King of Kings (1961)

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Movie
German title King of Kings
Original title King of Kings
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1961
length 171 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Nicholas Ray
script Philip Yordan
production Samuel Bronston for MGM
music Miklós Rózsa
camera Franz planner
Milton R. Krasner
Manuel Berenguer
cut Harold F. Kress
occupation
synchronization

King of Kings (original title King of Kings ) from 1961 is the first film adaptation of the life and suffering of Jesus Christ, which was produced in color and sound. Directed by Nicholas Ray , Jeffrey Hunter stars as Jesus Christ . Carrying roles are with Siobhán McKenna as Jesus' mother Mary, Robert Ryan as John the Baptist and Hurd Hatfield as Pontius Pilate. The film was made four years before George Stevens ' monumental film The Greatest Story of All Time and is to date the only MGM film that deals with the life of Jesus in isolation.

action

Born in Bethlehem and raised in Nazareth, the carpenter Jesus walks through the country and proclaims the word of God to the people.

At the same time, the career of the Roman governor Pontius Pilate is told, who has to assert himself against political unrest and uprisings by the Zealots . Their leader Barabbas and his most loyal follower Judas Iscariot repeatedly attack the Roman troops .

In Jesus the Zealots seem to have found the born leader to fight against Rome, whose bondage they have to endure. Especially since King Herod was in power, there has been suffering and fear in the country. Judas joins the Messiah ; but instead of war, Jesus preaches peace and forgiveness and does not want to know anything about armed conflicts.

No longer able to bear the suffering of his people, Judas decides to hand Jesus over to the high priests in order to provoke their lust for battle. But it turns out differently: Jesus is crucified .

production

Production notes

The work of Cecil B. DeMille , King of Kings (1927) had almost the same title, The King of Kings . Except for the opening and resurrection sequences, the silent film was shot in black and white .

The pre-production of Samuel Bronston's strip lasted from 1958 to 1960, the shooting seven months, from April to October 1960 with an additional shoot in June 1961. The film was shot in Spain . The Puerto de Navacerrada near Madrid represented the crucifixion site Golgota , the Chinchón the Mount of Beatitudes and the Alberche river the Sea of ​​Galilee . The ambitious scene of the Sermon on the Mount required five days of shooting in Venta de Frascuelas (south of Madrid). It was implemented there with five cameras and 5,400 extras, in a tasteful and intelligent manner that adhered to the Bible, as critics later confirmed.

The film was shot in Technirama , 35mm and 70mm copies were distributed (the title sequence of the film is called "70mm Super Technirama"). Some sources say that Orson Welles texts as narrator, which he brought into the production, go back to Ray Bradbury . Orson Welles was so disappointed with the project after completion that he wanted his name removed from the credits.

background

In the period from the mid-fifties to the mid-sixties, the Bible film genre was more popular in Hollywood than ever before. Among other things, this was due to the fact that the industry pulled out all the stops to draw viewers to the new medium of television and to find topics that were sure to interest the viewers. It was a bit of a surprise that the producer Bronston hired Nicholas Ray to direct the film, as he had previously attracted attention with other stories. The decision ultimately turned out to be the right one, as Ray did a good job. The casting for the leading roles was not easy, it was Bronston who chose Jeffrey Hunter, also because of his American good looks. The project didn't give Hunter the boost he'd been hoping for, as he spent the rest of his life on average projects. He died at the age of 43 after a fatal accident. Agnes Moorehead worked through his dubbing dialogues with Jeffrey Hunter. Carmen Sevilla did not speak in the original English version, she was dubbed by an unspecified actress, as was the German actor Gerard Tichy, who was dubbed in both the English and German versions.

According to Gavin Lambert , power struggles should have broken out behind the scenes . The atmosphere is said to have been poisoned by the fact that Nicholas Ray and the screenwriter Phil Yordan, who were once friends, no longer spoke directly to each other, but only allowed comments to be sent to each other via walkie-talkie.

A symbolic scene of the film can be found in the prologue , which contains the capture of Jerusalem by Pompey and shows how the Jews came to their unique privilege of being the only people annexed by Rome to be allowed to live out their belief in a god. In the scene, which got by without any dialogue, we see a priest of the Jews who is on his knees begging Pompey not to burn the Torah ; Pompey then hands him the scroll.

Voice actor

Dubbing company: MGM Synchronisations-Atelier, Berlin. Dialogue director: Ottokar Runze . The voice actors for the German version:

Publication, revenue

The Samuel Bronston production premiered on October 11, 1961 in New York, and the film was released in American cinemas on October 30, 1961. It was published in the United Kingdom in November 1961 and in Japan, Portugal, the Netherlands in December 1961 and in the Federal Republic of Germany on December 21, 1961.

In 1962 it was premiered in the following countries: Spain (Madrid), Mexico, Finland and Brazil. In 1963 it was published in Sweden and Denmark. It was revived in Finland in 1980 and in Brazil in March 1997 at the One Reel Film Festival. It was also published in Argentina, Austria, Bulgaria, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Serbia and the Soviet Union. It was also published in the USA under the title Samuel Bronston's Production King of Kings .

The film's revenues up to January 1989 amounted to approximately 25 million US dollars worldwide with a budget of less than 6 million US dollars.

Blu-ray Disc and DVD

The version, available on Blu-ray Disc and DVD, corresponds to a screening time of 171 minutes (164 minutes on PAL-DVD) and contains the overture, intermission, entr'Acte and the starting music typical of monumental films of the time. The image format of about 2.35: 1 corresponds to that of the 35mm copies of the film shot in Technirama . The correctly projected film image of the negative (35mm horizontal) and the 70mm copies is slightly higher at around 2.26: 1 (negative) and 2.21: 1 (70mm rental copy).

criticism

The statements of the critics at the time revealed mixed feelings. The conclusion that was drawn confirmed that the film was captivating and visually appealing entertainment that benefited from many outstanding creative contributions. The beautiful score by Miklós Rózsa and the lively cinematography by Franz Planer were particularly emphasized. The actor countered the mockery that Hunter was a teenage Jesus by endowing the role with vitality, compassion and serenity.

Bosley Crowther of the New York Times spoke of a gigantic biblical drama in color and super-wide-screen with a cast of thousands. The narrative voice of an oracular Orson Welles gives the film the character of an illustrated lecture, and that also corresponds to the general nature of the film. The fact is that the drama of Jesus in this strangely impersonal film seems strangely lost and is composed of a number of accidental actions and therefore also omissions. Jesus does very little to be perceived as a living personality. Ray is directing a film that has nothing to do with Jesus or other personalities that are also not credibly portrayed. It all seems more like a conventional melodramatic costume film.

The USCCB's critics praised the film for its achievement of presenting the life of Christ in a historical context, including the Jewish resistance to Roman rule. Jeffrey Hunter in the title role is unpleasant, Siobhan McKenna is better cast than his mother, Robert Ryan as John the Baptist, Hurd Hatfield as Pilate, Rip Torn as Judas and Harry Guardino as Barabbas. Although the script deals with the political unrest of the epoch and treats the Gospels with awe, it contains some licentiousness that is not acceptable to everyone.

On the Videobuster page there is talk of a “monumental masterpiece” with “spectacular crowd scenes” and “great music by Miklós Rózsa”, which is still considered to be “one of the most successful film adaptations of biblical history”.

On the site Die-Besten-Horrorfilme.de it is said that Jeffrey Hunter the role of the Christian Messiah is "written on the body", he embodies it "with passion and conviction". For the monumental film, “a lot of effort was made”, which can be seen “in the large sets and buildings, in the costumes and crowd scenes”. When it came to the line-up, the company "tended to put the money to the test because the big names were missing". The actors employed had "done their job very well" and contributed a lot to "the great atmosphere of the film". The music by Miklós Rózsa, who “perfected” the film, was particularly emphasized.

Kino.de was of the opinion that "Nicholas Ray [...] in a way the typical Hollywood commissioned director who staged westerns when westerns were in demand, melodramas when they were just becoming fashionable, etc.". Nevertheless, his films were "always harder and often more honest than other studio productions". His “human Jesus drama 'King of Kings', based on the silent film version of the same name by Cecil B. De Mille […] plays with different stylistic elements from the story of legends to crass naturalistics and proves naturalness and restraint in Dealing with his material ”.

The magazine Prisma spoke of an “impressive monumental film (20,000 extras, including 7,000 for the scenic representation of the Sermon on the Mount)”. Director Ray used "different stylistic devices" for the "different levels" of his film: "from the passion play to elements of the Russian revolutionary film".

“Nicholas Rays […] attempt to make the life of Jesus the subject of an almost three-hour show and edifying film remains without spiritual depth. In playing with various stylistic elements (from the idyllic tale of legends to elements of the Russian revolutionary film and crass naturalistics), however, the direction shows some skill. The main actor handles his task with a successful mixture of naturalness and restraint. "

- Lexicon of international film

Awards

  • Miklós Rózsa was nominated for a Golden Globe Award in 1962 for the film in the category “Best Film Music” .
  • In 2010 the film was nominated for an International Film Music Critics Award (IFMCA) in the category “Best Archive Release of an Existing Score”.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b King of Kings Box office adS IMDb
  2. ↑ a b c d e Jay S. Steinberg: King of Kings (1961) - Articles. In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved November 2, 2019 .
  3. ↑ King of Kings (1961) - Notes. In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved November 2, 2019 .
  4. ↑ King of Kings adS thespinningimage.co.uk incl. Movie poster (English)
  5. ↑ Dennis Schwartz: "King of Kings" - A sweeping and at Times stirring biblical epic adS homepages.sover.net (English)
  6. ↑ King of Kings (1961) - Trivia. In: Turner Classic Movies . Retrieved November 2, 2019 .
  7. ↑ synchronkartei.de: King of Kings. Retrieved October 29, 2016 .
  8. ↑ Bosley Crowther : "King of Kings" Has Its Premiere at State In: The New York Times, October 12, 1961 (English). Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  9. ↑ King of Kings adS archive.usccb.org (English)
  10. ↑ King of Kings ( Memento from December 1, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) adS die-besten-horrorfilme.de (with original trailer). Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  11. ↑ King of Kings (1961) Almost three hour gripping epic about the life of Jesus Christ, directed by Nicholas Ray. adS kino.de. Retrieved November 17, 2017.
  12. ↑ King of Kings. In: prisma.de . Retrieved November 17, 2017 .
  13. ↑ King of Kings. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed November 2, 2019 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used