The Nativity

I agree with the other reviewers. This retelling of the Christian nativity story is a very pleasant surprise. No one is surrounded by any weird glows; schmaltzy music does not swell every three minutes. Angels are not accompanied by sparkly fog. The storyline contains no surprises, of course. The biggest liberty the screenwriters take is to speed up the wise men's arrival.

I've always wondered why nativity retellings didn't make more of the Joseph character. This one finally does, and it turns out that treating Joseph as a three-dimensional character central to the plot worked even better than I thought it would. This Joseph is fully believable and just as conflicted and confused as one would expect. He is a good man who wants to be good to his word and who fully expected his fiancée to be true to hers. This treatment made me realize that Joseph's story is probably more relevant to regular humans than those of the other characters. Joseph is fully human, non-divine, non-chosen, no one special--a regular Joe (sorry!) just like you and me. He had the choice to trust and risk looking like a world-class chump, or to protect his pride by refusing to trust. That's a dilemma that is worth watching, even if you know how the story comes out in the end.

I was a bit nervous about watching this beforehand, worried that it would bring make memories of excruciating school plays and the like. I needn't have worried.

This turns out to be a piece of heartwarming television. The scriptwriter makes pains to allow the viewer to enter this historical world by bringing the characters to life with both realism and warmth. The attention to detail is fine, and the Moroccan backdrops are more than up to the job.

Aside from some dodgy CGI graphics of planetary shifts (left over from the latest DR WHO, perhaps) the BBC have done themselves proud here, with the ending particularly moving/everything you could have hoped to see. It's not often I get to commend the BBC for both sincerity and sensitivity, but both are in abundance here.

This was great stuff. It was delighted to stumble across this BBC mini series from 2010 over the course of the festive break.

It's a really clever idea to reimagine the story that we've seen and heard told in so many different ways but from a modern (well, 2010) approach.

It's written by Tony Jordan of EastEnders fame too, so that's another mark of quality.

The characters have never been so engaging or relatable, and that's no bad thing.

This is well written and well performed drama, that just happens to be a retelling of The Nativity.

It does rather rush its final episode though, but other than that this was great.

If you are going to attempt to create a series based on Biblical stories, at least open your Bible and read it, study the culture of the Jewish people during that era, and have at least a basic understanding of the religion! This was the absolute worst attempt at casting I have ever seen. The actors and actresses from Mary to Thomas were badly cast with people not even remotely interesting, and belonged in a Hollywood movie from the 60s not a Jewish/Christian movie about the birth of Christ. This was an epic fail from the movie set to the costumes. I was turned off within the first 30 minutes! If I could have given this series zero stars I would have done so, but I was forced to give it an undeserving 1 star.

It popped up on my kindle. I'm a fan of The Chosen and Dallas Jenkins' The Shephards, but productions can - and need to - stand on their own two feet even with the bar set so high. I watched the first episode opf The Nativity and about 2 minuites into the 2nd, but am stopping there.

Set design and costumes are superbly done. But what's with the 3 kings mention of Saturn and Jupiter? And desert might be hard to find in England, but I'm quite sure Joseph and Mary couldn't wander off alone together to hang out in greenery OR in the desert during their betrothal. They were lucky if they got to see each other much - supervised - much less UNsupervised.

Gabriel - we don't need light and drama theatrics but this is an angel who is frequently in the glory of God. I know people who have vision and have seen angels - the warrior ones are young, strong, and carry some serious weapons. Their light is often substantial. Gabriel may not be a general warrior angel, but I'm quite sure he isn't old with a slightly dirty face and a quite non-white garment, especially spending so much time in Heaven.

The Chosen provides backstories to the gospels, but they are credible and are plausible and scripturally accurate even so. The scene with Mary and Gabriel was....not so much on either count. A little too much liberty there. In fact - Mary saying "I don't believe you" is even a harsher version of what. Zechariah said to Gabriel (How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years.") and that got HIM mute for Elizabeth's pregnancy with John the Baptist.

And while we're at it, could we at least have had Mary say something along the lines of "Let it be done according to His will" rather than just smile charmingly and Gabriel disappears?

Interspersed with the backstory are scenes of them approaching Bethlehem. Episode 1 begins with it. I was like "Is Joseph mad at Mary? What's up with that?" Beginning of episode 2 - yes, joseph is very cool to Mary. Well, okay, he might have been, but he also had a dream and decided to marry her, and had to stick by her in some difficult times so.......what's his deal?

A narrative summary about The Nativity says they have trouble in Bethlehem too. Bethelehm was very far away from Nazareth. Additionally, Mary and Joseph are nobodies from a nowhere town. That anyone would know them in Bethlehem seems a bit far fatched - but it makes for good drama I guess.

If the deviation is that great this early on, and the fiction is this IMplausable so far, I can only assume it continues or gets worse.

2023 had a cute little musical movie called Bethlehem - that one took some serious license also, but was light hearted with song and dance. Kind of a kids' thing that put a smile on adult faces. But this one takes has too many errors in its presentation of the story's reverence.