overall its a very sympathetic portrayal, but episode 2 contains at least two instances where he subtly alters the facts to make his argument more persuasive. It's a subtle touch, but exactly the kind of thing you see politicians doing on Question Time every week. First up he starts by objecting to Jesus' critique of the law, saying that without the law the Jews will become no different to the Romans, but then he somehow turns this round to say that this will lead to the Romans coming down more heavily. The logic doesn't really hold up, but the way in which it is argued is very persuasive. Likewise Joseph of Arimathea gets similarly worked over later on. Caiaphas, dressed in all his priestly regalia, subtly alters Jesus' words as overheard by the bird seller. He claims that Jesus said he would destroy the temple, rather than merely predicted that it would be destroyed.

The quality of the writing is similarly evident throughout this episode (2) not least in the words of Jesus. The late Frank Deasy did a fantastic job here making the words sound fresher and more immediate. Sometime, I'd really like to take a closer look at the way Deasy had Jesus say certain things. I noticed a nice reference to Jesus Christ Superstar at one point as well.

Another interesting scene in this episode is the anointing of Jesus' feet. Here it's performed by the prostitute Jesus reformed in the first episode, not Mary Magdalene or Mary the sister of Lazarus. This fits with the Synoptics, and Luke in particular, but goes against John (who identifies Mary as the anointer) and some church tradition (which has often, wrongly identified Magdalene). What really struck me this time around was the way that the only people the camera shows in the scene are the disciples. Judas and Philip are appalled by her actions and Jesus' failure to condemn her. The absence of external observers works to put a distance between Jesus and his followers who are soon to be upset by Jesus prophesying his own death, This is another great scene shot with a nice blue filter and in atmospheric light.

The visual aspect of this episode is really strong actually, the colour scheme - a variety of light browns punctured by the occasional red Roman Road or black priestly turban - emphasises the poverty of most of the people of that day and stresses the gulf between them and the elite. The external scenes in particular are still very nice to look at.

Tomorrow we should cover the crucifixion episode (3) which has been pre-figured today by the "trials" of Barabbas and the two robbers we met right at the start of episode 1. They already have slightly different approaches, one is definitely more terrified by what is happening to him and almost seems to act as if he is innocent, or at least didn't expect things to go so far. I can't remember which repents though, whether they continue along these tracks, or bring a surprise twist and making a more surprising twist - the bad robber being the one who repents.
Anointing just disciples

Friday, April 15, 2011

Easter UK TV Schedule 2011

It's that time of year when I like to do an overview of the Bible film related telly that's on over the Easter period. There's a few things on this year although more documentaries than dramatised films about the scriptures. That said, given the absence of a major new dramatised series, there's a fair bit on this year.

Palm Sunday - Sunday 17th April
Does Christianity Have a Future?, BBC1 22:25

Rowan Williams is all over the telly this Easter, although this is really about frumpy politician turned popular reality TV "dancer", Anne Widdecombe. Having reinvented herself, Widdecombe ponders the question of whether the church can reinvent itself to ensure its survival. There's a look at the Alpha Course, Catholic immigrants and the resurgent black pentecostal churches, as well as a look at the longer term future.

Good Friday - Friday 22nd April

What's the Point of Forgiveness, BBC1 09:00

Williams again, this time teaming up again with Bettany Hughes, who made the excellent The Day Jesus Died this time last year. The programme is looking at forgiveness in a variety of contexts from Jesus' words on the cross, to the widow of one of those killed on 9-11.

The Story of Jesus: Part 1, BBC1 10:00
This is the first of a two part documentary looking at the life of Jesus. Part 1 covers Jesus' birth, ministry and the miracles whereas the second episode, on Easter Day, will cover the passion and resurrection. As with The Miracles of Jesus the programme will be using time lapse photography. It's to be hoped that this is slightly more restrained here than in the original series. It's directed by Big Book Media's David Batty and given that Jesus is also played by the Jesus from that project, Selva Raslingam, it all sounds quite promising.

The Prince of Egypt, BBC1 13:30
Before Pixar raised the bar in animation, Dreamworks looked poised to become a major force in animation. The Prince of Egypt was a decent first outing. Whilst not ideal from a biblical point of view, it was generally well made and did well at the box office. The massive, and unforeseen, success of Shrek and the disappointment of Joseph, King of Dream moved Dreamworks in another direction, but 13 years on The Prince of Egypt still looks pretty fresh, and the hieroglyphic sequence remains arguably the most impressive moment from any of the filmed versions of Moses' life.

Barabbas, C5 14:20
Barabbas' eerie crucifixion scene, famously shot during an actual eclipse, is a great choice for Good Friday a film about the way the events that day change lives. It's a far more complex exploration than the other Jesus cameo films from the era and well worth a watch.

Easter Sunday - 24th April

The Story of Jesus: Part 2, BBC1 11:35

Part 2 of the series wheels out the bigger hitters, with Ben Witherington, Helen Bond and Tom Wright amongst the nine experts featured. Whilst this episode starts with more of Jesus' ministry, I suspect it will be Jesus' death and resurrection that are the major foci of this episode.

Flight of Faith: The Jesus Story ITV1, 23:15
Laurence Vulliamy steps out from behind the camera on Time Team to narrate this journey through the life of Christ. It's major boast seems to be its use of aerial photography, though I'm not quite sure how much can be done with that. Nevertheless, it's American release was well received by various Christian outlets. There's an interview with Vulliamy available on YouTube.

Lastly, Chariots of Fire will be showing on Film4 at 6:40pm on Easter Sunday as well.

Incidentally you can see other festive seasons' religious programming all together or individually - Easter '10, '09, '08 and '07; Christmas '10 '09 '08, '07 and '06).

Friday, April 8, 2011

More Non-Western Jesus Films

Over the years, my friend Thomas Langkau has been an invaluable source of information to me, hunting out all kinds of obscure Jesus films and sending me the information. So it's him I have to thank for drawing my attention to the following films, all of which originate from non-western countries.

The first (pictured) is the 1996 Philippine film Kristo. It starred Mat Ranillo III as Jesus and is based on John's Gospel. Ranillo has been starring in passion play / theatre versions of the story since 1977. It's well known enough to have its own pages on Wikipedia page and IMDB, although photos are rather scarce. You can however watch it all (unsubtitled) on YouTube.

However, this is not the first Philippine Jesus film. It appears that there was also one made in 1952 called Kalbaryo ni Hesus. There are quite a lot of press cuttings (including some photos) on this film at the Pelikula blog. According to IMDb, Jennings Sturgeon played Jesus.

Lastly there's A Ultima Semana (The Final Week), which is another Passion movie from Brazil. There's not much on this one aside from an IMDb page. It's not even entirely clear who played Jesus. More may come to light on this one however as IMDb claims it was released on video in 2007. There's no evidence of that at Amazon, but perhaps a copy will come to light at some point in the future.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

Biblical Studies Carnival: Mar. 2011

Photo by Tim Parkinson, used under a Creative Commons Licence

Dreadfully late with this one, partly because it took me a while to find, and partly because I wasn't sure whether to post this here or on my Facebook channel. In the end I decided that seeing as the carnival is about blogs, I should keep it here.

Anyway Darrell Pursiful of the Dr. Platypus blog has posted March 2011's Biblical Studies Carnival. He's given it a basketball theme - a sport I used to be half-decent at mainly due to my height, but a lot of the terms fly, er, over my head. Nevertheless, it's a fun theme and it's nice to be mentioned.

Next month it will be the turn of Dr. Jim’s Thinking Shop & Tea Room to host the carnival. I do occasionally peruse Jim Linville's blog so it will be interesting to see what he comes up with.

Monday, April 4, 2011

Testament: Ruth

I recently came to the realisation that Ruth is one of my favourite books of the Hebrew Bible. It's fine reading about kings and prophets, mighty leaders and spiritual giants. Inspiring even. But, as is no doubt clear, I am not such a person and the chances are that you aren't either. For those of us lesser mortals, Ruth is our kinswoman. It's true she ultimately became the great grandmother of Israel's most famous king, but, at the same time, it's unlikely that she lived to know it.

What I find inspiring about Ruth is that she is so ordinary. She didn't seem to aspire to greatness, indeed I doubt she would have been able to conceivable of any way in which she might still be talked about 3000 years later, and her achievements must have seemed modest. And yet three generations later her loyalty, faithfulness and love have had huge implications.

The second thing that draws me to Ruth is the way she makes the right choices in the toughest of circumstances. Her story is told against a backdrop of famine grief and broken dreams. All she has left is her mother-in-law, and, watching this yesterday (Mother's Day in the UK), I was struck by what a fantastic example this is of how to honour one's mothers or strive for the best for one's (adult) child.

At the same time there is a huge cultural gap between the story of Ruth and today, which both the text and Testament's adaptation of it highlight without losing the story's relevance for all cultures. It's a culture of where the thought can cross your mind of remarrying in order to have another son to marry your widowed daughter-in-law. It's a world of sealing contracts by taking off your sandal, gleaning etiquette and making sexual advances by uncovering the other person's feet.

Other versions of this story never really capture the essence of this other world, but this film does it admirably. A key factor here is the choice of medium. The 3D puppets that the animators use lend the film a sense of nostalgia and tradition. Furthermore using an animated format from another culture, albeit a different culture from the one in which the story is set, heightens the feeling of otherness. At the same time the skill of the animators make Ruth an incredibly appealing figure capturing her vulnerability without making her seem a victim.

The film's lighting and use of colour also heighten the power of the story. The early scenes of famine and the death of Naomi and Ruth's husbands are dark and at times fairly mono-chromatic, which contrasts with Ruth's brilliant blue robe. There are also a couple of other visual links to the Virgin Mary – another woman who gives birth to a "royal" son in Bethlehem. But the film as a whole makes use of a broad colour palate, often quite dramatically, whilst still maintaining that sense of the past, which is so critical even in the text's original context.

It's also to the film's credit that it portrays Naomi as a little cranky early on. Again it's easy to portray Naomi as a helpless victim, but giving her this personality not only reflects the bitterness of her recent experience, but also gives her a sense of fight and strength of character. It also suggests that Ruth's actions not only provide for her mother-in-law, but draw Naomi out of her grief and bitterness.

Whilst Ruth, through no fault of its own, lacks the dramatic source material of other films in the Testament series, it's poignant character study and visual form make it possibly the best entry in the nine-film series, giving a sense of what an ordinary life can look like when lived by the most unordinary values.