Trailer
Plot summary
The angel Gabriel tells Mary, in the days of Emperor Augustus and King Herod the Great, that the child she carries is Jesus, the Son of God. Elizabeth, expecting John the Baptist, greets her as most blessed of women. When the Romans order a census, Mary and her husband Joseph travel to Bethlehem, his hometown, to register, and there she gives birth in a manger. A week later they bring him to the Temple in Jerusalem, where Simeon blesses him as the Christ. At twelve, Jesus stays behind after a Passover visit to Jerusalem, telling his mother that he had stayed in his Father's house. Later, under Emperor Tiberius and King Herod Antipas, John baptizes Jesus in the Jordan, the Holy Spirit descends, and after withstanding Satan's testing in the wilderness he reaches Capernaum and calls Peter, James and John.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Jesus Film (1979)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The film was released without production or cast credits, as producer John Heyman declared that its creators were "simply being translators" of the Gospel of Luke, "so nobody will know who produced or directed the film."
- The Guinness Book of World Records accredits it as the "Most Translated Film" in history: 1,977 languages as of May 2022, 2,200 by March 2025 and 2,303 by July 2026.
- American aid workers in Afghanistan, who were not working for the Jesus Film Project, were arrested by the Taliban in 2001 for screening the film to a family there; they were ultimately rescued by US Marines and welcomed back by President George W. Bush.
- Warner Bros. received backlash for distributing the film simultaneously with Monty Python's Life of Brian, and the Jesus producers evaluated whether to take legal action against the studio for a conflict of interest.
- Just after filming, Heyman was not satisfied with the accent of the Israeli cast members and decided that they should all be dubbed over by English voice actors using the Received Pronunciation accent.
- After failing to canvass funding from Hollywood studios, the film was financed primarily by Campus Crusade supporters Bunker and Caroline Hunt for a sum of $6 million.
- Brian Deacon grew his hair and beard during production, but Heyman decided he should wear a wig as well as a prosthetic nose so that he had a Mediterranean look; when Deacon developed pneumonia during principal photography, doubles were used in certain scenes.
