Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

Brilliant and touching

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

I expected to learn a lot more than I actually did. The acting was terrible with little conviction. I wondered how they shouted Allah hu Akbar at the beginning of the movie when no one was yet converted to Islam and Mohammed had not yet started preaching his message. The movie went into Islam superficially in my opinion. It purported to deliver the message. If it did it did not come through. The message deserved far far better than the movie delivered. I was excited to watch it in the first place, but in the end I was unmoved

Surprisingly, I had never heard of this movie and probably would have never seen it had it not been listed in IMDb's 'Top 250' films of last year. I can't imagine why that is, because films like "The Ten Commandments" and "King of Kings" seem to be universally known from the Christian perspective. I also have to confess that I know very little of the religion of Islam, though we are inundated on a daily basis with the extremist elements that have emerged from that ideology. I thought this picture presented a very even handed portrayal of the origins of Islam, even though a major downside was the inability to show the character of Mohammad on screen, a consideration afforded to the adherents of the religion. As a springboard to learning more about Islam, I think this film is an effective first step, designed to lead those having an interest toward other sources of information. The casting for the film is first rate, with excellent cinematography and bold characterizations. It deserves wider recognition among cinema fans, as evidenced by the relatively low number of user ratings and film reviews on this board.

The message is an incredible movie. It is the story of the birth of Islam. The movie portrays in great detail, the enormous odds the prophet Mohammed and his followers had to surmount when the idea of Islam was conceived. The movie is a wonderful .I would recommend it to everybody as a must see.

I'm no Muslim but I am interested in the story of Islam since it's the final of the monotheistic religions, as the Muslims say: its "seal". This is a seventies epic in the same style of Zefirelli's "Jesus of Nazareth" and "The lion of the desert". All three movies feature a magnificent Anthony Quinn. The movie is very enjoyable and well made. Beautiful shots, great cinematography, good score, great acting. Of course it brings a very short version of the story of Islam, mainly chronicling the most important political and military events but leaving out loads and loads of elements. At 3 hours one cannot expect more. This is why I would have preferred a miniseries double that length, as in "Jesus of Nazareth". That gives time to settle in, to give much more information, teachings, etc. Of course the movie is not as it could have. Islamic creed prohibits the depiction of the Prophet: you never see Muhammad nor do you hear an actor as his voice. That's quite a handicap for the movie. The same goes for the most important people around him. Next to none are depicted in the film: Fatimah, Aisha and in general the whole family of the Prophet, Ali, Abu Bakr, and the other first four caliphs etc. The result of the above is a movie which brings the most important "earthly" sides to the advent of Islam, but lacks a bit in spiritual depth. It also brings the story of Islam without including all its most important pioneers. Though I respect this, I find it a great pity. Nonetheless, even with these limits the movie still deserves 7/10 if alone for the beautiful photography, the acting of Anthony Quinn and the beautiful depictions of Islamic holy sites at the very end.