Guest AuthorI went to see the new movie Son of God last weekend with a group from my church. I knew I was in trouble when 30 minutes into the film I’m wondering how I could get up and leave without being branded a heretic and cast into the outer darkness. Two hours later, I stumbled out of the theater wondering what day it was.
It’s no good complaining about the ways this movie disappoints, mainly because its intended audience isn’t going to care very much about the flaws. They’re there to vicariously experience something approximating what it might have been like to follow Jesus around, if he looked Portuguese rather than Palestinian and everyone, including the Romans, spoke idiomatic English. But, since it’s my time and space to waste, here are a few complaints anyway.
No matter what you think of the Gospel accounts, the life of Jesus has to be considered pretty darn dramatic. With the notable exception of Pier Paolo Pasolini’s The Gospel According to St. Matthew, past attempts at putting it on film have proved only partly successful. But Son of God manages a rare feat, washing most of the drama right out of the story.
Perhaps the filmmakers’ hearts were in the right place. I don’t doubt their sincerity in trying to faithfully capture Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. But there is nothing compelling about this portrayal of the one whose followers called him Christos, anointed, chosen, divine. Why anyone might follow this movie’s amiable guy named Jesus would be a mystery to someone watching the film who knew nothing about him. Oh, look, he just raised someone from the dead, how nice.
Usually, Jesus films depend heavily on the actor carrying the role, but in this case it is not the fault of Portuguese actor Diogo Morgado. He gives it a game try, but he’s hamstrung by the tepid script and direction.
The evangelical magazine Christianity Today gave Son of God 2½ stars out of 4 and compared it to listening to a pretty good tribute band playing covers of top 40 songs you know by heart. That apt description points up a bigger question – why are these “faith-based” films, with very occasional exceptions, so mediocre? There is just no expertise in their execution. Small example: Jesus’ mother, Mary, looks (and acts) more like a soccer mom than a First Century Jewish teenage peasant. Please. We get the tribute band, not the original.
It’s illuminating that at the Academy Awards on Sunday, Gravity – in some ways a much more spiritually profound film than Son of God – won seven Oscars. It’s the drama of a woman who, when pushed to the most extreme perils imaginable, discovers transcendence, and, in the hands of professionals like actress Sandra Bullock and director Alfonso Cuarón, the film has the power to convince us of truths about ourselves.
In Son of God, we get showiness as a substitute for real dramatic power. The producers behind the film, Roma Downey and Mark Burnett, are known for their TV series, Touched by an Angel, Survivor and the miniseries The Bible, from which many of the scenes in Son of God were culled. This film has the same kind of hokiness and over-reliance on special effects as those TV shows.
I needn’t have worried about being castigated if I had chosen not to stick it out to the end. In spite of the applause in the theater after the movie – finally – ended, the fellow church-goers I spoke with were not particularly impressed. The general feeling was “eh, it was OK.”
Not exactly what you want when you’re watching a film about the savior of the world.
Cary McMullen is writer and editor who lives in Lakeland, Fla.
