evening1 Compelling depiction of Christ's final days.I agree with an earlier reviewer that H.B. Warner possesses the gravitas of Jesus but is a generation too old for the part. (Scenes between Jesus and his mother seem more like a husband and wife.)The supporting cast is also strong, including an almost elderly looking Ernest Torrence as Peter, Jacqueline Logan as Mary Magdalene, Rudolph Schildkraut as Caiaphas, and Victor Varconi as Pilate.This film quotes liberally from the Bible in formulating its dialog, and, if you are a fan of harp music, you'll really love the plink-plunk score."The King of Kings" excels in portraying well-known anecdotes from Jesus's life, such as the raising of Lazarus -- stunning as his winding cloths are unfurled -- the healing of a "lunatic" child (he'd be diagnosed with ADHD today), and the cast-no-stones episode involving an adulteress.The scenes involving the mortification of Jesus, his crowning with thorns, and his crucifixion are hard to watch yet still very poignant and powerful."The King of Kings" is a little long and drags in places but nicely encapsulates some iconic moments in cultural history.

Tad Pole . . . directly ordered from producer\director Cecille B. DeMille by God Himself, according to one of the first Intertitles of KING OF KINGS. Therefore, it's obviously sacrilegious to rate this movie below a perfect score of "10." It would be nice if ALL of the world's religions could lend themselves to film adaptations, since some have hundreds of such flicks in circulation. Others behead film makers, which is the ultimate outrage against practitioners of Film AS Religion. One of several fallacious charges made against this 1927 silent, KING OF KINGS, is that it helped inspire the Nazis to "sell" the Holocaust as a revenge killing. However, Caiaphus, the High Priest of Israel, says on an Intertitle card after the rending of the veil over the Holy of Holies, "I ALONE am guilty" for Jesus' execution. Even if Hitler did not grasp that this confessed crucifixion mastermind was long dead and buried by 1927, other Germans were around to fill him in and point out that under this blame-the-Jews logic, he also should be attacking Pontius Pilate's Italian descendant Mussolini, instead of being so Palsy Walsy with him. Controversy aside, is this a MORE authoritative religious film than THE LIFE OF BRIAN or APOCALYPTO? Don't forget they're putting on the Council of Massachusetts on the Boston Commons Feb. 29 to set the canon for the Church of Filmogy. Buffers can be part of it, or be apocrypha.

MartinHafer I have no idea exactly what it means, but the DVD I watched of "The King of Kings" was the roadshow version. Why called 'roadshow' I have no idea, but it's significantly longer than the official version released to the general public. So, it has more than a half hour additional footage. Exactly what extra it has, I really don't know.The film is interesting because it is different from some other films about the life of Christ. It does not start with his birth but begins in the weeks before his crucifixion. As for Jesus, his version starring H.B. Warner is pretty good--mostly because he lacks the ridiculously long hair and angelic visage in some films. He does, occasionally, sport a halo--a rather old fashioned look. However, he is a bit more human than some Jesus portrayals--as he smiles a bit. I wish that Jesus smiled a lot more in films and behaved like a more normal guy, but I have yet to see this sort of Christ in film. And, while it might sound morbid, I wish the crucifixion had been a bit more bloody and realistic (I am NOT talking about to the extent of "The Passion of the Christ", but there is practically no blood at all in the "The King of Kings")--an impossibility.In some ways, the story seems a bit more like a Catholic version of the last days of Jesus. Mary is a very traditionally Catholic one--in headdress and with doves--almost angelic. Also, like the Catholics and Church of England, there is an emphasis on the notion of a 'holy grail'--that glowed with mystical powers. These are not so much complaints--more just observations.What I did have a complaint about, however, is the odd timeline used in the film. Again and again, verses and Biblical accounts are mixed up chronologically--with events from early in a Gospel appearing late in his life. In other words, instead of writing a script, it looked almost like they just randomly picked verses from a hat. So, despite lots of verses being used on the intertitle cards (a good touch), the sequence just did not seem all that important--at least not until the last portion of the movie that centered on the death and resurrection. A bit of research and effort would have made a more historically accurate script.Now although I have complained a bit, there isn't that much to dislike about the film--especially in light of when it was made. The sets and costumes are what you'd expect from a Cecil B. DeMille film--top-notch and quite expensive. And, unlike some of DeMille's later works, this film is much more respectful of the characters and is not inundated with smut (yes, smut--as DeMille's early Christian epic "The Sign of the Cross" had bestiality, lesbianism and all sorts of shocking topics in a Christian epic). Additionally, the Two-Color Technicolor was a terrific addition at the beginning and end of the film--really state of the art for 1927 and one of the best examples of this sort of filming. Overall, a terrific silent--one of the best.

sdave7596 I just recently viewed the original silent film "King of Kings" (released in 1927) for the first time. Needless to say, it is the kind of awe-inspiring epic that Cecil B. DeMille became famous for. At first glance, my big issue was that I thought H.B. Warner was way too old to play Jesus. Warner was already 50 when he played the famous man, who was supposed to be only 30 year old at the time of his death. Once you get past that, however, Warner is brilliant in the role. DeMille has a "glow" around Warner throughout the whole film, obviously to show him as s divine being, and it is very effective. Warner is able to bring amazing humility and wisdom to the part of Jesus -- all without dialogue, folks! DeMille uses scripture quite liberally in this silent epic, and it makes it wonderful for those of us not quite so familiar with them. The supporting cast is outstanding -- Joseph Schildkraut plays the handsome traitor Judas Iscariot, and his performance is excellent. Schildkraut is effective at being able to portray Judas' conflict, jealousy and hypocrisy. Dorothy Cumming as Jesus' mother Mary has a small role, but the emotions she exhibits on her face are heart-wrenching. The rest of the cast is great, and of course, the thousands of extras so common to DeMille's films. DeMille uses great lighting techniques and special effects that seem to be way ahead of their time. According to TCM host Robert Osbourne, DeMille was so powerful at this time in Hollywood he even insisted his stars be on their best behavior off the set and not get into any scandals. While this certainly seems silly by today's standards, it was DeMille's respect for his project that prompted him to reportedly keep tabs on them! Anyway, the film is amazing, and even if you think you do not like silent films, this one is a masterpiece.