Il vangelo secondo Matteo (1964)

Director:

Pier Paolo Pasolini

Writer:

Pier Paolo Pasolini (writer)

Release Date:

2 October 1964 (Italy)

Genre:

Biography | Drama | History

Plot:

The life of Jesus Christ according to the Gospel of Matthew. Pasolini shows Christ as a marxist avant-la-lettre and therefore uses half of the text of Matthew.

Plot Keywords:

Jesus Christ | Walking On Water | Child Murder | Healing Power | Baptism

Awards:

Nominated for 3 Oscars. Another 6 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Enrique Irazoqui	...	Christ
Margherita Caruso	...	Mary (younger)
Susanna Pasolini	...	Mary (older)
Marcello Morante	...	Joseph
Mario Socrate	...	John the Baptist
Settimio Di Porto	...	Peter
Alfonso Gatto	...	Andrew
Luigi Barbini	...	James
Giacomo Morante	...	John
Giorgio Agamben	...	Philip
Guido Cerretani	...	Bartholomew
Rosario Migale	...	Thomas
Ferruccio Nuzzo	...	Matthew
Marcello Galdini	...	James son of Alphus
Elio Spaziani	...	Thaddeus

Also Known As:

L'évangile selon saint Matthieu (France)
The Gospel According to St. Matthew (USA)

Runtime:

137 min | USA:136 min | USA:91 min (edited version)

Country:

Italy | France

Language:

Italian

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Finland:K-11 (cinema release) (1967) | Spain:13 | Spain:18 (DVD) | Singapore:PG | South Korea:All | Italy:T | Argentina:16 | Sweden:15 | Norway:11 | UK:U

Filming Locations:

Apulia, Italy

Company:

Arco Film

Trivia:

In keeping with his idea of Jesus Christ as the greatest revolutionary of all time, Pier Paolo Pasolini considered casting Jack Kerouac or Allen Ginsberg in the role. He changed his mind when he met Enrique Irazoqui, a Spanish student of literature, who has written a thesis about Pasolini's novel "Ragazzi di vita" and was very curious to meet him.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Teorema (1968)

Soundtrack:

Sometimes I feel like a motherless child

There is no better film about Jesus Christ

Well, maybe there is, but I've never caught a glimpse of it. Most movies about him are fundamentally wrong. In a religion which has totally turned its back on the line "it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to get into the kingdom of Heaven" (in fact, I am surprised that some pope or other did not officially removed that line from the Bible; be sure that this film retains it and has it come right out of the mouth of Jesus Christ, who, I assume, was its speaker in the Bible), movies about Jesus are generally overproduced messes that do nothing but retell the story with much less effect than the Bible itself has. Even Martin Scorsese's version of the story, The Last Temptation of Christ, suffers from this. Although, despite its flaws, it has a lot more power than most films about these same events.

I do not understand why Pier Paolo Pasolini, who was a Marxist, a homosexual, and an atheist, made this film. But, despite his reason, it has turned out to be a great masterpiece. No one has ever attempted to set the story in its proper setting, at least not to my knowledge. The characters here are certainly semitic and Middle Eastern, unlike the entirely Anglo-Saxon casts of every other Jesus film or even any other religious film. Also, the cast, made up of unprofessional actors including Pasolini's own mother as the elder Mary, has not one beautiful face amongst it, except for maybe the actress who plays the younger Mary; she is quite beautiful. These faces and bodies are real: unattractive, harsh and worn. Teeth are not straight and white, but crooked and discolored as they certainly would have been before dentists were around. Clothing is not beautifully colored, but plain and tattered. Only the richest people could afford dye for clothing. Pasolini has also forsaken the traditional look of Jesus Christ. While the facial hair remains similar, although maybe lessened, the long hair is dropped in favor for shorter hair, which is the way that people wore it at the time. The image of the long-haired Jesus is a case of syncresis, that is, the mixing of religions; that image was adopted from the ancient Greek depictions of Bacchus, the god of wine.

What results is an account as straighforward as can possibly exist. With Pasolini's own personal convictions, the audience does not have to feel like they are being preached at. Christians, unless they are so foolish as to believe that Jesus WAS an Anglo-Saxon, should be moved to tears. Nonbelievers (anyway, those who appreciate film) will reel at the marvelous use of classical music (including, strangely enough, Prokofiev's music from Eisenstein's Alexander Nevsky), the greatness of the actors, especially the man who plays Christ (I've heard that he was a Marxist truck driver), and the beautiful simplicity of Pasolini's direction, sort of a perfect mix between Italian Neorealism and French New Wave. I myself, a staunch atheist, found it very powerful. 10/10.