King of Kings (film)


 * For the 1927 Cecil B. DeMille film, see The King of Kings


 * Name - King of Kings
 * Caption - film poster by Reynold Brown
 * Imdb id - 0055047
 * Producer - Samuel Bronston
 * Director - Nicholas Ray
 * Writer - Philip Yordan, Ray Bradbury (uncredited)
 * Starring - Jeffrey Hunter Siobhán McKenna Robert Ryan
 * Music - Miklós Rózsa
 * Cinematography - Manuel Berenguer Milton R. Krasner Franz Planer
 * Editing - Harold F. Kress Renée Lichtig
 * Distributor - MGM
 * Released - October 11, 1961
 * Runtime - 168 minutes

King of Kings (1961) is an American motion picture epic made by Samuel Bronston Productions and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It is a retelling of the story of Jesus from his birth to his crucifixion and Resurrection.

Synopsis
An earlier silent film about Jesus Christ was titled The King of Kings, released in 1927 and directed by Cecil B. DeMille, and starring H.B. Warner as Jesus. Director Nicholas Ray's 1961 version places Jesus's life in the political context of Roman conquest. As Jesus becomes an active preacher and healer, his activities are contrasted with the political stance of Barabbas and his insurgents who battle against the Roman occupiers.

Barabbas, rather than being shown in only one scene as the murderer whose freedom is offered to the mob in exchange for Jesus' life (as is usually done in film versions of the life of Christ), plays a major role throughout King of Kings. He is depicted as an incendiary figure fighting Roman domination, and a good friend of Judas Iscariot. Judas believes that he can persuade Barabbas to embrace Christ as a liberator, and that he can influence Christ to literally take up arms against Rome, but Barabbas becomes disillusioned after listening to the Sermon on the Mount. It is then that Judas decides to betray Christ to the Romans.

Production
The film features scenes of Jesus' miracles and his Sermon on the Mount (shot with many thousands of extras), as well as a scene where Jesus visits John the Baptist in his dungeon during his imprisonment by Herod Antipas. Ray staged the scene in such a way that John the Baptist must crawl up an incline inside the dungeon, holding out his hand to reach for Jesus' hand: a vivid example of Ray's architectural sense of composition and visual drama (Ray had studied under Frank Lloyd Wright to become an architect).

Nicholas Ray's direction balances spectacle with the human drama of Jesus's life. In the Sermon on the Mount sequence, Ray also conveys the central ethical-religious messages of Jesus' teachings. As such, the film can be seen as a model of the epic where grandeur serves to underscore the content. King of Kings is also memorable for the music score by Miklós Rózsa, a Hungarian emigre composer who composed the music for MGM's Ben-Hur (1959) and many other epic films.

The production was photographed in Technirama by Manuel Berenguer, Milton R. Krasner and Franz Planer, and was presented in 70mm Super Technirama at selected first-run engagements.

Not credited at the time, Orson Welles did the voiceover of the narration, written by Ray Bradbury.

Reception
Some have criticized it for showing a Jesus who was too "white bread" and a very subdued John the Baptist. The film was panned by publications such as Time magazine, and even by critics such as the New York Times's Bosley Crowther. It was the only one of MGM's religious epics to fail at the box office, but it has come to be regarded since as one of the finest cinematic versions of the life of Christ. According to the Internet Movie Database, the film had a budget of $6,000,000, and made $25,000,000 worldwide as of 1989, tallying together worldwide cinema showings, video rentals, and video sales.

Most films at the time did not show Jesus's face, preferring to do shots of his hands (as in Ben-Hur) or over-the-shoulder views. King of Kings was the first major studio sound film in English to actually show Christ's face, and as such, was a pioneering effort. Jeffrey Hunter's youthful appearance (although he was 33 when cast) caused some to nickname the film "I Was a Teenage Jesus," a parody from the Michael Landon film I Was a Teenage Werewolf. However, Brigid Bazlen's performance has been evaluated as being superb, with her Dance of the Seven Veils of a drunken lascivious Herod winning her rave reviews and being widely regarded as her best performance.

When the movie was released on DVD in 2003, it received a PG-13 rating for some violent content.

Primary cast

 * Jeffrey Hunter as Jesus
 * Siobhán McKenna  as Mary
 * Robert Ryan as John the Baptist
 * Ron Randell as Lucius
 * Hurd Hatfield as Pontius Pilate
 * Viveca Lindfors as Claudia
 * Rita Gam as Herodias
 * Frank Thring as Herod Antipas
 * Royal Dano as Peter
 * Rip Torn as Judas Iscariot
 * Harry Guardino as Barabbas
 * Carmen Sevilla as Mary Magdalene
 * Brigid Bazlen as Salomé
 * Guy Rolfe as Caiaphas
 * Gregoire Aslan as Herod the Great