Billed as the first in a series of films sponsored by an organization called The Visual Bible, The Gospel Of John delivers just what its title promises: The Gospel Of John, word for word, incident for incident. For those concerned about filmmakers who take liberties with the Bible, this is probably a fine selling point, but for everyone else, it ought to count as fair warning for an awkward translation. God never spoke in screenplay form.
Like a Sunday-school lesson without a built-in break for carrot sticks and apple juice, John takes three hours to get from "In the beginning was the word…" to Jesus' farewell appearance. Along the way, it features a number of Biblical-film mainstays: Spain fills in for the Middle East; crisply accented, theatrically delivered English fills in for Aramaic; and a voice from on high (here, the unmistakable Christopher Plummer) fills in the blanks.
Director Philip Saville tries to keep the low-budget visuals looking lively, and the cast, particularly Henry Ian Cusick as Jesus, keeps its characters' humanity at the fore, but the literal approach just dies on the screen. (It doesn't help that John is the least action-oriented of the gospels.) On the other hand, in the wake of The Passion Of The Christ, the three-hour chore takes on some positive qualities it wouldn't have had otherwise. It's refreshing, for example, to see a Jesus who spends more time teaching than dying, who finds time to get in a few words about forgiveness, and who, when He rises from the grave, doesn't look as if He's planning to kick some ass.