Jesus of Nazareth

A quite good representation of Christ's Passion. Full of good actors, beautiful music and an excellent story.

inema and television are absolutely full of works about Jesus Christ, or about Mary, the Apostles or other characters and people who lived at the same time or contacted, even slightly, with Jesus. This film is just another one, but that doesn’t mean it’s bad: it means it’s much less known and, because it was made for TV, thought of as a mini-series of four episodes of 90 minutes each, it works in practice as a long film of more than 5 hours in length. I will not waste time summarizing the plot because anyone knows the life of Jesus, even without having faith or touching the Bible with a finger. Jesus is the most striking and revolutionary figure in human history. However, the fact that it was a mini-series allowed the director, Franco Zeffirelli, to extend himself and show moments of Jesus' life that would normally be suppressed or implied in a conventional film. Therefore, we have scenes that almost never appear on film such as the annunciation, circumcision, the presentation at the Temple, the massacre of the Innocents, the death of John the Baptist and several moments after the resurrection, such as the appearance of Jesus to Mary Magdalene or the ascent. The film jumps almost thirty years between the run of the Holy Family and the reappearance of Jesus to the beginning of His ministry, but this reflects a gap in His life: we really don't know anything about Jesus between these two moments. The series was entitled to a luxurious cast loaded with strong names of the time: Robert Powell gave life to a blue-eyed Jesus with a British accent that bothers a little; Christopher Plummer shone in the role of Antipas, alongside a wicked Valentine Cortese in the role of the fearsome queen Herodiad; Michael York was good as a Baptist, Anthony Quinn is an excellent High Priest, Anne Bancroft was a good Mary Magdalene and the same can be said of James Farentino in the role of Simon or Peter Ustinov as Herod; Olivia Hussey was a very sweet but underused Virgin Mary; Ian McShane was satisfactory in the role of the traitor, as well as the several actors who brought the apostles to life. The film still makes room for small but honorable appearances off Claudia Cardinale, Laurence Olivier, Ernest Borgnine, James Mason, Ian Holm, David Garfield, Isabel Masters, John Duttine, James Earl Jones and Donald Pleasence. It seems that all the actors who were or wanted to be somebody entered this series! If the series is clearly a nest of stars and heavy names in European and American drama, and if it has the power and merit to approach Jesus' life more calmly, with more time and going through moments and facts that are generally omitted, however, it cannot be said to be particularly accurate from the historical point of view. In fact, the choice of big stars is understandable but it ended up bringing together a weird mix of people who look anything but Jews from the Middle East. The lack of rigor also applies to sets and costumes, too imaginative and showy to be historically credible. Another problem that can make the series a little boring is a sense of self-assumed vanity, with each episode telling us “I am fantastic and great”. In addition, cinematography does not shine particularly, there is too much light in some scenes and the way some actors behave sounds a little theatrical. The way Jesus acts constantly, for example, is too ethereal for him to appear minimally human, and that takes away his likelihood. Finally, a word for the soundtrack, very competent, and for some visual effects very well achieved.