Good idea lost in the noise

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Before other movies depicting the life of Christ, this was always my favorite. In my opinion, the best depiction of Christ's life was and still is the made for TV series, "Jesus of Nazareth". Robert Powell was a little "soap opera-ish" but overall he did a good job. There are many biblical errors in this version--mostly stressing the Protestant version of the Bible, but again, those were easily ignored. I thought the Magi were the BEST ever--especially Donald Pleasance. James Earl Jones wasn't bad either. Fernando Ray (Rey?) was also great! Today, my favorite religious movie is "The Passion of the Christ". There is no other biblical movie to date that can outdo this perfect depiction of the last three days of Jesus' life. Mel Gibson has his problems, but this movie is his shining accomplishment. (Apocalyto was awesome, too!)

A retelling of the gospels from Samuel "more-studio-than-sense" Bronston - clearly this is the film that Python was lampooning in The Life of Brian. The Biblical humourlessness is to be expected, but it's also rigid and stylised, either by design or lack of imagination, which lends it the unfortunate feel of a primary school nativity play.The story is embellished on the political side, with Hurd Hatfield playing a camp and effete Pilate and Brigid Bazlen's Salome providing the most memorable scene, relieving us of Robert Ryan's tedious John the Baptist, for which those of us without religious scruples may be thankful. Jesus and the disciples come across as a kind of gay brotherhood, which it is tempting to presume was Ray's hidden agenda.Spiritually it fails to uplift, partly because of the artificiality of the presentation, partly because Jesus seems to be in an insensate trance the whole time which undermines any sense of actual suffering. Mainly though, it's the explicit implication that God is pulling all the strings that subverts the power of the story. Later adaptations have avoided those pitfalls, this film is rooted in them.

This is a biblical movie, one of many that was made in the mid-fifties and sixties. It accounts, in a somewhat light way, the life of Jesus from birth to the ascent to heaven and, thus, runs counter to the general tendency of focus only on the birth or passion of Christ. On the other hand, the film makes a very interesting use of peripheral biblical characters (Herod, Salome, Pilate, Barabbas etc.) to make a movie with more movement than one would expect, which prevents it from appearing slow and drawn. The problem of doing this is the indispensable resource for creating scenes that aren't in biblical accounts, but cinema does a lot of that, it's normal and I deal well with it, as long as creative freedom doesn't contradict the biblical story. Nicholas Ray assures the direction in a competent way and Orson Welles makes a great narration of the events. The cast is mostly composed of illustrious strangers (at least for me) which reinforces realism, probably in a conscious move by the director. The cast usually does a convincing and enjoyable work, especially Jeffrey Hunter, who gave birth to Jesus, and Robert Ryan, who played John the Baptist. The environment, costumes and scenery are convincing, beautiful and look good on the screen, but they have no comparison to other biblical films such as "Ben Hur" or "Quo Vadis", where everything is bigger and done in greater detail.

Someone should have read the New Testament before writing this movie. Halfway through, my wife and I found at least ten things that were falsehoods/inaccuracies according to the Bible. They made up a lot of stuff. We didn't plan on looking for inaccuracies, they just kept showing up and then we started noticing them. After starting to see the very beginning we expected something like a movie like one directed by John Ford. We didn't get it, even though we got narration by Orson Wells. There are much better movies about the life of Christ than this one. At least they got the crucification, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ right except for some fillers. Praise Jesus Christ for our salvation.