Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

A story that's too fascinating to pass by...

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

. . . directly ordered from producer\director Cecille B. DeMille by God Himself, according to one of the first Intertitles of KING OF KINGS. Therefore, it's obviously sacrilegious to rate this movie below a perfect score of "10." It would be nice if ALL of the world's religions could lend themselves to film adaptations, since some have hundreds of such flicks in circulation. Others behead film makers, which is the ultimate outrage against practitioners of Film AS Religion. One of several fallacious charges made against this 1927 silent, KING OF KINGS, is that it helped inspire the Nazis to "sell" the Holocaust as a revenge killing. However, Caiaphus, the High Priest of Israel, says on an Intertitle card after the rending of the veil over the Holy of Holies, "I ALONE am guilty" for Jesus' execution. Even if Hitler did not grasp that this confessed crucifixion mastermind was long dead and buried by 1927, other Germans were around to fill him in and point out that under this blame-the-Jews logic, he also should be attacking Pontius Pilate's Italian descendant Mussolini, instead of being so Palsy Walsy with him. Controversy aside, is this a MORE authoritative religious film than THE LIFE OF BRIAN or APOCALYPTO? Don't forget they're putting on the Council of Massachusetts on the Boston Commons Feb. 29 to set the canon for the Church of Filmogy. Buffers can be part of it, or be apocrypha.

I have no idea exactly what it means, but the DVD I watched of "The King of Kings" was the roadshow version. Why called 'roadshow' I have no idea, but it's significantly longer than the official version released to the general public. So, it has more than a half hour additional footage. Exactly what extra it has, I really don't know.The film is interesting because it is different from some other films about the life of Christ. It does not start with his birth but begins in the weeks before his crucifixion. As for Jesus, his version starring H.B. Warner is pretty good--mostly because he lacks the ridiculously long hair and angelic visage in some films. He does, occasionally, sport a halo--a rather old fashioned look. However, he is a bit more human than some Jesus portrayals--as he smiles a bit. I wish that Jesus smiled a lot more in films and behaved like a more normal guy, but I have yet to see this sort of Christ in film. And, while it might sound morbid, I wish the crucifixion had been a bit more bloody and realistic (I am NOT talking about to the extent of "The Passion of the Christ", but there is practically no blood at all in the "The King of Kings")--an impossibility.In some ways, the story seems a bit more like a Catholic version of the last days of Jesus. Mary is a very traditionally Catholic one--in headdress and with doves--almost angelic. Also, like the Catholics and Church of England, there is an emphasis on the notion of a 'holy grail'--that glowed with mystical powers. These are not so much complaints--more just observations.What I did have a complaint about, however, is the odd timeline used in the film. Again and again, verses and Biblical accounts are mixed up chronologically--with events from early in a Gospel appearing late in his life. In other words, instead of writing a script, it looked almost like they just randomly picked verses from a hat. So, despite lots of verses being used on the intertitle cards (a good touch), the sequence just did not seem all that important--at least not until the last portion of the movie that centered on the death and resurrection. A bit of research and effort would have made a more historically accurate script.Now although I have complained a bit, there isn't that much to dislike about the film--especially in light of when it was made. The sets and costumes are what you'd expect from a Cecil B. DeMille film--top-notch and quite expensive. And, unlike some of DeMille's later works, this film is much more respectful of the characters and is not inundated with smut (yes, smut--as DeMille's early Christian epic "The Sign of the Cross" had bestiality, lesbianism and all sorts of shocking topics in a Christian epic). Additionally, the Two-Color Technicolor was a terrific addition at the beginning and end of the film--really state of the art for 1927 and one of the best examples of this sort of filming. Overall, a terrific silent--one of the best.

You can't help but love this movie, for the story, the acting, the effects, the drama, the Biblical quotes. It all comes together so well to tell the story, and does it much better than the Jeffrey Hunter version (which I nevertheless like). In many silent movies, the actors seem to over play their roles to convey the message, but in this movie they are spot on; how could a person over play a scene when he/she first sees a person walking, talking, eating who had been killed three days ago before their very eyes. These actors act in a way that mirrors how normal people would behave when witnessing the miracles and actions reported in the Bible. They are convincing. Make no mistake, this movie is a Christian story; it takes the story of Jesus literally and portrays it. No doubts, no cut-aways, no shadows; its the story of Jesus as told in the Bible put in film. Warner is great in his role, he really does a great job of portraying a believable, accurate Jesus that is majestic, moving, noble, loving, generous, and forgiving as well as Godly. A remarkable performance that seems to have been forgotten merely because it is a silent movie. The music fits the action very well, and the text inserts do not detract from telling the story. I wish they would show this movie more often, I think it would develop a following as it is a truly remarkable movie that takes on the impossible task of portraying the life of Christ as told in the Bible, without gimmicks and without ducking the hard questions, like the Resurrection, and very nearly accomplishes the task. The whole cast is to be lauded for their performances, and of course DeMille does a magnificent job as director, I can hardly wait to see the movie again.

For a silent religious film this is quite good. H.B. Warner plays Jesus. He looks about twenty years too old for the part (didn't Jesus die when he was 33?) and spends too much of his time looking pious while holding his hands out the way Jesus does in the drawings. His beard looks false, and you can almost imagine the make-up guy standing just off camera sweating over whether a corner is about to detach itself from Warner's face.The film doesn't follow Jesus's early life. He's already causing quite a stir in the Holy Land by the time we catch up with him, and almost half of the film takes place after Judas has betrayed him, probably because Hollywood felt it needed to add some kind of suspense to the story to sell it to the great unwashed. For a DeMille film the excesses are mostly reined in apart from a couple of huge sets. There's a lot of dialogue, and most of it is comprised of sound-bites from the Bible that are still instantly recognisable. You know the sort of thing: the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Maybe this was also an attempt to keep the masses involved because I remember thinking as I watched that it was strange that all the catchy lines appear in the second half of the Bible. Perhaps there was some judicious shifting around of the good book's catchiest phrases. Not being a religious man, I wouldn't know.While the pace is fairly slow by today's standards, the last reel, which follows the resurrection of Christ, still retains some of its power and must have been really impressive in its day. There's even a couple of colour scenes to emphasise the miracle we are witnessing.