Histoire de Judas (2015)

As the cradle of cinema in general, and biblical movies in particular, France's religious films (often featuring long static takes) have travelled from the Lumieres, Pathé Passion plays and Alice Guy, via the likes of Robert Bresson and Philippe Garrel, to find recent expression in works such as Le fils de Joseph (2016) and now Histoire de Judas (The Story of Joseph). Of course this kind of slow, contemplative cinema is hardly unique to France, but the connection between the two is certainly well-established.

Histoire is a strikingly beautiful film. Director Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche sets his take on the Jesus story in the midst of some remarkable exteriors on the edge of the Sahara Desert. Ameur-Zaïmeche was born in Algeria, before his family moved to France two years later, which is perhaps why he chose to locate the film in the Biskra province in northeastern Algerian and the Roman ruins at Thamugadi in the Aurès Mountains.  While his film is very much anti-epic in style with it's long static takes and its slow pace, in an odd way the breathtaking scenery lends the film some of the same kind of feeling the original audiences might have got from a DeMillean spectacle; one is seduced by the striking images, even though there's an historical unlikeliness inherent in their eye-catching nature. Riccardo Centola sums up well the film's anti-epic style:

Lo stesso Gesù viene rappresentato volutamente secondo canoni antispettacolari, in atteggiamento quasi sempre meditabondo, a viso semi-coperto, mentre snocciola frasi celebri nel modo meno enfatico possibile.

Often Jesus' representation is deliberately according to anti-spectacular traditions: in attitude, almost always brooding; his face half covered, while he rattles off celebrated phrases in the least emphatic manner possible. (translation mine).¹

Irina Lubtchansky's cinematography brings a sensuous, materialist quality to the images here. When a woman anoints Jesus with perfume - which we have just witnessed her bartering prized possessions to obtain - you can practically smell the aroma of the oil as it dribbles tantalisingly across Jesus' forehead. As with other films directed by Ameur-Zaïmeche's, the ambient sounds are enhanced giving the impression of a world that endures beyond the confines of the narrative. Elsewhere it's the lighting. In contrast to the bright, colourful exteriors dominated by blue skies and ocre rocks, the interiors opt for more a tenebristic feel. Indeed Ameur-Zaïmeche cites Caravaggio and Rembrandt as the inspiration for these scenes. ²

Visually Histoire de Judas recalls a number of Jesus films. The anti-epic and desert locales recall Pasolini's Il vangelo secondo Matteo (Gospel According to Matthew. 1964) and Albert Serra's less familiar El cant dels ocells (Birdsong, 2008), but also, to a lesser extent, Le lit de la Vierge (The Virgin's Bed, 1969), although that may be partly due to both films - and perhaps French-language Jesus films in general - typifying the tendency to veer into philosophy. (Indeed, the trial scenes feel similar to those from Jesus of Montreal (1989), for this very reason, and that's only French-Canadian). Surprisingly, the Jesus film to which Ameur-Zaïmeche actually refers to in the press pack is Carl Theodore Dreyer's (ultimately unmade) Jesus of Nazareth.³ However, the most striking piece of intertextuality is with Jesus Christ Superstar (1973). Both films rely on desert locations, even during the trial scenes and both films are set amongst Roman remains which whilst largely ruined nevertheless both feature prominent columns.  

One other Jesus film that comes to mind while watching Histoire is Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ (1988). Both films re-cast Judas as Jesus' closest friend, who knows him even before his temptation in the desert and who remains faithful even after Jesus' crucifixion. Ameur-Zaïmeche's film goes several steps further, however, for here Judas is not even responsible for leading the guards to Jesus.⁴ Indeed this attempt to "rehabilitate Judas" with a more sympathetic portrayal is the film's main premise.⁵ The opening scene shows Judas ascending a mountain to retrieve Jesus after his 40-day fast, which has left his master so weakened by the experience that Judas has to give him a piggy back all the way back to Nazareth. Later Judas persuades his former zealot colleagues to arrange for a crowd to attend Jesus' triumphal entry in to the city and he quickly follows his master's lead in destroying the cages and tables in the temple. "No living being deserves to be in a cage" he announces as the people begin to contribute to the carnage.

However the biggest and most significant deviation from the Gospels surrounds the Last Supper and Jesus' arrest. Earlier in the day Judas witnesses a man from Qumran (who is presumably meant to be an Essene, the group responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls) writing down what Jesus is saying. Judas knows Jesus is opposed to this (he "distrusts the word that is frozen, and which will inevitably become dogma, a tool of power, an instrument of domination and submission") and so having confronted the man, seeks permission to destroy his writings. And this what Jesus means at the Last Supper when he tells Judas to do what he has to do quickly.

[SPOILERS]So while Jesus and the other disciples head to Gethsemane (seemingly without the knowledge that Jesus is to be arrested there) Judas heads to Qumran and burns the Essene's writings. However, shortly afterwards the man finds his records in ashes and rushes to confront Judas, stabbing him in the stomach and leaving him for dead. Judas is found and returned. A Samaritan (named so in the credits⁶) returns him to the city, but by the time Judas awakes and staggers to Golgotha, Jesus has already died on the cross. Judas finds Jesus' recently vacated tomb and unaware of the significance of what has happened lies down 'in Jesus' place' and dies. The shot deliberately evokes Hans Holbein the Younger's "The Dead Christ in the Tomb" (1521-22),⁷ and is the first film I can think of where Judas dies not by hanging as in Matt 27:3-10, but in a way that more closely relates to the Bible's other description of Judas' death in Acts 1:15-20.[END SPOILERS]

But the film's inherent sympathy for Judas is perhaps best embodied by the fact that Ameur-Zaïmeche himself plays Judas and that he chose his close friend Nabil Djedouani to play Jesus. (Djedouani is a director in his own right and is also credited by Ameur-Zaïmeche as an Assistant Director, one of a number of cast members to also take roles in the crew - Marie Loustalot cast as Bathsheba, was assistant editor).⁸

Ameur-Zaïmeche's five other major films - Wesh wesh, qu'est-ce qui se passe? (2001), Bled Number One (2006), Dernier Maquis (2008), Les chants de Mandrin (2011) and Terminal Sud (2019) - have, to a greater or lesser extent, explored Algerian-French identity, and the accompanying internal and external conflicts. His Berber family moved to France when he was just two, so just as all his other films have primarily been in French, and so too is Histoire. This does seem to have raised a few eyebrows,⁹  However, whilst it's understandable that a director born in Algeria might seek out Algerian locations to stand in for the Holy Land, as someone who has lived in France since the age of two it's only natural that his film is shot in French. Rather than being a purely Algerian film it's more nuanced and complex than that.

However, the use of French in an Algerian context does recall the country's suffering under French colonialism. In particular the extended scenes where Pilate (Régis Laroche) and his colleagues - played by a white actors -  interrogate Jesus adds an extra dimension, almost as if they are events from the fringes of the Algerian War. Pilate fears Jesus is a revolutionary and wants to quell the threat to the empire. "Look all around you. Your empire lies in ruins" says Jesus at one point, "it’s in my name that nations will place their hopes".

That said the tone of the discussion here is decidedly philosophical compared to standard Hollywood fare. It feels like a number of French-language Jesus films similarly pit Pilate and Jesus against one another in a battle of philosophy, though perhaps my impression of that is exaggerated by my love of existential New Wave movies. Nevertheless, both Golgotha (1935) and Jesus of Montreal (1989) feature relatively long sequences where Jesus and Pilate engage in philosophical tête-à-tête. It perhaps also reflects Ameur-Zaïmeche's uses of Roger Caillois' "Ponce Pilate". I have to say I'm not hugely in favour of these kind of portrayals: The more Pilate appears as philosophical, the less he seems like the brute of Luke 13, Philo and Josephus, and the more the blame for Jesus death deflects from him onto the Jewish people. That said, given that Ameur-Zaïmeche's motivation for making Histoire de Judas was to counter antisemitism, it's less of a concern in this case.

These concerns are also offset by the film's handling of the Barabbas figure. Here he is called Carabas and he appears to have a severe cognitive disability. Pilate has him arrested but the chief priests seeing the injustice appeal to Pilate and persuade him that Carabas is not a threat. By dismantling the way the Gospels place the two men in opposition, and by making distinction (found in Mark 15:6-8) between trying to save Carabas / Barabbas and trying to have Jesus killed this also counters many of the ways that the text has often been presented which reinforce antisemitism.

However, perhaps the film's biggest weakness is that it's unclear who exactly was driving Jesus' execution. Judas is recast as Jesus' great friend, nowhere near the events in Gethsemane. The priests have some qualms, but don't seem particularly involved and even Pilate seems reluctant. Things kind of fall on one of Pilate's advisers, but it's not exactly convincing.

Nevertheless, this is an interesting take on the story and one which is beautifully shot. For those who are interested, it's currently available on Mubi along with several of Ameur-Zaïmeche's other films.

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Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat have also reviewed this film at spiritualityandpractice.com. Moreover Reinhold Zwick has written more extensively on the film in the soon to be published T&T Clark Handbook of Jesus and Film (pp.67-76) edited by Richard Walsh and also containing an essay from me.

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1 - Centola, Riccardo (2015) "21 MFF Histoire de Judas" at Cinemafrica, 11 November. Available online: http://www.cinemafrica.org/spip.php?article1603 

2 - Frodon, Jean-Michel (2015), “An Interview with Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche,” in Sarrazink Productions (ed.), Presskit for Story of Judas. Available online: https://medias.unifrance.org/medias/7/42/141831/presse/story-of-judas-presskit-french.pdf

3 - Frodon, "Interview"

4 - In Last Temptation Judas does this only after Jesus' emphatic instructions to do so. It's hardly what could be called a betrayal.

5 - Ameur-Zaïmeche, Rabah (2015) "Director’s Note" in Sarrazink Productions (ed.), Pressbook for "Story of Judas". Available online: https://medias.unifrance.org/medias/44/47/143148/presse/story-of-judas-presskit-english.pdf

6 - Zwick, Reinhold (2021) "Inculturation and Actualization: Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche’s Histoire de Judas" in Walsh, Richard (ed.) T&T Clark Handbook of Jesus and Film, London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark. p.69

7 - Frodon, "Interview"

8 - Frodon, "Interview"

9 - Not only does Frodon ask Ameur-Zaïmeche about this in the press-pack interview, but both Centalo and Zwick (p.67) have also questioned this decision/choice/move.

Mesih (Jesus, the Spirit of God, 2007)

Nader Talebzadeh's Jesus, the Spirit of God (2007) is the first Islamic film about Jesus. One of the reasons that a Muslim film about had not been done before was because the Sunni form of Islam does not permit portrayal of prophets, indeed the hadith discourages portrayal of all humans and animals in general. Secondly however, the Qu'ranic material about Jesus (who it calls Isa) does not fall so conveniently into entire books as it does in the Bible, or even in the same way as the Qu'ran treats other Islamic prophets such as Noah, who have their own surah (71).

To produce his Islamic Jesus film, Talebzadeh turned to another text, the Gospel of Barnabas. The origins of this gospel are unclear. There are mentions of a gospel bearing Barnabas' name from even before the formation of the canon in the fourth century, but there are few compelling reasons to believe that this is the same text we have today. Tales abound of the book being secreted away in a fourth century pope's private library, but there's little news of it until its re-emergence in the seventeenth century.

It's perhaps no surprise, then, the text we have today is fairly unusual. It's far longer than any of the canonical gospels, and contains almost all of the material from Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, as well as some that is unique. Moreover it contains a number elements at odds with the traditional portrayal of Jesus. Most notably Jesus goes out of his way to make it clear that (in contrast to Christian teaching) he is not divine. There is also a chapter (135) with strong echoes of Dante's seven circles of hell, as well as numerous predictions about the future coming of Muhammad scattered throughout the text.

Perhaps most controversially Barnabas expands on the Qu'ran's implication that Jesus was not crucified (surah 4:157). Instead both the text and the film have Jesus taken up to the third heaven. while back on earth Judas is transformed into Isa's likeness and is crucified in his place. At the time of its release Talebzadeh spoke about his intention "to make a bridge between Christianity and Islam, to open the door for dialogue" (Breitbart). It's notable, then, that whilst Talabzadeh does include this passage, he also includes a very abridged version of the Christian account of Jesus' death. Films with multiple endings, such as Wayne's World (1992) and Run Lola, Run (1998), proliferated in the 1990s but this is surely the only religious film to have tried such an approach. Both sequences are introduced with a subtitle, firstly "Continuation of events according to the Christian narrative" and then shortly afterwards "Continuation of events according to Islamic sources and the Gospel of Barnabas".

The ending here, more akin to Freaky Friday (2003) than holy writ, is one that will strike those unacquainted with Barnabas as a little odd. But then the same might also be said by those who are unfamiliar with the ending of the canonical gospels. The idea of God replacing Jesus' body with that of Judas is no more inherently strange than the idea of God replacing Jesus' lifeless body with one that has been transformed and resurrected.

There are numerous other moments in the film which will raise eyebrows with those familiar with the Christian versions of the story, which are also taken straight from the pages of Barnabas. For example, the inclusion of Barnabas the man as one of Jesus' twelve disciples (ch.14); the moment when Caiaphas bows before Jesus to worship him (93); the scene where the Roman Senate pronounces, for Jesus' sake, that he is neither God nor the son of God (98); or, the way that what condemns Jesus in the Sanhedrin is his assertion that the Messiah will be a descendant of Ishmael, not Isaac (208), all of these are to be found in the Gospel of Barnabas. Perhaps most oddly is the scene when Jesus is asked decide if a woman should be stoned for adultery. Instead of just writing in the sand, he creates a mirror in the sand, which one accuser looks into and is driven mad with the horror he sees therein. It's a scene reminiscent of parts of Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, a film which Talebzadeh admires even if he is critical of its theology.

Gibson's film was, of course, heavily criticised for its anti-Semitism and sadly the same criticism could also be levelled at Mesih. Some of this comes from the Gospel of Barnabas itself. It's also possible that some of this might be coloured by the ill feeling between Iran and modern-day Israel. Whichever way, when Pilate falters about passing sentence on Jesus one of the priests shouts out "we take full responsibility for his blood" which if not a direct quote of the Matt 27:25 passage Gibson included, certainly seems like a reasonably accurate paraphrase. Moments later the narrator say that "God set a seal on the cruel hearts of the Children of Israel". Indeed, across the film in general, the Romans, bizarrely, seem to almost support Jesus, whereas the Jewish leaders are seen as the full instigators of his death. Furthermore the moment when a Jewish High Priests kneels, bows before Jesus and hails him as "My God" will, quite understandably, cause offence in some circles.

In a few places the filmmakers add dramatic flourishes of their own which are particularly interesting in this respect. Firstly, Gamaliel the Jewish rabbi known to us from the Talmud and the Mishnah as well as the Bible's book of Acts appears in one of the first scenes featuring the Jewish leaders. In Acts 5 his tolerant laissez-faire policy of leaving the Jesus movement to run it's course seems like almost pro-Christian wisdom, but here, whilst the tolerance element remains, both Judaism and Christianity are held to be in error, and his word come across as more wrong-headed than wise.

Similarly 'brought forward' is St. Paul, or Sha-oul, whose campaign of terror against the followers of Jesus begins with him murdering the newly raised Lazarus. Again, given Saul's role in spreading what Talebzadeh sees as false accounts of Jesus, this seems like an attempt to discredit him, though one that is consistent with his initial appearance in Acts.

Similarly, the filmmakers also give additional validity to the Gospel of Barnabas by not only introducing Barnabas as one of the twelve, but also by showing him at various points in the film, as scribbling down the events as they are happening. Some of the more traditional Bible films have adopted a similar approach, the use of the older and younger Matthew characters in The Visual Bible: Matthew (1993) or Luke's appearance in A.D. (1985) as well as various other scenes where Matthew or John are seen taking their pens with them or noting things down. On the one hand, these touches are light propaganda, not least because they are reasonably unlikely, yet somehow I always find this a nice touch, and here's its no exception.

One particularly interesting element of the film is Jesus' appearance. Isa is played by Ahmad Soleimani-Nia, a veteran of the Iranian army. As this footage was also used as part of an 1000-minute TV series, Soleimani-Nia had to maintain his Christ-like appearance as Jesus for seven years in case they needed to shoot additional scenes (Fleishman).

Soleimani-Nia is strikingly different from any of the film Jesuses that had gone before him. For one thing Isa's long blond curly hair seems far more 'western' than those watching an Islamic take on Jesus might expect. Whilst he would not easily be mistaken for the Jesus of Christian art, there certainly seems to have been some influence; Talebzadeh did, after all, study at New York's Columbia University Film School for several years. Certainly this blond look makes Jesus stand out from the film's other characters who look more typically Iranian than he does. That said Soleimani-Nia's appearance could not be described as western either. Thios makes him a striking figure, but also give him an air of the other-worldly, both at home in this world, but also distinct from it. Whilst none of the canonical gospels, the Qu'ran or the Gospel of Barnabas give a physical description of Jesus, there is some precedent for Isa's appearance from the Hadith. The Hadith of al-Bukhari (vol.4 no.168) describes Jesus as having "curly hair and a reddish complexion" (Tatum 221). This too is different from the film's final portrayal, it may well be a factor in how he is portrayed.

In contrast the rest of the characters feel far more authentic. Just as Soleimani-Nia was a former member of the Iranian military, the rest of the actors seem much more believably like the kind fo people Jesus may rubbed shoulders with. Not only are they more ethnically similar, but there's an ordinariness to them that is absent from the majority of western Jesus films. Similarly, the muted, almost monochrome, costumes feel more authentically like the kind of things peasants of Jesus' time may have worn, as opposed to the bright colours of Hollywood's grandest biblical epics.

Perhaps the most interesting visual aspect of the film, however, is its frequent use of slightly below eye-level camera positions. Filmmakers often drop in the occasional low-level shot to emphasise a certain character's power. Here it is not nearly quite so deferential, but it is used frequently throughout the film. The extent to which it is used suggests that Isa's superiority is not about a certain context or a particular moment, it's something more integral to who he is. The subtlety of the position indicates that whilst Isa is special compared to those around him, he's not that special. He's not a god, just a prophet.

And it's that which seems to be at the heart of this film. Overall it is surprisingly faithful to its source, but that source is clearly the Gospel of Barnabas rather than the canonical gospels. It's this that makes the film so interesting amongst biblical films, even if the extra interpretative step that places between it's viewers and the original events themselves will not be welcome in all quarters.

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- Breitbart (2008) "'Islamic Jesus' hits Iranian movie screens" Jan 13. Retrieved from Web Archive - http://web.archive.org/web/20080115212748/http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=080113231632.1q3rt654&show_article=1

- Fleishman, Jeffrey (2008) "An Iranian's vision of Jesus' life stirs debate" in Los Angeles Times April 29. Retrieved from Web Archive - http://web.archive.org/web/20120113224042/http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/movies/la-fg-jesus29apr29,1,3806018.story

- Tatum, W. Barnes (2004) Jesus: A Brief History (Blackwell Brief Histor. London: Blackwell

The Savior (2013)

One of the most common criticisms of films about Jesus is that the actors chosen for the leading role are either too good-looking, or too white and, not uncommonly, both together. Recent years, though, have seen a bit of a reversal in that particularly trend and what with the performance of part-Tamil Selva Rasalingam in the Lumo Project's Gospel of John finding a wider audience this Easter and Lebanese actor Haaz Sleiman's potrayal in Killing Jesus actors of south Asian descent are started to provide a more ethnically correct Jesus.

But before either of those productions got off the ground, Robert Savo's The Savior had already had its première and had been touring film festivals back in 2013. The film not only stars Israeli-born actor Shredy Jabarin in the lead role - which is of itself, I believe, something of a first - but all the dialogue is in Arabic.

Whilst Jabarin's ethnicity and the filmmaker's decision to opt for a Middle-Eastern language are more quasi-authentic than fully authentic, it does make watching the film interesting and its certainly more authentic than the Hollywood Jesuses with their blue eyes and blond hair.

Moreover it's not a bad little film. Jabarin's performance as Jesus may not quite be divine, but there's hardly a step out of place and he manages to add gravitas without getting dull or stodgy over being overly severe. Jesus smiles occasionally but he always feels like a man with a bigger, more pressing vision on his mind.

There is also some nice camerawork, notably the moment Jesus and the disciples emerge over the hill ready for their fateful trip to Jerusalem, good soundtrack and I particularly enjoyed the film's use of colour and camera filters.

One of the things about Jesus films that is usually quit telling is seeing the episodes from his ministry that the filmmakers choose to include and here the film steers away from many of the scenes that appear in most of the other Jesus biopics. So there's no rescuing the adulteress, or Sermon on the Mount, for example. On the other hand we also get a few episodes from the gospels that appeared in a several of the early Jesus films, but have largely been absent ever after. So there's the exorcism in the local synagogue (Mark 1:21-28); the healing of the widow of Nain's son (Luke 7:11-25) replete with the film's best special effects; the mini-apocalypse of Mark 13; and the discussion with the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4).

Indeed the film manages to pack an awful lot into the first hour or so before Jesus and his disciples arrive in Judea. The nativity story lasts only 15 minutes, the rest of the first hour deals with Jesus' ministry prior to his arrival at the temple. It's able to do this by a combination of economical scene selection combined with the decision to avoid embellishing the story wherever. Whilst it's an interesting approach it perhaps leaves the film a little light on drama and character development. The film tends to whizz from one scene to the next without joining the dots. Each of the scenes, in and of themselves, offer a fairly credible portrayal, but it's not always very clear what motivates the various characters.

One major exception to this however is the long scene of the Last Supper and, in particular, the moment when Jesus washes his disciples feet. It suggests that this demonstration of humility is one of the key points that the filmmakers are trying to stress and that's highlighted still further immediately afterwards when the disciples argue over which of them is the greatest. There's a hint of this in John's gospel, but the contrast is made all the stronger by moving this incident here.

Having said all that there are a few weakness in the film, not least the jarring and rather sporadic use of the narrator, and some of the special effects. The narration device - depicting an elderly Luke sitting down to write - feels very dependent on the Visual Bible's Matthew project and stresses Luke's role. It even opens by emphasising the lengths Luke has to go to just to prepare his ink. But this is a rare device in cinema in general and with good reason. I can see why emphasising the written nature of the text might appeal to those seeking to find common ground with the "people of the book", many of whom speak some form of Arabic, but it adds very little dramatically and the latter parts of the film are all the better for his general absence.

The special effects are also rather mixed. Generally one can accept that a film like this is fairly low budget and may not have the money to invest in impressive special effects; a good film can work around those, indeed as I noted of Ray's King of Kings (1961) some bigger budget films do this anyway. The problem is that most of the effects budget seems to have been used up in the temptation in the desert scene and it doesn't really pay off. I'd be interested to know what proportion of the overall budget went on that scene alone. For some reason it's a common approach to go to town with special effects on this scene and yet the most effective treatments, for me at least, are those where there are no special effects, such as (another big budget film) The Greatest Story Ever Told. Having said all that the angelic scenes are more restrained and I did like the effect used when the widow of Nain's son was brought back to life. I'm quite intrigued to know how they did it.

However, these are fairly minor complaints. Overall the film has a good sense of restraint and is built on fairly sound filmmaking principles. Most of the scenes work well not least because Savo seems to appreciate the restraints he is under and brings out the best with what he has. He knows for example, that many of his actors are not very experienced, so he places a great deal of weight on Jabarin's shoulders, knowing he is up to the task. The dialogue is dramatised but, aside from the narration, not allowed to get bogged down in any particular agenda. And after years of seeing English, American and occasionally European productions the film gives a sense of place, time and sensibility which whilst they may not entirely reflect the first century Palestinian context in which the stories occurred, certainly captures it in a way that few, if any, other films about Jesus do.

More new on the Coptic Jesus Film

It's almost four years since I blogged about plans to make a Coptic Jesus film. The current financial difficulties seem to have accounted for so many Bible film (and other independent) projects that I thought this had been one of them, but, according to Cairo's Al-Ahram, apparently not.

There's quite a bit in the article, not least the news that the project is about to start filming. But it's mainly based on quotes from Muslim director Ahmed Maher,(rather than Coptic Christian screenwriter Fayez Ghali) who sees it as his task "to present a religious story in a secular way". But it looks like Maher is keen to give the film a distinctly Egyptian twist.

he country that embraced Christ the infant when no one else would: "it is important for the West to understand that Egypt...is itself the country that embraced Christ the infant when no one else would. This is the principal issue on which the film is based."

Thanks to David Wilson for letting me know about this article.

Saint Mary and Jesus the Spirit of God on Google Video

Peter Chattaway's blog has been quiet recently whilst he's been at VIFF, but he has popped up at Arts and Faith with a few interesting bits and pieces. Two items that caught my eye in particular were regarding two 'Islamic' Jesus films coming up on Google Video. I've had a copy of Saint Mary, for a while, but it's nice that there's a subtitled version available to view for free. There's also Mesih/Massiah/Jesus the Spirit of God. I couldn't find the video Peter refers to, but it looks like the whole film is available on YouTube. No subtitles for that one unfortunately. Hopefully I'll get a chance to watch these soon.

Arabic Jesus Film - The Resurrected

Photo by Tinou Bao, used under a Creative Commons Licence

Peter Chattaway has posted an article from Variety about a $2 million Jesus film being made in Lebanon. Shooting is due to start in the summer with the aim being for an initial release at Easter 2010. That's starting to look like a busy period; Mary, Mother of the Christ is also due to arrive in cinemas at the same time.

It looks like Lebanese director Samir Habchi (Beirut, Open City) will direct the film, currently named The Resurrected, whilst the actor chosen to play Jesus is called Youssef Al-Khal.

Despite the claims of producers Eagle Pictures / the Marwa Group, there have been a couple of similar projects recently. Back in 2006 there was talk of a Coptic Jesus film and i talked quite a bit last year about the Iranian Jesus production Mesih (a.k.a. Jesus, the Spirit of God).

Like Mesih, the producers are hoping their film will foster "mutual respect... between Christians, Muslims and Jews". Having seen neither film, I'm keen to see how this would work in practice, particularly as elsewhere there's talk of the "redemptive nature of Jesus’ message" and the film's working title obviously refers to a specifically Christian doctrine. The producers plan to take aspects from the canonical gospels but it will be interesting to see if any other ancient sources are also in evidence.

The story will apparently be told from Mary Magdalene's perspective via the use of flasbacks, an idea that was used in 2007's Magdalena, Released from Shame. As they are planning to shoot on the sites where Jesus visited (such as Tyre), it will be interesting to see if they opt to film on either of the two Israeli sites touted as being Mary's supposed home town of Magdala.

LA Times on Jesus Spirit of God

Jeffrey Fleishman of the LA Times has written what I think is the longest article yet on the Iranian Jesus film Jesus Spirit of God (a.k.a. Mesih or The Messiah). There's also and accompanying video file and a brief entry by Fleishman at the LA Times Blog.

There are a few interesting comments on this one. Firstly, it's the first time I recall the actor playing Jesus, Ahmad Soleimani-Nia, being discussed at length. Apparently he's been in character for 7 years as director Nader Talebzadeh "never knows when he might shoot new sequences for the film".

Secondly, Talezadeh seems more evangelistic in this piece than previous articles have suggested. For example, the recent Breitbart article which quoted him as saying he wanted the film to "make a bridge between Christianity and Islam, to open the door for dialogue" and so on. Here, though, he claims to "pray for Christians" and says that "They've been misled. They will realize one day the true story."

Finally the soon to be released TV series of Jesus Spirit of God will apparently run to 1000 hours. That sounds like a long time, but, as Peter Chattaway notes, that's only as long as twenty-two 40-45 minute long episodes, or a series of West Wing if you will.

CNN Video on The Messiah

Yesterday's Biblical Studies Carnival brought my attention to a couple of other bloggers who have been discussing the Iranian Jesus film Mesih (The Messiah). Tony Chartrand-Burke discusses both it and The Aquarian Gospel over at Apocryphicity, and Jim Davila of PaleoJudaica notes a similarity with Life of Brian.

However, the big news is that CNN have a report showing some footage from the film interspersed with some comments from director Nader Talebzadeh. According to that the film will be released over the web shortly. I should warn you, however, that the report contains a major spoiler. I've been trying to get hold of Talebzadeh to get more information, but, as you might imagine, it's not that easy.

ABC on Jesus the Spirit of God

ABC News have interviewed Nader Talebzadeh the director of Mesih the film about Jesus based not only on the canonical gospels, but also The Koran, and, it would seem, the Gospel of Barnabas. The film, which won an award at Rome's Religion Today Film Festival is currently being made into a mini-series, and Talebzadeh was keen to talk about how he thought it could strengthen inter-faith dialogue as well as breakdown misunderstandings between Iran and the US.

Peter Chattaway has also covered this story commenting in partiocular on Talebzadeh's statements about the Gospel of Barnabas.

Another Islamic 'Bible' Film

Firstly a few more bits on Mesih / Jesus, the Spirit of God (the image above [AFP] is of Talebzadeh during filming. It's interesting to note how the two actors pictured are so middle eastern looking, particularly when compared to the film's image of a blond Jesus shown below).

Firstly, the Breitbart article that I discussed a few days ago has disappeared, although it's still available at Islam Online. Secondly, the story has been followed up by an article in Variety which includes the following quotation:

"It is important to show our history before the Islamic revolution," said CMI managing director Mohammed Reza Abbasian. "These episodes of religious history and Iranian history are very popular with Iranian audiences. We want to show the opinions of Islam toward the prophet. This story came from the Koran without any changes. You could call it Jesus through Islam's lens."

But then the article also goes on to discuss the next project by Iran's state broadcaster Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcastingand its production and sales arm Cima Media Intl.

CMI execs have even bigger plans for their follow-up skein, a $20 million version of the life of Joseph and his multi-colored coat, helmed by Farajollah Salahshoor, that is set to be one of Iran's biggest-budget productions ever.

The costly skein could be described as a passion project for its producers, as they will have little chance to ever recoup their money back from foreign sales.

"We have tried to sell it to Arab TV stations, but they say that they cannot show the face of the prophets, and, at the same time, it's not good for European TV," said Abbasian. "The Iranian government is spending its money on the project, but it wasn't supposed to cost this much.

"When you start a project you say it will cost $2 million, but we wanted to film this on 35mm not video so it's become more expensive. We can't stop the project now. We have to spend more money so we can save the money we already spent. Next time, though, we will film with HD or Digi-Beta."

I imagine this will be a more serious take on it than Joseph and the Technicolour Dreamcoat. It'll be interesting to find out how the Joseph story varies in the Koran, and also whether the "coat of many colours" features, given that biblical scholars now consider that particular phrase a mis-translation (it should be coat with long sleeves or something along those lines).

More on Islamic Jesus Film(s)

About a year ago, I made a couple of posts about a possible Muslim-made film about the life of Jesus called The Messiah (official site?). At the time, Peter Chattaway also reported on the story. Now, he's picked it up again linked to an article at Breitbart which discusses what appears to be the same film only with the (new?) title - Jesus, the Spirit of God.

Both Mesih and Jesus, the Spirit of God are by Iranian director Nader Talebzadeh, and were released around some point last year. Indeed Jesus, the Spirit of God won an award in Italy's "Religion Today Film Festival" in 2007. It's also about to be expanded into a 20 part series to run on Iranian national TV.

The same article has been used wholesale in a number of different publications originating with Agence France-Presse, so I'll only reproduce the bit that most caught my eye.

Talebzadeh insists it aims to bridge differences between Christianity and Islam, despite the stark divergence from Christian doctrine about Christ's final hours on earth.

"It is fascinating for Christians to know that Islam gives such devotion to and has so much knowledge about Jesus," Talebzadeh told AFP.

"By making this film I wanted to make a bridge between Christianity and Islam, to open the door for dialogue since there is much common ground between Islam and Christianity," he said.

The director is also keen to emphasise the links between Jesus and one of the most important figures in Shiite Islam, the Imam Mahdi, said to have disappeared 12 centuries ago but whose "return" to earth has been a key tenet of the Ahmadinejad presidency.

[snip]

The bulk of "Jesus, the Spirit of God", which won an award at the 2007 Religion Today Film Festival in Italy, faithfully follows the traditional tale of Jesus as recounted in the New Testament Gospels, a narrative reproduced in the Koran and accepted by Muslims.

But in Talebzadeh's movie, God saves Jesus, depicted as a fair-complexioned man with long hair and a beard, from crucifixion and takes him straight to heaven.

"It is frankly said in the Koran that the person who was crucified was not Jesus" but Judas, one of the 12 Apostles and the one the Bible holds betrayed Jesus to the Romans, he said. In his film, it is Judas who is crucified.

Weird Goings on with Koranic Jesus Films

On Friday I posted about one, or is it two, film(s) about Jesus written from the perspective of the Koran. By accident I missed off the link for a website which seemed to belong to one of them (or was it a third film). So I went back today to try and correct the error. Yet strangely, over the weekend, the site seems to have disappeared. It's still available on Google cache (where would we be without Google cache?), but otherwise it seems to have gone without trace. I can't help the darker side of my imagination running away with this one.

Meanwhile, Peter Chattaway has done some research on this one, and he seems to think that the film Son of Mary isn't so much of a Jesus film as one where Jesus makes a cameo appearance in a modern day story. Oh, and it seems to be 8 years old (blush). IMDB doesn't have any details for either film, although Peter finds the following capsule review for Son of Mary from the New York Times:

An unlikely friendship between a young Muslim child and an aging Catholic priest forms the basis for this touching story. Moshen Falsafin plays a little boy whose mother died in childbirth. A good student who works hard to help his father, he is troubled by one thought -- he does not know what his mother looked like. When the boy meets a priest (Rafik Dergabrilian) and expresses his concern, the cleric suggests the boy imagine his mother looked like his portrait of the Virgin Mary. Pesareh Maryam/Son Of Mary was the directorial debut of noted Iranian actor Hamid Jebeli.

Koranic Jesus Film(s) - The Son of Mary / The Messiah

I've received two pieces of news in the last 24 hours about a film being made about Jesus based on the Qu'ranic accounts of his life. Last month, I discussed Iranian film St. Mary which looks at the story of Jesus's mother from the Koran. I received a comment on that post from Ali who says "Soon to be released is the Farsi movie, The Messiah, a movie about the life of Jesus Christ (according to the Qur'an)". He indicates that it's being distributed by the Jafria Association of North America. From what I can work out the website from this film might be this one.

Then earlier today I got an email from my friend Thomas Langkau who is in the latter stages of getting his book about Jesus Films, "Filmstar Jesus Christus" published (more to follow on that later). He pointed out this website to me which, like his book, is in German. A very rough translation of it is as follows:

Iranian Jesus Film at Catholic Festival

The Iranian director Hamid Jebelli is showing the life Jesus from the view-point of the Koran.

The Iranian film about Jesus Christ is one of the high points of the Mirror-Image-Ritual Film Festivals "Tertio Millennio", which takes place at present in Rome. Director of the Iranian film "The Son of Mary" is Hamid Jebelli, a Muslim. The film represents the Koranic view of the history of Jesus.

"Voices of the spirit" in the film production

The festival is organized by the magazine "Rivista del Cinematografo" together with the Italian catholic play combination. The director/conductor of the festival, Andrea Piersanti stressed, it is a matter of hearing the "voice of the spirit in the film production of the present".

There are a couple things to add to this. Firstly, it's unclear whether these are two different films or not. Certainly it seems quite a coincidence that two films about Jesus based on the Koran have come to the fore at the same time. But then the titles are different, although obviously that often is the case when films are translated into different languages.

Secondly, I wonder how these movies/this movie will film Jesus. As an Islamic prophet I'd imagine he is unlikely to appear on screen, or has this film decided to ignore that? If not will it film the story through his eyes like The Message, or Lance Tracy's The Cross (which it would appear is now available on DVD)?

Finally, FilmChat has linked to shiachat.com where there is some more discussion about the St Mary film, in relation to The Nativity Story

Saint Mary Iranian film

My friend Peter Chattaway recently interviewed Shohreh Aghdashloo at the junket for The Nativity Story (Aghdashloo plays Elizabeth). Along the way, she mentioned an Iranian made film called Saint Mary which neither Peter or I were aware of.

Peter's done some research and written a post on the film which includes finding the retailers website, which includes a montage of clips from the film. A different selection of clips are available on YouTube in Farsi (with English subtitles).

One thing Peter doesn't mention is that the film would appear to be primarily based on the Qu'ran. Sura 3 discusses the birth of Mary, including some indications that Israel's deliverer was already expected at that point, and Surah 19 deals with Mary's role in the birth of Jesus. I notice that Aghdashloo declared that "Obviously it's been distorted, it's not the real story" in the interview. I'm not sure whether this is a reference to it being based on the Qu'ran rather than the bible (and if this was the Grace Hill organised event she would have known Peter was a Christian) or just to the fact that padding out either version of the story to fill its incredible 6 hour run time.

Whilst the original is in Farsi it is available to buy in an English dubbed version in a number of different countries (including the US and the UK). There was also a screening of the film last year, put on by the Islamic Centre of England

A Coptic / Arabic Jesus Film?

Jeffrey Overstreet has discovered news about plans to make a Jesus film in Arabic. It's a plan between Coptic Christian Fayez Ghali, and a Muslim producer Mohammed Uchub/Ashub/Ashoub, and has already caused quite a stir, even though it would appear that the film is a long way from being made. In particular, when they requested authorisation from Al-Azhar, an ancient mosque that has extended to become an academic institution, and the "highest authority in Sunni Islam",¹ they were told that "the image of the prophet [Jesus should] not appear".

Peter T Chattaway has rounded up a number of different news articles on the story, so I recommend you read his post and the various links he has assembled.

One thing that does seem strange is that there are already two films that provide something of a precedent here. Firstly, the Jesus film (1979), has, of course, been translated into Arabic already. Secondly, as others have pointed out, The Passion of the Christ played in Egypt without problems. Indeed some cited its generally positive reception as evidence of its anti-Semitism.

Part of the reason I was slow out of the blocks on this one is that I'm not overly optimistic that it will ever get made. I hope it does. Whilst I eagerly anticipate seeing this years' films such as Son of Man and Color of the Cross, which have black actors playing Jesus, I long for the day that a Jewish / Middle Eastern actor plays him. I am amazed that no-one has done this yet. Of course Carl Dreyer spent 16 years trying to make a film about the Jewish Jesus. (There is an interesting Variety article on this). It seems strange that so long after that project failed we are still awaiting another one - despite the frequent aspirations to realism that Jesus film directors routinely trot out. Anyway, hopefully this will be the first film to use someone from Jesus' part of the world to take on the role.

1 - "Al Azhar objects to Egyptian-made Jesus movie", Middle Eastern Times, International Edition. March 20, 2006
2 - "Egypt: Muslims Oppose Planned Film On Jesus" - AllAfrica.com