Day of Triumph (1954) Comes to DVD and Download

Despite the many Bible films to have been released to DVD in the last twenty years one that has been curiously omitted up to this point is 1954's Day of Triumph. Thankfully the good people at the Gospel Films Archive/Christian Movie Classics (whose other work I've covered here) have finally made the film available both on DVD (via Amazon) and for digital download from Vision Video. The DVD also features an introduction to the film from the son of its producer James Friedrich and the 1941 short The Child of Bethlehem (dir. Edwin Maxwell).

At the moment the film has not been digitally remastered, but I know that is something the team at Gospel Films Archive are hoping to do in the future. However, the recording on the DVD is from a good quality TV broadcast master, it's just not an HD version taken from the original negative. The image at the top of this post is a screenshot of the film's opening scene. There's a little discolouration but otherwise it's very clean and the resolution is certainly far better than that VHS copy you may have stashed in the attic.

I've been sent a review copy of the DVD and I'll post a review of the film shortly. Having seen it on VHS a few times many years ago it was really interesting to watch it again with a far better appreciation of the successes and failures of the Jesus films sub-genre. I will include some screen shots from the film so any fellow purists can assess the quality for themselves.

Essentially, though, for the time being this is the only version currently available of what is a significant entry in the canon.