Gospel of John Review
by Harvey S. Karten (harveycritic AT cs DOT com)November 6th, 2003
THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
Reviewed by: Harvey S. Karten
Grade: B
THINKfilm
Directed by: Philip Saville
Written by: John Goldsmith
Cast: Henry Ian Cusick, Daniel Kash, Richard Lintern, Stephen Russell, Scott Handy, Stuart Bunce, Lynsey Baxter, Christopher Plummer
Screened at: Review 2, NYC, 11/10/03
Philip Saville's ambitious, 3-hour movie is filled with characters who are Jews for Jesus but who not only did not require T-shirts and aggressive stumping on big-city sidewalks to prove their group identity but in many cases actually sought to hide their affiliation. Why so? They were afraid of the big, bad Jewish authorities in the Holy Land of two millennia ago, tough- looking fellas with big beards, fine-looking tallises, and voices that regularly took on the seriousness of Cecil B. DeMille's Old Testament heroes. These Pharisees, as the ultra-orthodox leaders of the Roman-ruled Jerusalem and surrounding areas were called, pretty much get all the blame for the crucifixion of Jesus even as writer John Goldsmith tries to remove some of the guilt with the words that crucifixion was the Roman, and not the Jewish, method of execution. Philip Saville's "The Gospel of John," which will begin hitting the screens three months before the far more publicized Mel Gibson vehicle, "The Passion of Christ," will probably not generate the audience of the latter given the huge publicity given not only to "Passion" but to the beliefs of Mr. Gibson himself. Still, folks watching "The Gospel of John" are not going to leave the theater any more freed of their view that the Jewish lawgivers were responsible for the death of Jesus than they will be after taking in the Gibson work. At least they'll realize that perhaps a majority of Jews in those areas of the Holy Land traveled by Jesus were downright converts to Jesus' brand of Judaism.
"The Gospel of John" is based on the last of the four books of gospels, one which was written a couple of generations after the death and resurrection of Jesus, and is purportedly the interpretation that gives Jesus his most human attributes. Not at all like the stern, white-bearded Moses depicted by Charlton Heston in C.B. DeMille's 1956 film "The Ten Commandments," Jesus's role is all too human. Therein lies part of the problem, since Philip Saville's picture does not mimic the vivid storytelling that we've come to expect of Biblical epics. We do not see the birth in the manger, whereas DeMille's Moses is shown from birth and abandonment through manhood, slavery and trials in leading the Jews out of Egypt. There are miracles this time around, but nothing like the parting of the Red Sea, and Jesus' walking on water is simply not convincing. Nor does Jesus' turning of water into wine, the resurrection of the four-days' dead Lazarus, the production of oodles of breads and fish, the curing of a blind man and a paralyzed fellow stand up to Moses's staff's turning into a snake.
Still, that was not the intent of the team that put across this film, opening on 200 screens by Thanksgiving. The aim is to keep the humanity in the Messiah while giving new life to the American Bible Society's "Good News Bible," produced by Toronto-based Visual Bible International. The rendition is a literal one, with Christopher Plummer's narration heard throughout, giving the production the feeling of a Sunday-school sermon while Jesus occasionally delivers his orations peppered with so much insistence that "I'm telling you the truth," you might start to believe that he's a used-car salesman.
There's much going for the film, nonetheless. Shot in Spain with interiors gussied up in Toronto, the production, which comes to us from the Toronto Film Festival, is populated with performers from such prestigious groups as the Royal Shakespeare Company which gives you a good idea of the cast's tolerance with long monologues by the man who claims to have no authority of his own, only that of a messenger from his Father in heaven.
While the title character, John (Stuart Bunce), enjoys just a few intermittent moments on the screen, particularly in carrying out baptisms and insisting that he's a nobody compared to Jesus, Henry Ian Cusick fills the role of the human being who has a couple of contradictions. He preaches non-violence and a non-judgmental attitude ("let him who is without sin cast the first stone," to a bloodthirsty group of guys who want to execute an adulteress) yet shocks the people of the temple by overturning the tables of the moneychangers and, like a loyal member of PETA, freeing the lambs from the pens and the chickens from their cages. Unlike an American politician, he is not afraid to tell the same message to both his growing hordes of Jewish followers and the Pharisees who are threatened by desertions from their form of ritual.
Henry Ian Cusick, who dominates the proceedings, causing the people around him to be either wide-eyed with awe or with eyes flashing with hatred, is a Peru-born gent, raised in Trinidad and Scotland and now living in England. Having performed stage roles such as that of Cassio in "Othello" and Demetrius in "A Midsummer Night's Dream," he bears a theater-person's charisma, able to smile and chit-chat with his disciples at times while in other situations he stands up to his envious body of antagonists.
Whether or not you're carried away with enthusiasm for a pretty literal "The Gospel of John" or dismiss the picture as the sort of propaganda you might get from purveyors of Jehovah's Witness cadres, the film is probably nothing new to those imbued with the faith while a pleasant if not particularly moving substitute for Sunday morning brunch.
Rated R. 180 minutes.(c) 2003 by Harvey Karten at
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