La vie du Christ

You have to give this film credit for having been made in 1906, and it seems to me it was one of the earliest epics, predating D.W. Griffith by almost a decade in big productions. Director Alice Guy-Blaché had beautiful sets crafted, a very large cast, and delivered some nice special effects via double exposures. By far the most impressive shot is when the dead Christ rises from the sepulcher, done apparently by slowly dropping the camera on the superimposed image, with an effect that is ethereal and miraculous. The indoor stage scenes feature pretty arches and action over a wide area (and depth of field), and the outdoor scenes of Christ carrying the cross include a panning shot.

Unfortunately, despite all of these notable achievements, the film was not very interesting to me. With a single exception, the entire story is told with long shots, which severely limits the actors and feeling the emotions of the moment. It's as if we're in the 30th row at the theater and looking at a stage play, one with no dialogue or intertitle equivalents, and a static view. The selected 25 scenes from Christ's life are introduced and rather dryly marched past us one by one, each taking about a minute. And even worse, the chosen scenes miss the most profound and moving aspects of Christ's teachings, e.g. the Sermon on the Mount, his advocating pacifism and nonviolence, his views on forgiveness, loving one's enemies, and fighting for the poor. This is the meat of the story of Christ, and instead we're given the bare bones of events, which seems to me to be missing the point entirely. This would have been much better had some of that been included, but instead it takes the safe, dogmatic path, which is where I was most disappointed. Guy-Blaché was not simply the first woman director, she was an innovative pioneer, so for film historians it wouldn't be a bad idea to check this one out though.

i embraced the opportunity to watch this early Pathé film with both arms wide open. The story of Christ is told here in 22 sequences. At that time this was an expensive project. There are maybe two basic camera moves through the whole movie and for that time this movie has SPECIAL EFFECTS! yes indeed, some of the things are "colored" (the star for example) but the people who did the effects did an incredible job if you ask me. We can't even imagine what it took to create FX at that time! If a movie from 1906 can hold someone's attention from 2000 than you can be sure this is a strong film! Of course, in every scene there are things that were meant to be serious, but now just seem hilarious (talking about over-acting!). Recommended for all real film addicts, since there were people sleeping in the audience...

While this film will look extremely primitive to viewers today, for 1906 it was absolutely amazing. The life of Christ is told in a very archaic form, though the production values (for 1906) are shockingly good and quite expensive. It must have taken a lot of work to produce the film--with so many costumes, sets and live animals. When compared to the average film of the day, this is an incredibly complex film. And, at 33 minutes, it's a very, very long movie for the day. And, compared to the wonderful film of the director's countryman, Georges Méliès, the backgrounds were MUCH higher quality and construction--not just painted curtains. I was particularly impressed with Jesus' rising to Heaven near the end--very impressively done.

The biggest shortcoming, and I don't blame the director (Alice Guy) is the format. Instead of a typical narrative they would have used decades later, slides appear that tell what the next portion of Christ's life is and then you see some actors replicate the scene very briefly. It's tough going today, but it had to absolutely wow audiences at the time it was made.

For film historians, this is a must-see. Most non-film historians could probably pass on this one.

This silent film from 1906 is one of the earliest films about Jesus Christ (although it isn't THE FIRST, which would be "The Passion Play" from 1903), whose possibly the most well known figure of all mankind.

Whether you're particularly religious or not matter, because any work of cinema this old is at least somewhat interesting, and it's amazing seeing how well made this film is when you consider the fact that it was made 110 years ago! There's actual extras, sets, and multiple sequences, rather than just being a couple seconds of a man drinking a glass of water. It's probably the highest scale film of the 1900's (other than "A Trip to the Moon" and "The Great Train Robbery", two more popular and, somewhat, superior films), and it is really amazing how successful they were able to tell this story.

The film is also pretty dramatic and emotional for its time, showing how cruel the death of Christ really was (but it doesn't go nearly as in depth as, say, "The Passion of Christ").

Anybody with a strong interest of the history of silent and classic cinema should really take a look, because it truly is amazing.

We're at 1906 now and once again in France for another of Alice Guy's works. Here, she's trying to depict the life of Jesus Christ from birth to resurrection after death. So the thing is divided into segments throughout his life. The camera is stationary for each segment with the exception of when it goes on location on some hills when it moves from one part of a terrain to another. There are also some neat dissolves involving angels, dreams, and the last scene. There were no intertitle cards but if you know the story of Jesus you should have no trouble understanding what's going on even though there's nothing that I would consider violent being depicted considering what happens during the narrative. This was mostly interesting stuff to watch so on that note, I recommend The Birth, the Life and the Death of Christ for anyone interested in movie history.