The King of Kings
Encyclopedia
The King of Kings is a silent film
directed by Cecil B. DeMille
. It is a religious movie about the last weeks of Jesus
before his crucifixion. H. B. Warner
starred as Jesus. One of the last sequences of the movie, the Resurrection
, is in Technicolor.
, here portrayed as a wild courtesan
, entertain many men around her. Upon learning that Judas
is with a carpenter she rides out on her chariot drawn by zebras to get him back. Peter is introduced as the Giant apostle, and we see the future gospel writer Mark
as a child who is healed by Jesus. The Virgin Mary is shown as a beautiful and saintly woman who is a mother to all her son's followers. Our first sight of Jesus is through the eyesight of a little girl, whom He heals. He is surrounded by a halo. Mary Magdelene arrives afterwards and talks to Judas, who reveals that he is only staying with Jesus in hopes of being made a king after Jesus becomes the king of kings. Jesus casts the Seven Deadly Sins
out of Mary Magdalene in a multiple exposure
sequence.
Jesus is also shown resurrecting Lazarus
and healing the little children. Some humor is derived when one girl asks if He can heal broken legs and He says yes, she gives him a legless doll. Jesus smiles and repairs the doll. The crucifixion is foreshadowed when Jesus, having helped a poor family, wanders through the father's carpentry shop and, himself a carpenter's son, briefly helps carve a piece of wood. When a sheet covering the object is removed, it is revealed to be a cross towering over Jesus.
Jesus and His apostles enter Jerusalem, where Judas incites the people and rallies them to proclaim Jesus King of the Jews. Jesus, however, renounces all claims of being an Earthly king. Caiaphas
the High Priest
is also angry at Judas for having led people to a man whom he sees as a false prophet
. Meanwhile Jesus drives away Satan who offers Him an Earthly kingdom, and he protects the woman caught in adultery. The words he draws in the sand are revealed to be the sins the accusers themselves committed.
Judas, desperate to save himself from Caiaphas, agrees to turn over Jesus. Noticeably at the Last Supper
, when Jesus distributes the bread and wine saying that they are His body and blood, Judas refuses to eat. He puts the cup to his lips but refuses to drink; he tears off a piece of bread but lets it drop to the ground. Towards the end, Mary confronts her son and tells Him to flee the danger that is coming. Jesus replies that it must be done for the salvation of all peoples. They leave the room but the camera focuses on the table where a dove flies on and stays for a moment.
Jesus goes to the Garden of Gethsemane where He is soon captured by the Roman soldiers and betrayed by Judas. Judas' life is saved, but on seeing that Jesus is going to be killed he is horrified. He takes a rope that the Romans had used to bind Jesus' wrists and runs off. Jesus is beaten and then presented by Pontius Pilate
to the crowd. Mary pleads for the life of her son and Mary Magdalene speaks for Him but Caiaphas bribes the crowd to shout against Jesus.
Jesus is taken away to be crucified, though He pauses the Via Dolorosa
to heal a group of cripples in an alley, regardless of His weakened condition. He is crucified and His enemies throw insults at Him. (One woman even anachronistically eats popcorn and smiles with glee at Jesus' crucifixion.) When Jesus does die, however, a great earthquake comes up. The tree where Judas had hanged himself with the rope used to bind Jesus's wrists is swallowed up amidst gouts of hellfire. The sky turns black, lightning strikes, the wind blows, the people who had mocked Jesus run on terror, and the veil covering the Holy of Holies
in the Jerusalem Temple is torn in two.
The tumult ends when Mary looks up at heaven and asks God to forgive the world for the death of their son. The chaos ends and the sun shines. Jesus is taken down from the cross and is buried. On the third day, He rises from the dead as promised. To emphasize the importance of the resurrection, this scene from an otherwise black and white film is shot in color. Jesus goes to the Apostles and tells them to spread His message to the world. He tells them "I am with you always" as the scene shifts to a modern city to show that Jesus still watches over His followers.
Many of the film's intertitles are quotes (or paraphrases) from Scripture, often with chapter and verse accompanying.
.
The film opens with a titlecard stating that Israel
was under terrible oppression in the time of Jesus and that even the chief priesthood was subject to Roman
interference. The implication is that while Ciaphas is a villain, he was foisted on the Jewish people and is not somebody whom they would ever willingly accept. It is compared to a kind of racket
.
Judas is shown as corrupt, greedy, and unwilling to recognize Jesus as the Messiah; he instead sees Jesus as a fraud. During Christ's Passion, Ciaphas is shown bribing people to call for Jesus' death; one man, however, refuses. The man asks, "How can a Jew betray a fellow Jew?" Aside from reminding the audience that Jesus is at least ethnically Jewish, the presence of a token good Jew reminds the audience that not all Jews are evil. Showing that not even Caiaphas is truly evil, the film shows that he killed Jesus not because He was God but because he thought that He was a mere man claiming to be God and thus liable to the death penalty for blasphemy.
The film also allows him a measure of repentance. After Christ has died, Caiaphas is shocked to see the sky turn black, the earth quake and wind howl. Contemplating the unthinkable, he runs to the temple and sees the curtain covering the holy of holies torn in two. Realizing what he (the Jewish High Priest of all people) has done, that he is the Jew that killed his own Messiah
, that he is the priest that killed his own god, Caiaphas weeps. Consumed with remorse that, in addition to this sin he has committed, that he has turned the Jews against their own Messiah, perhaps forever, he begs an angry God to forgive His chosen people. He then adds that if anyone be punished for the sin of deicide it be him. "For myself," he says, "I ask no pity for I have slain pity!"
This is ahistorical, as the Bible records Caiaphas persecuting Christ's followers. Nevertheless, it succeeds in giving a nuanced portrayal of the Jews. The film's DVD release contains the words of various religious leaders, among them a rabbi who expresses gratitude for the film's sensitivity.
King Kong
, and was among the sets torched for the "burning of Atlanta" in 1939's
Gone with the Wind
.
The King of Kings was the first movie that premiered at the legendary Cinema Grauman's Chinese Theater in Los Angeles
, CA
on May 18, 1927.
Sally Rand
, before becoming notorious for her "fan dance" at the 1933 World's Fair, was an extra in the film.
Ayn Rand
(no relation to Sally Rand) also was an extra in the film, and met her future husband Frank O'Connor on set.
In order to preserve the spiritual nature of the film DeMille made his stars enter contracts that prohibited them from doing anything "Unbiblical" for a five-year period. These activities included attending ball games, playing cards, frequenting night clubs, swimming, and riding in convertibles. In spite of this the actor portraying Jesus became involved in an affair with an extra on the set of the film, and actress Dorothy Cumming
, who portrayed the Virgin Mary, went through a much-publicized divorce from her first husband, director Frank Elliott Dakin.
and scholar Mirza Ahmad Sohrab
sued DeMille for stealing the scenario for The King of Kings from them. The case went to trial in February 1930 but eventually settled without publicity. Surratt who had left films to return to the stage in 1917 appeared to be unofficially blacklisted after the suit.
Silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...
directed by Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil Blount DeMille was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies...
. It is a religious movie about the last weeks of Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
before his crucifixion. H. B. Warner
H. B. Warner
H. B. Warner was a British actor.-Early life:He was born Henry Byron Charles Stewart Warner-Lickford in St John's Wood, London, England in 1875...
starred as Jesus. One of the last sequences of the movie, the Resurrection
Resurrection
Resurrection refers to the literal coming back to life of the biologically dead. It is used both with respect to particular individuals or the belief in a General Resurrection of the dead at the end of the world. The General Resurrection is featured prominently in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim...
, is in Technicolor.
Plot
We see Mary MagdaleneMary Magdalene
Mary Magdalene was one of Jesus' most celebrated disciples, and the most important woman disciple in the movement of Jesus. Jesus cleansed her of "seven demons", conventionally interpreted as referring to complex illnesses...
, here portrayed as a wild courtesan
Courtesan
A courtesan was originally a female courtier, which means a person who attends the court of a monarch or other powerful person.In feudal society, the court was the centre of government as well as the residence of the monarch, and social and political life were often completely mixed together...
, entertain many men around her. Upon learning that Judas
Judas Iscariot
Judas Iscariot was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve disciples of Jesus. He is best known for his betrayal of Jesus to the hands of the chief priests for 30 pieces of silver.-Etymology:...
is with a carpenter she rides out on her chariot drawn by zebras to get him back. Peter is introduced as the Giant apostle, and we see the future gospel writer Mark
Mark the Evangelist
Mark the Evangelist is the traditional author of the Gospel of Mark. He is one of the Seventy Disciples of Christ, and the founder of the Church of Alexandria, one of the original four main sees of Christianity....
as a child who is healed by Jesus. The Virgin Mary is shown as a beautiful and saintly woman who is a mother to all her son's followers. Our first sight of Jesus is through the eyesight of a little girl, whom He heals. He is surrounded by a halo. Mary Magdelene arrives afterwards and talks to Judas, who reveals that he is only staying with Jesus in hopes of being made a king after Jesus becomes the king of kings. Jesus casts the Seven Deadly Sins
Seven deadly sins
The 7 Deadly Sins, also known as the Capital Vices or Cardinal Sins, is a classification of objectionable vices that have been used since early Christian times to educate and instruct followers concerning fallen humanity's tendency to sin...
out of Mary Magdalene in a multiple exposure
Multiple exposure
In photography, a multiple exposure is the superimposition of two or more individual exposures to create a single photograph. The exposure values may or may not be identical to each other.-Overview:...
sequence.
Jesus is also shown resurrecting Lazarus
Lazarus of Bethany
Lazarus of Bethany, also known as Saint Lazarus or Lazarus of the Four Days, is the subject of a prominent miracle attributed to Jesus in the Gospel of John, in which Jesus restores him to life four days after his death...
and healing the little children. Some humor is derived when one girl asks if He can heal broken legs and He says yes, she gives him a legless doll. Jesus smiles and repairs the doll. The crucifixion is foreshadowed when Jesus, having helped a poor family, wanders through the father's carpentry shop and, himself a carpenter's son, briefly helps carve a piece of wood. When a sheet covering the object is removed, it is revealed to be a cross towering over Jesus.
Jesus and His apostles enter Jerusalem, where Judas incites the people and rallies them to proclaim Jesus King of the Jews. Jesus, however, renounces all claims of being an Earthly king. Caiaphas
Caiaphas
Joseph, son of Caiaphas, Hebrew יוסף בַּר קַיָּפָא or Yosef Bar Kayafa, commonly known simply as Caiaphas in the New Testament, was the Roman-appointed Jewish high priest who is said to have organized the plot to kill Jesus...
the High Priest
Kohen Gadol
The High Priest was the chief religious official of Israelite religion and of classical Judaism from the rise of the Israelite nation until the destruction of the Second Temple of Jerusalem...
is also angry at Judas for having led people to a man whom he sees as a false prophet
False prophet
In religion, a false prophet is one who falsely claims the gift of prophecy, or who uses that gift for evil ends. Often, someone who is considered a "true prophet" by some people is simultaneously considered a "false prophet" by others....
. Meanwhile Jesus drives away Satan who offers Him an Earthly kingdom, and he protects the woman caught in adultery. The words he draws in the sand are revealed to be the sins the accusers themselves committed.
Judas, desperate to save himself from Caiaphas, agrees to turn over Jesus. Noticeably at the Last Supper
Last Supper
The Last Supper is the final meal that, according to Christian belief, Jesus shared with his Twelve Apostles in Jerusalem before his crucifixion. The Last Supper provides the scriptural basis for the Eucharist, also known as "communion" or "the Lord's Supper".The First Epistle to the Corinthians is...
, when Jesus distributes the bread and wine saying that they are His body and blood, Judas refuses to eat. He puts the cup to his lips but refuses to drink; he tears off a piece of bread but lets it drop to the ground. Towards the end, Mary confronts her son and tells Him to flee the danger that is coming. Jesus replies that it must be done for the salvation of all peoples. They leave the room but the camera focuses on the table where a dove flies on and stays for a moment.
Jesus goes to the Garden of Gethsemane where He is soon captured by the Roman soldiers and betrayed by Judas. Judas' life is saved, but on seeing that Jesus is going to be killed he is horrified. He takes a rope that the Romans had used to bind Jesus' wrists and runs off. Jesus is beaten and then presented by Pontius Pilate
Pontius Pilate
Pontius Pilatus , known in the English-speaking world as Pontius Pilate , was the fifth Prefect of the Roman province of Judaea, from AD 26–36. He is best known as the judge at Jesus' trial and the man who authorized the crucifixion of Jesus...
to the crowd. Mary pleads for the life of her son and Mary Magdalene speaks for Him but Caiaphas bribes the crowd to shout against Jesus.
Jesus is taken away to be crucified, though He pauses the Via Dolorosa
Via Dolorosa
The Via Dolorosa is a street, in two parts, within the Old City of Jerusalem, held to be the path that Jesus walked, carrying his cross, on the way to his crucifixion. The current route has been established since the 18th century, replacing various earlier versions...
to heal a group of cripples in an alley, regardless of His weakened condition. He is crucified and His enemies throw insults at Him. (One woman even anachronistically eats popcorn and smiles with glee at Jesus' crucifixion.) When Jesus does die, however, a great earthquake comes up. The tree where Judas had hanged himself with the rope used to bind Jesus's wrists is swallowed up amidst gouts of hellfire. The sky turns black, lightning strikes, the wind blows, the people who had mocked Jesus run on terror, and the veil covering the Holy of Holies
Holy of Holies
The Holy of Holies is a term in the Hebrew Bible which refers to the inner sanctuary of the Tabernacle and later the Temple in Jerusalem where the Ark of the Covenant was kept during the First Temple, which could be entered only by the High Priest on Yom Kippur...
in the Jerusalem Temple is torn in two.
The tumult ends when Mary looks up at heaven and asks God to forgive the world for the death of their son. The chaos ends and the sun shines. Jesus is taken down from the cross and is buried. On the third day, He rises from the dead as promised. To emphasize the importance of the resurrection, this scene from an otherwise black and white film is shot in color. Jesus goes to the Apostles and tells them to spread His message to the world. He tells them "I am with you always" as the scene shifts to a modern city to show that Jesus still watches over His followers.
Many of the film's intertitles are quotes (or paraphrases) from Scripture, often with chapter and verse accompanying.
Portrayal of the Jews
DeMille's film attempts a sensitive portrayal of the Jews. It does not shy away from its insistence that Jesus is the Messiah and that the Jews of the time erred grievously in rejecting their savior, but it tries to do so in a way that holds only a select group of Jews as guilty of deicideDeicide
Deicide is the killing of a god. The term deicide was coined in the 17th century from medieval Latin *deicidium, from de-us "god" and -cidium "cutting, killing")...
.
The film opens with a titlecard stating that Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
was under terrible oppression in the time of Jesus and that even the chief priesthood was subject to Roman
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
interference. The implication is that while Ciaphas is a villain, he was foisted on the Jewish people and is not somebody whom they would ever willingly accept. It is compared to a kind of racket
Racket (crime)
A racket is an illegal business, usually run as part of organized crime. Engaging in a racket is called racketeering.Several forms of racket exist. The best-known is the protection racket, in which criminals demand money from businesses in exchange for the service of "protection" against crimes...
.
Judas is shown as corrupt, greedy, and unwilling to recognize Jesus as the Messiah; he instead sees Jesus as a fraud. During Christ's Passion, Ciaphas is shown bribing people to call for Jesus' death; one man, however, refuses. The man asks, "How can a Jew betray a fellow Jew?" Aside from reminding the audience that Jesus is at least ethnically Jewish, the presence of a token good Jew reminds the audience that not all Jews are evil. Showing that not even Caiaphas is truly evil, the film shows that he killed Jesus not because He was God but because he thought that He was a mere man claiming to be God and thus liable to the death penalty for blasphemy.
The film also allows him a measure of repentance. After Christ has died, Caiaphas is shocked to see the sky turn black, the earth quake and wind howl. Contemplating the unthinkable, he runs to the temple and sees the curtain covering the holy of holies torn in two. Realizing what he (the Jewish High Priest of all people) has done, that he is the Jew that killed his own Messiah
Messiah
A messiah is a redeemer figure expected or foretold in one form or another by a religion. Slightly more widely, a messiah is any redeemer figure. Messianic beliefs or theories generally relate to eschatological improvement of the state of humanity or the world, in other words the World to...
, that he is the priest that killed his own god, Caiaphas weeps. Consumed with remorse that, in addition to this sin he has committed, that he has turned the Jews against their own Messiah, perhaps forever, he begs an angry God to forgive His chosen people. He then adds that if anyone be punished for the sin of deicide it be him. "For myself," he says, "I ask no pity for I have slain pity!"
This is ahistorical, as the Bible records Caiaphas persecuting Christ's followers. Nevertheless, it succeeds in giving a nuanced portrayal of the Jews. The film's DVD release contains the words of various religious leaders, among them a rabbi who expresses gratitude for the film's sensitivity.
Cast
- H.B. Warner as Christ
- Dorothy CummingDorothy CummingDorothy G. Cumming was an actress of the silent film era. She appeared in 39 American, English, and Australian films between 1915 and 1929, notably appearing as the Virgin Mary in Cecil B. DeMille's 1927 film The King of Kings and the jealous wife in Lillian Gish's 1928 The Wind. She also appeared...
as Mary - Ernest TorrenceErnest TorrenceErnest Torrence was a Scottish born film character actor who appeared in many Hollywood films, including Broken Chains with Colleen Moore,Mantrap with Clara Bow, and Fighting Caravans with Gary Cooper and Lili Damita...
as Peter - Joseph SchildkrautJoseph SchildkrautJoseph Schildkraut was an Austrian stage and film actor.-Early life:Born in Vienna, Austria, Schildkraut was the son of stage actor Rudolph Schildkraut. The younger Schildkraut moved to the United States in the early 1900s. He appeared in many Broadway productions...
as Judas - Jacqueline LoganJacqueline LoganJacqueline Logan was a star of the silent motion picture screen who was on board William Randolph Hearst's yacht The Oneida in 1924 when film director Thomas Ince died. The young actress was under contract to Ince at the time. Logan was a WAMPAS Baby Star of 1922. She was born in Corsicana, Texas...
as Mary Magdalene
Production details
A giant gate built for this film was later famously used in 1933's1933 in film
-Events:* March 2 - King Kong premieres in New York City.* June 6 - The first drive-in theater opens, in Camden, New Jersey.* British Film Institute founded....
King Kong
King Kong (1933 film)
King Kong is a Pre-Code 1933 fantasy monster adventure film co-directed by Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, and written by Ruth Rose and James Ashmore Creelman after a story by Cooper and Edgar Wallace. The film tells of a gigantic island-dwelling apeman creature called Kong who dies in...
, and was among the sets torched for the "burning of Atlanta" in 1939's
1939 in film
The year 1939 in motion pictures can be justified as being called the most outstanding one ever, when it comes to the high quality and high attendance at the large set of the best films that premiered in the year .- Events :Motion picture historians and film often rate...
Gone with the Wind
Gone with the Wind (film)
Gone with the Wind is a 1939 American historical epic film adapted from Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer-winning 1936 novel of the same name. It was produced by David O. Selznick and directed by Victor Fleming from a screenplay by Sidney Howard...
.
The King of Kings was the first movie that premiered at the legendary Cinema Grauman's Chinese Theater in Los Angeles
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, CA
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
on May 18, 1927.
Sally Rand
Sally Rand
Sally Rand was a burlesque dancer and actress, most noted for her ostrich feather fan dance and balloon bubble dance. She also performed under the name Billie Beck.-Early life and career:...
, before becoming notorious for her "fan dance" at the 1933 World's Fair, was an extra in the film.
Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand was a Russian-American novelist, philosopher, playwright, and screenwriter. She is known for her two best-selling novels The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged and for developing a philosophical system she called Objectivism....
(no relation to Sally Rand) also was an extra in the film, and met her future husband Frank O'Connor on set.
In order to preserve the spiritual nature of the film DeMille made his stars enter contracts that prohibited them from doing anything "Unbiblical" for a five-year period. These activities included attending ball games, playing cards, frequenting night clubs, swimming, and riding in convertibles. In spite of this the actor portraying Jesus became involved in an affair with an extra on the set of the film, and actress Dorothy Cumming
Dorothy Cumming
Dorothy G. Cumming was an actress of the silent film era. She appeared in 39 American, English, and Australian films between 1915 and 1929, notably appearing as the Virgin Mary in Cecil B. DeMille's 1927 film The King of Kings and the jealous wife in Lillian Gish's 1928 The Wind. She also appeared...
, who portrayed the Virgin Mary, went through a much-publicized divorce from her first husband, director Frank Elliott Dakin.
Technicolor
All together this movie has two Technicolor sequences, the beginning, and the resurrection scene.Lawsuit
In 1928 actress Valeska SurrattValeska Surratt
Valeska Suratt was an American stage and silent film actress.-Early life:Born in Owensville, Indiana, she moved with her family to Terre Haute when she was six years old. In 1913 Suratt became noted for the New York Casino musical success, The Kiss Waltz...
and scholar Mirza Ahmad Sohrab
Mirza Ahmad Sohrab
Mírzá Aḥmad Sohráb was a Persian-American author and Bahá'í who co-founded the New History Society and the Caravan of East and West in New York, and was excommunicated from the Bahá'í Faith in 1939 by Shoghi Effendi.-Early life:...
sued DeMille for stealing the scenario for The King of Kings from them. The case went to trial in February 1930 but eventually settled without publicity. Surratt who had left films to return to the stage in 1917 appeared to be unofficially blacklisted after the suit.
See also
- King of Kings (1961 film)
- List of early color feature films
External links
- The King of Kings at TCM DatabaseTurner Classic MoviesTurner Classic Movies is a movie-oriented cable television channel, owned by the Turner Broadcasting System subsidiary of Time Warner, featuring commercial-free classic movies, mostly from the Turner Entertainment and MGM, United Artists, RKO and Warner Bros. film libraries...
- Criterion Collection essay by Peter Matthews