La pasión de nuestro señor Jesucristo

This is one of the earliest versions depicting the life of Christ. And what a film it is! It's partly colourised (but only parts of most frames). So you get a movie made over a hundred years ago hand coloured and 44 minutes long which is much longer than the average films of the time (1-5 minutes). This was made to last, you can tell - the effort it took to hand- colour hundreds of feet of film and shoot that length with so many decorations.

The opening scene - The Annunciation is clearly made in a setting inspired by the Italian Renaissance art, just like the Last Supper scene later in the film. And if you put yourself back in those days where film was just coming out of its embryonic state, as it were, people were used to seeing paintings, pictures and frescoes, and of course, those films were made to look like those paintings only moving, which was in a way a miracle of a painting coming alive. Static camera shots (there was no zooming or panning of camera at the time) only add to that effect. In this film, however, they used camera panning in two of the scenes.

As I mentioned, it's whopping 44 minutes long and the director managed to fit the events of entire life of Christ into it - from Annunciation to Ascension (Mel Gibson had 2 hours of running time and managed to fit only a quarter of the events - just teasing). So it is like a visual Bible reminiscent of those stained glass windows in cathedrals called the Poor Man's Bible made not only for beauty and inspiration but also for those who couldn't read (which was the vast majority of the population as books were rare and very expensive). So the film is also made of stand-alone parts or scenes, just like those windows. The other thing to mention is that it is made in a fashion of passion plays (hence the English name of the film). In good old days those were very common throughout Europe for many centuries wherein actors performed scenes from the life of Christ and saints in towns around the holy days. So, clearly the settings in this film look very much like open theatre stage decorations. However, the progress, it seems was made in shooting some open air scenes as well. They also used special effects - combined shots. Some are really incredible for the time, like the walking on water in the catching of fish scene or transfiguration scene or or the scene with lightning on Calvary. And so... the development in film-making continues...

The film runs at normal speed so there's no fast moving comic effect everyone is used to. And the actors face quite a difficult task: there was no speech possible as they were used to in theatre and had very limited use of facial expressions (there were no close-up camera shots at the time, although they made two here), so they only had to make use of their body language and arms, which looks a bit over the top at times. There are no title cards in the film apart from the scene titles, so the viewer is meant to know at least the basics of the four Gospels, which was, I'm sure, a lot more common back then than today. Enjoy, highly recommended.

This is an interesting film in a few respects, if not necessarily a very good or entertaining one. It's an early filmed passion play and chronicle of the life of Jesus Christ and is of both religious and film history interest. It becomes more of curio because of its length and extravagance for a film made in the early 1900s. It seems to be the longest story film made to that date. There had been some actuality, or documentary, films already made that were longer, including some boxing matches and a series called "Army Life" (1900) by R.W. Paul. Nevertheless, film subjects lasting near or longer than 40 minutes were rare until the 1910s.

Jesus has been a popular subject throughout film history, perhaps nevermore so than in the beginning of its history. Before this film, quite a few passion plays had already been filmed. Moreover, these films were generally longer and more elaborate than were other subjects. In 1897, when the cinema was barely more than a year old and when nearly every film was one shot-scene and under a minute in length, a Frenchman named Léar filmed a passion play of 12 scenes, which received popular distribution in Britain and the US, as well as in France. George Hatot's "La Vie et la Passion de Jésus-Christ" (1897/1898), produced by the Lumiére Company, had 13 tableaux. An American passion play, featuring Horitz villagers, was supposedly even grander and longer. Shortly thereafter, "The Passion Play of Oberammergau" (1898), which probably didn't have much of anything to do with the plays performed in the village of Oberammergau, contained over 20 scenes. Sigmund Lubin also made a passion play claiming, but lacking, authenticity to the Oberammergau performances. With a lecturer and magic lantern slides, these films would provide as long an entertainment as does the modern feature-length film. In 1899, Alice Guy made "La Vie de Christ" in 11 tableaux for Gaumont, and again, in 1906, made a passion play of, reportedly, 25 scenes. Pathé, in fact, had made a film on Christ before this picture; their 1900 release consisted of 16 scenes. They, too, would go on to make another one after this, in 1907.

According to film historian Richard Abel ("The Ciné Goes to Town"), there were a few versions of this film sold to exhibitors, and exhibitors may have had the option to purchase individual scenes and may have further edited various passion plays together (these were common practices back then, when exhibitors retained much editorial control over films). Abel says Pathé filmed this over three different periods; others say this production lasted from 1902 to 1905. Actors and styles changed during shootings. The version available from Image Entertainment seems to be complete, if not more than (with the title of "Passion and Death of Christ"). Abel says the longest version was 32 tableaux. Yet, I counted 35 tableaux separated by title cards and 46 total shots in the version from Image Entertainment.

In the beginning of the history of cinema as an international business, Georges Méliès was the most popular and innovative filmmaker, and, consequently, his films were the most often imitated. Supposedly, this film avoided any reference to prior theatrical productions, says Abel. Upon a second viewing of this film, however, I noticed that this Pathé production, like so many other Pathé films, significantly copies the féeries/fairy films of Méliès. This is especially evident in the soft, fanciful set designs, and the device of female angels guiding characters and events being a variation of the female fairies in Méliès's fantasy pictures. Additionally, the use of stop-substitutions and superimpositions for trick effects, moving props, and dissolves between scenes and trick effects were trademarks of Méliès adopted religiously by Pathé. The use in this film of many actors or extras to fill and decorate some scenes, which often serve no narrative purpose or biblical fidelity, was also done in Méliès's féeries. This imitation of Méliès's films makes this passion play stand out from the drab, realist set designs that seemed to have been used in other such early passion plays and the location shooting used in later films such as "From the Manger to the Cross" (1912) and the Christus films made in Italy. They're also in stark contrast to the more realist painted sets used by Ferdinand Zecca, the co-director of "The Life and Passion of Christ" and Pathé's studio manager for a time, in "Historie d'une crime" (1901).

Most of the technique and style in "The Life and Passion of Christ" is common of film-making in the beginning, but there are some notable exceptions. Not many prints from this period exist with tinting, which doesn't seem to have been a prevalent practice yet ("Scrooge; or Marley's Ghost" (1901) is another early example). It's also an early example of Pathé's patented stencil coloring, and their use of bold, red lettering and the rooster logo in the title cards. Pans are used often, including in the Nativity scene, where a pan and tinting changes move the scene between the indoor action of the nativity and the outdoor action of the approaching wise men and gang. Another example of three scenes in one via panning is the Mount of Olives/Kiss of Judas tableaux, where the camera follows Jesus into and out of the woodlands. I haven't seen this kind of extensive panning anywhere else in story films this early in film history (extensive panning was widely done by actuality filmmakers). The use of a window to show outside action is another example of early alternatives to scene dissection (of which there is very little here or in most early films). There's also a match-on-action shot in The Holy Family at Nazareth tableaux, and two medium insert shots later in the film, which are rather unexpected departures from the film's mostly fixed camera, head-on long shot framing tableaux style. I certainly recommend this for those interested in the history of Christianity and cinema.

The story of Jesus Christ from the proclamation of his Nativity to his crucifixion. Impressive scenes and dynamism of the actors prelude to the Italian colossal movies of the silent period.

Few people, I think, appreciate how the bible has been reinvented in the last century. Until this very film, what we had were words, stories in words. For centuries, those written stories were illustrated in static icons and symbols complex and simple. With this film, we began a new era, where religion is cinematic. American Fundamental Christianity and Indian neoHinduism are currently in the lead, nearly completely transformed by the moving icon and the ghostly eye. Prayer has literally been redefined and no amount of thumping will restore the imagination as a personal relationship with God again. Not one with an INNER eye.

Its why the Fundamentalist Film School down the road from me at Pat Robertson's empire is so interesting. They change the thing by bearing witness, in a sort of quantum effect.

It all started here, but you won't find much to indicate so. What we have with this first instance are two things. First is the implicit proposal that as "the greatest story," it deserved the greatest, fullest, longest treatment.

The second is the interesting stuff. This is literally closer to moving stained glass than films of today. Its quite beautifully painted if you see it that way. Its staged as tableaux, with little movement and none from the camera which is at eye level. There are "miraculous" appearances and disappearances, which is how the filmmakers would have seen the promise of film. The much noted fades are harder to notice. I'll take the historian's word that these French fellows invented the fade. It is remarkable how they worked it though with the color. Because you see the color fade, so they must have painted before optically splicing. Its a mystery to me.

I'll just take it on faith.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

With the invention of a new medium of narrative and communication, it was inevitable that the story of "the life and passion of Christ" (the film's original title) would immediately attract the attention of those seeking to dabble in the nascent enterprise. This primitive artifact is of historical value not for being the very first film to deal with these events but because it was later considered to be the first feature-length film ever released...despite the fact that, running just under 45 minutes, it isn't one technically and besides, it was originally shown in segments in serial-like fashion!

What I find more important, however, is the fact that for the next few years after its making, rather than setting up newer and more elaborate productions, it was being exploited by exhibitors by getting re-edited and distributed under various aliases. The version I watched, subdivided into virtually split-second re-enactments of the most famous incidents in Christ's life on Earth, was predictably bland on a technical and artistic level with the usual drawbacks of overly emphatic acting and stagey movement. What to say, then, about the extremely hirsute and curiously chubby actor chosen to portray the all-important central role?

Even so, it proved pleasant enough to watch given the sheer ingenuity (hand coloring specific objects, like angels' wings or soldiers' robes, for added effect) utilized to straightforwardly convey familiar material for mass consumption. Occasionally there was also the odd sparkle of inventiveness, with the angel literally obfuscating the Holy Family from Herod's pursuing soldiers in the land of Egypt. Also, I have to say the print was in much better shape than a century-old footage has any right to be. Divine intervention, perhaps?