After about ten years I finally could watch this movie again. I was just around 13 the first time I did and even though I could not remember all the scenes and many details, the essence of the movie stayed. It is not just intelligent, it is beautiful... the photography is excellent... the music is magnificent. But the most important and awesome thing is the argument. What if Jesus would have been born again and everybody is too busy with commerce, fame and banality to notice it? Then you start to think not just in Jesus, but in all the people that lives in the planet and we don't give them the chance to enter in our lives. A perfect example of that are the two TV producers (that might be a metaphor of the followers of Cesar 2000 years ago). And about metaphors there are many others and that's what makes the movie so unique: The beautiful actress is Mary Magdalene, the actors are the prophets, and finally (there might be a big spoiler here): The Lawyer. Maybe the scene that impressed me the most is after the trial, in which Daniel gets free without any problem, when he is talking to the man that wanted to be his defense (that Daniel refused), in a very tall building (that remembers to me the biblical story in which Jesus is on the top of the mountain with Satan, being tempted), when he says "you could have this city if you want"... It's really moving. And like that one I could mention lots more. Even in the very end, when Daniel dies, and her friends give his healthy organs to other persons and you can see them: they will live longer: the resurrection. I'm not religious at all, but the way they handle the movie and the story is really heart moving. By the other way we have a preacher that has been with a lot of prostitutes, such as they say Mary was, we find a Daniel that besides his friends, is completely alone in the world, we have a girl that (even though is not exactly prostitution) has to sell her body to live, and many other things that are not that nice. So it is not just a white, nice movie, it is very ambiguous. Besides its beautifulness it has a dark (very real) side. It is awesome.
Review of Jesus of Montreal
