The Nativity Story - Review

by Scott Gwin

The story of the birth of Jesus is a moving, multi-dimensional one that often gets horribly lost in an over-commercialized, angrily debated ruckus holiday the world calls Christmas. Director Catherine Hardwicke’s The Nativity Story is a movie that sends out a gentle whisper over the clamoring din, a tender retelling of that story in a fashion true to its origins.

Pay no attention to the movie’s dramatic tagline about one child who would change the world forever. Even though it culminates with his arrival as a baby, the movie isn’t really about Jesus. It’s about Mary, Joseph and the handful of other people who figure into the months leading up to the birth. Simple people caught up in extraordinary circumstances, some follow their hearts, others their faith, others a star, seeking to fulfill the journey laid before them by a higher power. The story is a familiar one to many, but the movie brings it to life in a much more relatable, real way than most story books or popular Nativity plays offer.

Joseph (Oscar Isaac) is a carpenter in the poor, Roman-oppressed Israeli town of Nazareth. He’s a man of honor who lives his life well and quietly sacrifices himself for the good of others. Mary (Keisha Castle-Hughes) is a young girl in the town, a quiet and faithful daughter who hopes for something better for her family and her town. When her father, according to the customs of their people, betroths her for marriage to Joseph, she’s less than excited about it, but that’s nothing compared to another responsibility that she is about to be given.

The angel Gabriel (Alexander Siddig) delivers the message to Mary that she has been chosen by God to bring into the world the Messiah, the incarnation of God and the prophesied savior of her people. It’s a charge with an enormity that at first she doesn’t grasp, but one that will come to haunt, challenge, terrify, elate and enrapture her. Mary’s life isn’t the only one affected. The implications of this divine occurrence are enormous, both at home in Nazareth and around the world. While Joseph struggles to come to terms with Mary’s situation and the decisions he must make as a result, others are also becoming aware of the impending fulfillment of a millennia old Jewish prophecy.

King Herod (Ciarán Hinds), the Roman-appointed ruler of Israel, has struggled with rebellious uprisings among the Jews and talk of the prophecy has only worsened matters, driving him to desperate measures. Meanwhile, a trio of Eastern astronomers, astrologers and mystics (who from time to time brilliantly serve as the much needed comic relief) has been closely following celestial events which lead them to believe that the fulfillment of a major prophecy is close at hand. Realizing the magnitude of what the arrival of a great king in Israel could mean, they set out on a potentially foolish journey to be present when it happens.

Matters become even more difficult when Rome decides a census needs to be taken of its vast Empire. As a result, Joseph and his very pregnant wife must make a long, uneasy journey to a place over one-hundred miles away to meet the requirements of the census. The journeys of many converge on one very unlikely spot, bringing together an unsuspecting group of people to an event that is much different than any of them expected.

The movie not only hits the sorts of stirring emotional notes that make it interesting to watch, it does it in a way that focuses on the people involved without getting too caught up in the supernatural or any sort of proselytism. Even if you don’t believe the story on some sort of personal or spiritual level, the movie is still a wonderful piece of storytelling that could be enjoyed by anyone.

Some movies about Biblical figures stray too far into the realm of creative license, like Scorsese’s overwrought The Last Temptation of Christ. Others stick so close to the written text that they end up cinematically stiff and stuffy. This film finds a nice blend between the two, holding fast to what history and the Bible say while feathering in interpretations and additional moments that really make the characters and their journeys come alive. No doubt some will complain about certain inaccuracies. For example, even though it has become tradition in the Nativity that three wise men attended the birth at the stable that night, the Bible never really says how many there were and according to the text they didn’t actually catch up with Jesus until he was about two years old. If that sort of nitpicking is going to ruin the movie for you, don’t bother going. The beautiful moments that Hardwicke creates at the end of the film when everything converges in one moment and one place will sadly be lost on you.

Like the recent Passion of the Christ, the movie has a poignant script, is magnificently acted and beautifully filmed. Of course, there are no ancient Roman regional despots around to complain that the movie antagonizes them and unfairly portrays them as the bad guys, so this movie will hopefully arrive without all the unnecessary protestations. As well I hope it isn’t excessively embraced by any religious groups as some sort of masterpiece of their faith. This isn’t a “good Christian movie”. It’s a good movie, period, and deserves to be recognized as exactly that.

Movie review: The Nativity Story

Father Peter Malone

Beautifully filmed- The Nativity Story is a worthwhile and modest enterprise that, by and large, comes off well. It is to the credit of New Line Cinema that they were prepared to venture into this kind of religious film-making. No doubt the box-office success of The Passion of the Christ was an encouragement. Screenwriter Mike Rich has a church background and a respect for his biblical sources. Director Catherine Hardwicke brings a detailed eye to sets and the re-creation of the era.

New Zealand actress, Keisha Castle-Hughes (Whale Rider) fits the role of the young girl, Mary, very well - a bit stern at first but mellowing when Joseph accepts her. Oscar Isaac is a compassionate Joseph. The Iranian actress, Shohreh Aghdashloo is Elizabeth and the Israeli actress Hiam Abbass is the mother of Mary. The whole cast, quite international, performs with the same slightly accented English.

The screenplay is well-grounded in the biblical texts, but also offers substantial historical background.

Like the apocryphal gospels of the early Christian centuries, some imaginative incidents not in the Gospels have been added.

The film's depiction of Nazareth in credible and realistic. The town was not an easy place to live in. The residents were poor and oppressed by taxation. This had its consequences on work in the town, the fields and harvests, the making of basic foods and selling them, the work of builders and carpenters. The journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem is beautifully portrayed, giving enough time for us to appreciate the hardships - lack of food, desert crossings, dangerous rocky paths, the swirling River Jordan, the approach to Jerusalem with road blocks, wayside preachers, fortune tellers, the bustle of the city - as well as conversation between Mary and Joseph about the future.

When the screenplay uses direct texts from the Gospels, it is not so effective. They move too quickly. This is the case when Mary arrives at Elizabeth's house and, barely turning round, Elizabeth utters the greeting verbatim from Luke and the acknowledgement of Mary as the mother of the Lord.

There are many Magi sequences, with more emphasis on the astronomy than on the Hebrew texts they also quote. Their differing characters provide touches of humour. Ciaran Hinds is a sinister, egoistic and paranoid Herod - with a rather oily Antipas, his son, giving him sinister advice.

There will be discussions about some of the visuals, especially the appearance of Gabriel. He is a voice only for Zachary. He is a swiftly place-changing physical presence to Mary (although the annunciation works quite well when it is filmed in close-ups of Mary and Gabriel in conversation). He appears briefly in Joseph's dream. There is a bird motif at various moments representing the Holy Spirit that is sometimes too long and obvious. The star and the light shining on the crib is too static and Christmas card-like.

The Silent Night ending seems a bit much but, on the other hand, it evokes memories of Christmas for the audience. This film should be popular with Christian audiences and it is hoped will have a wider appeal to non-Christians.


The Nativity Story is released on 1 December.

As we roll into December, "The Nativity Story" hits theaters, with Keisha Castle-Hughes as Mary, Oscar Isaac as Joseph and Alexander Siddig as the Archangel Gabriel. The age-old story of the birth of Jesus certainly contains enough splendor, emotion and drama to satisfy any moviegoer who prefers a flick with a strong plot and opportunities for spectacle. But, especially at this time of year, it's also a movie that is certain to hit the Christian world right in the heart.

Vatican officials give thumbs up for 'The Nativity Story'

By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Vatican officials have given the latest Hollywood re-enactment of the Gospel accounts of Jesus' birth a thumbs up after hosting the film's world premiere Nov. 26.

Praise for "The Nativity Story," due out in U.S. theaters Dec. 1, came from the Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano; the Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone; and the head of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, U.S. Archbishop John P. Foley.

"It's well done," Cardinal Bertone told journalists after seeing the film in the Vatican's Paul VI hall together with more than 7,000 other invited guests. Pope Benedict XVI, who was due to fly to Turkey less than 40 hours later, did not attend the evening event.

"It retells this event which changed history with realism but also with a sense of great respect of the mystery of the Nativity," said Cardinal Bertone, adding that he found it to be "a good cinematic" feature.

The benefit event raised money to build two new schools in the Israeli village of Mughar in Galilee. Christian, Muslim and Druze students will attend the elementary and middle schools.

Thunderous applause broke out several times during the film's 90-minute showing, with the most enthusiastic being during the scene of Christ's birth in Bethlehem.

Archbishop Foley said Rolf Mittweg, president of the film's distributor, New Line Cinema, told him he was "stunned, but happy" the film generated so much applause.

"I told him it was because they were pleased to see an affirmation of (the Christian) faith," the archbishop said.

In his opening remarks before the nearly full audience hall, Archbishop Foley said it was "nice to be able to have something religious for Christmas."

The film, which revives the true meaning of the season, comes at a time when "people are afraid of saying 'Merry Christmas'" and makes people "proud to say 'Merry Christmas,'" he said.

The archbishop told Catholic News Service he found the film to be "very moving" and thought "the part of Joseph was sensitively scripted and played."

Cardinal Bertone also praised the way the scriptwriter, Mike Rich, crafted "very beautiful dialogue" between the characters, especially in fleshing out Joseph and Mary's relationship and how "they together accepted the mystery of God's plan for them."

"In particular, Joseph is the example of how an honest and righteous man, who undergoes a humanly upsetting experience" -- finding out his betrothed is pregnant -- can still "abandon himself completely to God's plan."

Meanwhile, L'Osservatore Romano called the feature film "graceful and unpretentious," praising it for being a light, happy and imaginative retelling of the story of Joseph, Mary and Christ's birth.

END

The Nativity Story': A headstrong teenager with a great responsibility
By A.O. Scott

It's best to think of "The Nativity Story" as a Hollywood version of the kind of Christmas production some of the "Peanuts" kids put on in "A Charlie Brown Christmas." This is not meant as a criticism. Quite the contrary.

Directed by Catherine Hardwicke from a script by Mike Rich, "The Nativity Story" sticks to the familiar details of the narrative and dramatizes them with sincerity and good taste. There are no flights of actorly or cinematic bravura - though all of the performances are credible, and some better than that - and very few big, showy, epic gestures. Rather than trying to reinterpret or modernize a well-known, cherished story, the filmmakers have rendered it with a quiet, unassuming professionalism.

The challenge in producing a movie like this is to find enough conventional movie elements - suspense, realistic characters, convincing dialogue - without selling out the scriptural source. How do you make piety entertaining without seeming impious? (It is probably to avoid this risk that some religious traditions forbid making spectacles or graven images out of religious texts.) A certain degree of kitsch is inevitable, and perhaps even desirable.

The Bible supplies a ripe villain in the person of Herod, who is impersonated here, with a stagy frown and magnificent hair, by Ciaran Hinds. The three wise men (Nadim Sawalha, Eriq Ebouaney and Stefan Kalipha) provide some comic relief along with the gold, frankincense and myrrh. They quarrel and kvetch their way across the desert like Hope and Crosby (or Moe, Larry and Curly) on the road to Morocco (which happens to be where much of "The Nativity Story" was filmed).

The movie has been cast with an eye toward authenticity rather than renown, which spares audiences the distraction of seeing familiar movie stars in robes and sandals. Instead we have an impressive sampling of international actors; they come from Northern Ireland, Guatemala, Cameroon, Iran and even, aptly enough, Nazareth. Their accents sometimes clash - the ancient Israelites have apparently been instructed to sound like modern Israelis when they speak the English dialogue - but this could hardly have been avoided.

Several plots are threaded together, as the film synthesizes the plain, step- by-step storytelling of the Gospels according to modern screenwriting conventions. (It starts with the massacre of the innocents and then flashes back "one year earlier" to the story of Zechariah and Elizabeth, parents of John the Baptist. Political events - Herod's paranoid cruelty and the brutality of the Roman occupation - are juxtaposed with the more intimate story of Mary and her family.

Keisha Castle-Hughes, the 16-year-old New Zealand actress (and the youngest- ever best-actress Oscar nominee, for "Whale Rider" a few years ago), seems entirely unfazed by the demands of playing Mary. She has the poise and intelligence to play the character not as an icon of maternity, but rather as a headstrong, thoughtful adolescent transformed by an unimaginable responsibility. Mary's stubbornness and her honesty make her entirely believable, and the film's most subtle and lively dramatic thread concerns her maturation from an ordinary Nazareth teenager into a wife and expectant mother.

In "Thirteen" and "Lords of Dogtown," Hardwicke's previous films as a director - a role she took up after a long career as a production designer - she showed an unusual sensitivity to the feelings and motives of young people growing up too fast, and a similar sympathy infuses her understanding of Mary. Without making the character into an anachronism, she and Rich try to imagine what Mary's experience must have felt like. The daughter of loving, worried parents (Shaun Toub and Hiam Abbass), she must absorb first the shock of an arranged marriage (to Oscar Isaac's Joseph) and then the startling attention of the Archangel Gabriel (Alexander Siddig).

One of the vivid memories of my earlier life as a movie-mad college student is of the protesters picketing a theater showing Jean-Luc Godard's "Hail Mary," a film whose retelling of the Nativity story was presumed, sight unseen, to be blasphemous.

Hardwicke's version, aimed at a global mass audience in the Christmas season, steers clear of both Godard's provocations and the confrontational style of Mel Gibson's "Passion of the Christ." At its best, though, "The Nativity Story" shares with "Hail Mary" an interest in finding a kernel of realism in the old story of a pregnant teenager in hard times. Buried in the pageantry, in other words, is an interesting movie.

Born Again
Although she's at its center, Mary is rarely The Nativity Story's star.
by Cindy Fuchs
Published: November 29, 2006

Once upon a time, the Christmas story was news, startling and even daunting, especially to a teenager named Mary. Now that Jesus' birth is the stuff of plastic crèche scenes, the surprise has rather worn off. But Mary couldn't have had an easy time of it. Matthew and Luke attest to her maturity and grace: The girl was assigned a miraculous pregnancy that put her life at risk not only from her neighbors in Nazareth (who regularly stoned unmarried expectant women), but also by King Herod, who feared the prophesied Messiah.

Predictably, The Nativity Story reinforces the traditional notion of Mary (Keisha Castle-Hughes) as wise, patient and wholly accepting of her destiny. To its credit, Catherine Hardwicke's movie also shows her initial disquiet. Though her concerns are promptly squelched by the angel Gabriel's (Alexander Siddig) perfection, for a couple of moments, Mary looks very worried indeed.

Mary is, after all, a girl in a specific kind of trouble, which makes her an intriguing subject for the director of Thirteen. Established as sensitive and creative (she bakes treats for children), Mary resists her father's economic decision to marry her off to Joseph (Oscar Isaac). Though she frets in voiceover, "Why do they force me to marry a man I barely know, a man I do not love?" a rather perfunctory romantic possibility is indicated by Mary and Joseph's earlier shy glances at one another across the town square, and his gallant recovery of her family donkey from the villainous tax collectors. The film eases up on the couple's reported age difference (in some sources, he's middle-aged and already has kids), and instead shows them to be more or less "made for each other."

That's not to say they don't have issues. Neither is quite ready for their his-and-her visitations from Gabriel. First coming as a breeze, the angel is then reduced to a typically white-robed authority figure. "Nothing said by God can be impossible," he tells her, though a subsequent shot shows her lying awake in bed, worrying, "How is anyone to believe me?"

She's right to worry, as her neighbors are certainly inclined to think the worst. Still, Mary's faith in her purpose is granted additional reinforcement from her kinswoman Elizabeth (Shohreh Aghdashloo), who becomes pregnant around the same time — her "miracle" being the fact that she's past childbearing age. Of the many scenes depicting miracles and wonders, the one where the two women — both pregnant, following orders and feeling chosen — stand together during a break from their fieldwork, touching one another's big bellies, stands out. Brief and charming, the moment offers a respite from the movie's push to Bethlehem. For once, the women are not only vessels, but also characters unto themselves.

(c_fuchs@citypaper.net)

Yes, there is something about Mary. Something inspiring. Something hopeful.

Told with faith, heart and simplicity, “The Nativity Story” follows the physical and spiritual journey of this Judean 13-year-old and Joseph, her betrothed, from their engagement through the first Christmas.

Because its makers walk in the sandals of this young couple struggling to understand the implications of God’s favor, the movie encourages empathy rather than religious awe. It knocks Mary and Joseph out of the creche and off the fresco and sees them as living, breathing individuals.

The result is a vital, human-scaled drama that gets into the heads and souls of ordinary people who come to realize they are figures of destiny.

What must it be like to be 13, a devout Jewess living under the repressive regime of King Herod and the uncertainties of Roman occupation? In her encounters with villagers and Herod’s soldiers, Mary (Keisha Castle-Hughes) is watchful and shy.

She can scarcely make eye contact with Joseph (Oscar Isaac), the smiling, bearded man to whom her parents have betrothed her. So imagine her reaction when an apparition, the angel Gabriel (Alexander Siddig), tells her she has been chosen to bear God’s child. She’s confused. And afraid. But, she says, the will for the child is greater even than her fear.

Between them screenwriter Mike Rich ("Finding Forrester,” “Radio") and director Catherine Hardwicke ("Thirteen," “Lords of Dogtown") have chronicled the teenage experience, from academics to athletics. Here they give life to a teenager who struggles to meet her duty to family, faith and self.

A potential weakness of the film is that Castle-Hughes, so unpredictable and exuberant as the tribal shaman of “Whale Rider, is unusually subdued.

But her reticence serves to strengthen another aspect of the film. “The Nativity Story” is really the love story of Mary and Joseph. What must it be like to be a 13-year-old girl who explains to her betrothed that she is pregnant, but chaste?

Isaac’s emotional performance as the man who learns to share the woman he loves with the God he worships is profoundly moving and gives the movie its heart.

Hardwicke’s movie (PG-rated for discreet violence) sets the journey of Mary and Joseph against that of the Three Wise Men - played here for comic relief, like a brainy version of the Three Stooges.

The rhythms of her film - much of it shot, like “Passion of the Christ,” in the ruggedly picturesque town of Matera, Italy - underscore the spiritual and physical convergence of the Holy Family with the wise men from the East.

“The Nativity Story” is not a perfect movie. But I admire it for avoiding the epic and spectacular and for telling its story with intimacy and immediacy. It’s a film for all ages and faiths.

THE NATIVITY STORY

3 stars

Produced by Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen, directed by Catherine Hardwicke, written by Mike Rich, photography by Elliot Davis, music by Mychael Danna, distributed by New Line Cinema.

Running time: 1 hour, 41 mins.

Mary/Keisha Castle-Hughes

Joseph/Oscar Isaac

King Herod/Ciaran Hinds

Elizabeth/Shohreh Aghdashloo

Gabriel/Alexander Siddig

Parent’s guide: PG (nothing unsuitable for children)

Few stories are more familiar than the one told in "The Nativity Story," a new film about the trials of Mary and Joseph, the journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem and the birth of Christ. So it seems a wonder at times that director Catherine Hardwicke and writer Mike Rich still manage to make the tale seem fresh and vital.

Their movie is reverent without seeming too pious-minded, and loving without being sticky. And it has actors in the central roles, Keisha Castle-Hughes and Oscar Isaac, who are young, beautiful, even a bit lusty-looking, and who don't fit the usual cliched image of Mary, the immaculate virgin, and Joseph, her aging protector.

Hardwicke became famous for "Thirteen," a realistic contemporary drama about youthful delinquency and sexuality -- and, as you'd expect, she doesn't deliver a typical religious movie. Covering the events from the time of Zechariah's vision in the temple up to Herod's massacre of the innocents, and the flight of Mary and Joseph into Egypt, Hardwicke and Rich retell the story with art and simplicity, without the characters becoming creche figurines.

Herod's massacre is their framing device. We see the mad monarch ordering the slaughter at the beginning, and then we move back to the events that led up to it: the birth of John the Baptist, the lunacies of Herod and his tax plan, the long journey of Joseph and Mary into Bethlehem, and the Nativity as witnessed by the shepherds and the Three Wise Men -- Gaspar, Melchior and Balthasar.

Throughout, Hardwicke keeps us aware of the danger and primitivism of the places around Mary and Joseph -- and Jesus.

This movie isn't an intense visceral shocker like Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ." Nor is it a groundbreaking neo-realist depiction, like Pier Paolo Pasolini's 1964 "The Gospel According to St. Matthew" -- although Hardwicke stages much of her film near the ancient but well-preserved Italian village of Matera, where both Gibson and Pasolini shot the main parts of their movies.

The moviemakers haven't embossed "Nativity Story" with greeting-card imagery. They haven't sentimentalized, overdramatized, or stuffed it with contemporary political parallels. Instead, they've told the story with a measured seriousness but also with an often fiery, youthful quality.

New Zealander Castle-Hughes, the young Oscar-nominated star of "Whale Rider," brings this film some of the liveliness and joy that infused that role. Isaac is a 2005 graduate of the Juilliard Academy, and he brings the part a freshness and vulnerability it usually doesn't have.

Herod is the Irish actor Ciaran Hinds, who played Julius Caesar in HBO's "Rome." Others in the cast include Hiam Abbass ("Paradise Now") as Anna, Mary's mother; and Shohreh Aghdashloo, the Oscar-nominated Iranian actress who played the wife in "House of Sand and Fog," is Elizabeth, Zechariah's wife and John's mother. A hunky-looking actor, Alexander Siddig, is the Angel Gabriel, and the interchanges among the Wise Men, especially the ones involving skeptical Gaspar (Stefan Kalipha), are often played for a bit of gentle humor.

Scriptwriter Rich, who initiated the project, has gone to great lengths to keep the characters plausibly motivated and the movie tasteful. And Hardwicke, who began her film career as a production designer, has done her best to make it look and sound beautiful. The modernistic score is by Mychael Danna, who works most often with Canada's often audacious experimentalist Atom Egoyan ("The Sweet Hereafter").

"The Nativity Story" surprised me. I didn't expect such an obvious art-film approach. Yet the Bible, in the King James version, is great English literature, and it's just as capable of a more elevated style -- as we see in John Huston's epic "The Bible" -- as it is of the popular storytelling we see in the shamelessly operatic Cecil DeMille movies, or the gorier excesses of Gibson's "Passion."

"Nativity Story" lacks a certain excitement and narrative depth, but it is capable of pleasing, on some level, believers and skeptics alike.

I wasn't much moved by "Nativity" -- perhaps it was too careful and intelligent -- but, as I watched it, I could sense some of the urgency of its belief, the universality of its themes of God, loneliness and redemption. "Nativity" is a movie that may not take full advantage of its tale but doesn't betray it either.

(CNN) -- Low-budget Christian cinema has been quietly racking up small but significant profits over the last few years without troubling the mainstream media, but thanks to "The Passion of the Christ," bigger studios are weighing in.

"The Nativity Story" is a major release (from New Line, like CNN a unit of Time Warner), and boasts the kind of production values only money can buy. Discreetly ecumenical in thrust, it's a reverent, orthodox movie aimed at churchgoers across the spectrum.

A little too reverent, perhaps. It takes the first chapter in the Greatest Story Ever Told and turns it into a mild yarn.

Drawing on the gospels of Matthew and Luke, screenwriter Mike Rich takes no liberties with Scripture, though there are occasional concessions to contemporary sensibilities. Instructed that she is to be married to Joseph, Mary worries that she is not in love with him.

Director Catherine Hardwicke's two previous films, "Thirteen" and "Lords of Dogtown," both centered on troubled teens, and at a pinch you could lump "The Nativity Story" in with them.

Hardwicke angles for historical authenticity, and convincingly reproduces life in Judea 2007 years ago. (The production was largely based in Matera, the same Italian town used in "The Passion of the Christ.") We are treated to scenes of Nazarene farming, food preparation and religious instruction that have the faint mustiness of an old National Geographic about them.

The casting approximates ethnic realities (at least, you won't find Jeffrey Hunter or Max von Sydow here, though Belfast-born Ciaran Hinds is an old-school scheming Herod). Whether by accident or design, most of the Jews are played by actors of Persian or Arabic descent, including Shohreh Aghdashloo, as Mary's cousin Mary, Shaun Toub as Mary's father and Alexander Siddig as Gabriel.

The Virgin Mary herself is played with earnest fortitude by the Maori actress Keisha Castle-Hughes, who seems to have surrendered most of the spontaneity and joy that made her the youngest-ever best actress nominee for "Whale Rider" a few years back. Her performance hits one note, over and over.(Watch when the unwed 16-year-old actress revealed her off-screen pregnancy )

However, Guatemalan-born Oscar Isaac is a real find as Joseph, hinting at pent-up anger, humiliation and doubt beneath the character's fundamental integrity. He's a markedly younger Joseph than we're used to seeing, and his crisis is the meatiest drama in the story (except perhaps for Herod's infamy).

"The Nativity Story" is a shade more sensitive to the dilemmas presented by a virgin pregnancy in a strictly religious society than previous incarnations of the story -- when she returns home Mary is under threat of stoning -- but the film's scrupulous, rather plodding treatment only exacerbates the tale's familiarity. It's a relief whenever the magi are on screen, just for the very mild comic interplay they allow.

Of course there is nothing inherently wrong with preaching to the converted -- secular Hollywood does it all the time. But I confess I wish the movie had some of the passion of "The Passion of the Christ." For all that film's bloody excess, at least it communicated Mel Gibson's absolute need to make it.

Hardwicke and Rich have taken the safer road and played it by the book, but they never once risk putting their audience's beliefs to the test.

"The Nativity Story" is rated PG and runs 101 minutes.

Hollywood is in a born-again mode with its rediscovery that Biblical epics can bring manna at the boxoffice. In New Line Cinema's "The Nativity Story" we have the first smart, artistically and spiritually satisfying film to emerge from this trend. The familiar story, iconic aspects of which will decorate many front lawns during the next few weeks, unfolds in a scrupulously accurate historical adventure story that depicts the world of Jesus' birth with an exciting you-are-there verisimilitude.

Young Keisha Castle-Hughes (an Oscar nominee for "Whale Rider") plays not so much the Virgin Mary but a gutsy young woman born to an honorable though struggling Jewish family in Nazareth, who handles miracles and hardships with a tough-minded spirit. When a diaphanous Archangel Gabriel puts in appearances, we're clearly in the realm of mythology. But the movie, written by Mike Rich and directed by Catherine Hardwicke, sticks as close as possible to a realistic account of the Christ child's birth.

The faithful will flock to this well-told tale -- and DVD sales will be formidable -- but there is room at the inn for nonbelievers, who appreciate a good story told with cinematic flair. Because most "Christmas movies" these days are mean spirited -- i.e., "Deck the Halls" -- "Nativity" is positively refreshing.

Hardwicke has directed the teens-on-the-edge-of-disaster drama "thirteen" and the Venice skateboard film "Lords of Dogtown," neither of which prepares us for her stepping into the scandals of Cecil B. DeMille. But step she does with remarkable assuredness and sensitivity. She and Rich shake off any qualms they might have entertained about retelling a Sunday school story and go for the inherent drama of an epic about sacrifice and destiny.

At the time of Jesus' birth, the Holy Land was a fearful place, occupied by arrogant Roman soldiers under the command of King Herod, a client of Caesar Augustus. Yet the king quakes in morbid fear of the Old Testament prophecy of a Messiah, who will overthrow his rule, even to the point of ordering the slaughter of all male children, under 2 years of age, in the city of Bethlehem.

The movie retreats one year to account for this drastic action. In Nazareth, a city hounded by the king's tax collectors, economic necessity forces Anna (Hiam Abbass) and Joaquim (Shaun Toub) to tell their daughter Mary (Castle-Hughes) they have arranged her marriage to "a good man" named Joseph (Oscar Isaac). Troubled by this news, she retreats to an olive grove where the angel Gabriel (Alexander Siddig) appears and tells her that the Holy Spirit will cause her to bear a son she will name Jesus, who will be mankind's savior.

Her aging cousin Elizabeth (Oscar-nominee Shohreh Aghdashloo) is experiencing a similar miracle, newly pregnant by her equally ancient husband Zechariah (Stanley Townsend), a priest. Mary convinces her parents to allow her to visit the pious couple to sort out her life. It is here she experiences the Immaculate Conception.

But returning to her hometown clearly pregnant, she puts her new husband in a moral dilemma. No one in town, not even her parents, believe her story about angels and conception. In many ways, it is Joseph who is the real hero of this story, a man who stoically accepts a role that in many eyes brands him a cuckold. Some of the movie's best passages survey his evolving spiritual awareness of this role.

Meanwhile, in Persia, three Magi -- Melchoir (Nadim Sawalha) the scholar, Gasper (Stepan Kalipha) the translator and Balthasar (Eriq Ebouaney) the confident Ethiopian astronomer -- study celestial charts and maps to discover that the signs of the Messiah's coming are unmistakable. Melchoir convinces his reluctant companions to undertake the hazardous journey through the wilderness to witness the child's entry into the world.

The film follows these story lines, paying close attention to details. This ancient world -- its flowing clothes, stone houses, scattered settlements and vast, forbidding deserts -- displays harmonious, earthen colors that delight the eye in Elliot Davis' subtle cinematography. Here we witness the close proximity of mankind with their livestock. And the spiritual awareness of a people, subjugated by foreign troops, dominates all thought and action.

The film's locations -- Matera, Italy; Morocco; and Israel -- supply amazing terrain, while production designer Stefano Maria Ortolani dresses real locations and sets that make this world come vibrantly alive. Stables are cramped, filthy places; a river crossing invites disaster; wise men weary of the journey; and treachery lurks everywhere. Mychael Danna's music is a major plus as it underscores rather than overrides the film's emotions.

With a fresh approach to the birth of Jesus, Hardwicke (Thirteen) tells the biblical story with energy and spark, adding layers of meaning that give the film a bit of a kick. The faithfulness to the Gospel account will thrill believers, although mainstream audiences may struggle with the emotive spirituality.
Mary (Castle-Hughes) is a typical Jewish teen 2,000 years ago, betrothed by her parents (Toub and Abbass) to a local carpenter, Joseph (Isaac). When an angel (Siddig) tells her she's going to conceive God incarnate, she naturally struggles to accept this news. And how will Joseph take it? Meanwhile, King Herod (Hinds) is looking for new ways of levying taxes against his subjects and avoiding a prophecy about the coming people's king. And three astronomers in Persia (Sawalha, Kalipha and Rusoff) link that prophecy to an eventful alignment of planets, and head towards Judea to investigate.

The best thing about this film is the exhaustive research into the time and place, which shows in the detailed context in which the story's set. This is a vivid portrayal of the politics of the day, complete with an intriguing look at Jewish culture and even international relations. In this setting, Mary and Joseph's story takes on even more meaning and relevance. And Rich's script also cleverly weaves in references to Jesus' adult life, which adds layers of new meaning to a familiar story.

Performances are very strong, and there's even some nice chemistry between Castle-Hughes and Isaac. The three wise men provide the badly needed comic relief, even as their scientific instruments offer an intriguing glimpse into the technology of the period. Hinds is slightly reduced to a one-note paranoid villain, storming and glowering at everyone. While Aghdashloo and Townsend provide a nice interlude as Elizabeth (Mary's pregnant cousin) and her husband.

besides the slightly reverential tone, the only real problem is the rather wonky geography (exactly where in central Israel is the Sahara Desert?) as well as a few too-perfect Christmas card tableaux. But as a story of a young couple confronted with something truly outrageous and facing it with honesty and faith, this is a powerful, moving drama.

It's a far too familiar scenario - a pregnant teenager, a family thrown into turmoil and an arranged marriage to protect everyone's honor.

But add to this an unbelievable tale of Virgin Birth that is one of Christianity's founding tenets and you get "The Nativity Story," a new film based on the biblical tale of the birth of Christ.

At a time when secular celebrations, including most films, have redefined the holiday as a meaningless and generic act of consumerism, "The Nativity Story" reclaims its roots as a story of sacrifice and celebration.

To the casual observer, it is without the distracting speculative filter imposed on "The Passion of the Christ," but, to be fair, "The Nativity Story" does tell the more upbeat narrative.

It is an epic of intimate proportions, a sincere and spare work of social realism where there are taxes to pay, crops to harvest and children to raise. And this grass-roots portrait of family and community life becomes the foundation that allows one's faith in what happens next to blossom.

Olive-skinned and raven-haired Mary, played by Keisha Castle-Hughes, is not a particularly pious or responsible girl. She grudgingly runs errands for her family and sulks when she becomes betrothed against her will to a man named Joseph, played by Oscar Isaac.

She is just another moody teenager until she is touched by an angel, played by Alexander Siddig of "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" and "Syriana," who tells her she will become pregnant with the child of God.

And to underscore it, her cousin Elizabeth, played by Shohreh Aghdashloo, has become miraculously pregnant, too, despite her advanced age.

Mary's family is, of course, crushed by her pregnancy, and Joseph is humiliated, until an angel reassures him that all is as Mary says.

Meanwhile, camel-riding and wisecracking wise men who peer at the stars and pore over charts, and a paranoid King Herod, played by Ciarán Hinds, separately conclude that the night sky is signaling the fulfillment of a prophecy about a king of kings, whom Herod fears will usurp him.

And Joseph and his pregnant wife make the grueling trip by donkey to Bethlehem, home of his ancestors, for the Roman census, where she will give birth in a manger.

"The Nativity Story," by "Finding Forrester" and "The Rookie" screenwriter Mike Rich, is the biblical story we all know given the texture of an unforgiving world where any act of compassion is a miracle.

Castle-Hughes, who ironically is pregnant in real life, has the ordinary and normal scale of someone who was mortal before she was blessed.

And Isaac's Joseph is a multidimensional portrait of a good and dependable man, worried about what kind of father he can ever be to a child who is prophesied to save mankind.

Catherine Hardwicke, director of the skateboarder film "Lords of Dogtown" and the teen drama "thirteen," is an odd choice for "The Nativity Story." Odder still is her decision to coat the film in a soft-focus, grapes-or-grain tint, which obscures the real-world details she creates.

There are no glowing halos or heavenly choirs in "The Nativity Story," just a portrait of how a divine birth depended on the efforts of very flawed human characters.

The Nativity Story (2006)
Directed by Catherine Hardwicke. Keisha Castle-Hughes, Oscar Isaac, Hiam Abbass, Shaun Toub, Ciarán Hinds, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Stanley Townsend, Emilia Fortunato, Alexander Siddig. New Line.

See also
St. Joseph Gets His Due: The Nativity Story Through the Eyes of Jesus’ Foster Father (article)

Christmas Story: Catherine Hardwicke and Mike Rich Discuss Bringing The Nativity Story to the Screen (article)

From a National Catholic Register review

By Steven D. Greydanus
Bible scholars tell us that the Passion narratives in the Gospels represent the earliest stage in the development of New Testament tradition regarding the life of Christ. How Jesus suffered, died and was raised was of paramount importance in the earliest days of the church; interest in his birth and infancy came later, leading to the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke.

It is fitting, then, that the success of The Passion of the Christ should have paved the way for The Nativity Story. In the past, Jesus films have generally sought to cover the whole sweep of the gospel story, whether according to one particular Gospel (e.g., The Gospel According to Matthew; The Gospel of John) or synoptically (e.g., King of Kings; “Jesus of Nazareth”). By contrast, The Passion and The Nativity Story, like earlier forms of Christian drama, are narrower in scope — modern equivalents of, respectively, the medieval passion play and Christmas/Epiphany play (also known as “pastores et magi” or “shepherds and wise men”).

Astonishingly, The Nativity Story is essentially the first major “shepherds and wise men” feature film in Hollywood history. There’s never been any shortage of Christmas movies, of course. From It’s a Wonderful Life to A Christmas Carol, from Miracle on 34th Street to Tim Allen’s Santa Clause films, there are more Christmas movies than you could watch in all twelve days. Yet even at the height of Hollywood biblical epics, the real meaning of Christmas was essentially ignored (a few brief scenes in Ben-Hur notwithstanding).

The Nativity Story goes a long way toward redressing this historic omission. Written by Mike Rich (The Rookie, Radio) and directed by Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen, Lords of Dogtown), the film weaves and elaborates the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke into a character-centered tale of faith, calling, and sacrifice.

While relying on both Matthew and Luke, in one important respect the film takes its cues from the Matthean infancy narrative: Luke’s Gospel has a Marian emphasis, while Matthew focuses on Joseph. Where other retellings have almost uniformly followed Luke’s emphasis on Mary, The Nativity Story is a more Matthean exploration of Joseph’s character-arc, struggles, and heroism.

As seen here, it’s the story of a craftsman (charismatic Oscar Isaac, All About the Benjamins) whose arranged betrothal to a virtuous young woman (Keisha Castle-Hughes, Whale Rider) turns out not at all the way he expected or hoped. From the outset Mary is clearly not pleased to be marrying Joseph — and then, after a three-month hiatus to Judea to visit a kinswoman, she returns three months pregnant. The film includes the Lucan incidents of the Annunciation and visitation to Elizabeth, but it’s through Joseph’s eyes that we see Mary’s departure, her absence for three months, and her return just as she begins to show.

It’s in these scenes, fleshing out the human dimension of what the terse biblical narratives merely imply, that The Nativity Story is at its best. The tender relationship between young Mary and the older Elizabeth (Shohreh Aghdashloo, House of Sand and Fog) is touchingly drawn, and the public shame and scandal faced by Mary returning to Nazareth, and by Joseph if he stands by her, is vividly portrayed.

Even after the angelic appearance in his dream, Joseph continues to wrestle with uncertainty and doubt, notably in an affecting moment on the journey to Bethlehem involving an innocent comment from a street vendor. Orthodox journalist Terry Mattingly has observed that this depiction of Joseph’s ongoing struggles converges with a tradition in Eastern iconography depicting St. Joseph troubled by the devil even during the Nativity itself.

What is not in keeping with traditional iconography, or with the oldest tradition, is the depiction of Joseph as a comparatively young man, here in his later twenties. The Nativity Story portrays Joseph as an established craftsman living on his own, but it doesn’t follow the traditional depiction of Jesus’s foster father as a widower with children by an earlier marriage. (Though very ancient, this tradition isn’t authoritative; it is possible to envision Joseph as a young unmarried man.)

It’s fair to say that the driving religious sensibility behind The Nativity Story is more Protestant than Catholic. Even so, the film’s appeal is broadly ecumenical. If Mary’s perpetual virginity and Immaculate Conception aren’t affirmed, they aren’t contradicted either, and nothing here need be a serious obstacle for Catholic viewers. (Another venerable tradition, that Mary did not experience pains in childbirth, is also not followed, but this too is not Church teaching.)

What matters more is the film’s avoidance of the kind of love-story approach to Joseph and Mary’s relationship seen in some earlier treatments. Here, on the contrary, Mary is at first averse to the arranged betrothal, only gradually coming to respect and be grateful for the man the Lord has chosen to be father to her Son. While necessarily speculative, this seems a plausible approach both psychologically and theologically.

Even in the modern cinematic age, when exacting production design in period films is almost a given, The Nativity Story recreates textures and details of first-century rural life with an earthy authenticity that is particularly rich. (Those familiar with Jesus’ saying about a “donkey’s millstone” will find out what one looks like.)

Further enhancing the realism is doubtless the most non-Caucasian cast in Hollywood Bible movie history. Perhaps English in a Bible film will never quite sound the same after The Passion's visionary use of ancient languages, but Middle-Eastern accents work better than the British or American English common in the past, and may set a new standard for such films.

Anchoring the cast above all is Isaac, whose sensitive, compelling peformance gives depth and humanity to the relatively obscure figure St. Matthew describes simply as “a righteous man.” Other assets include Aghdashloo’s warmly maternal Elizabeth, and Hiam Abbass’s prosaic Anna (i.e., St. Anne, the mother of Mary). Ciáran Hinds is darkly brooding as Herod, and Alexander Siddig is suitably otherworldly as the enigmatic Gabriel. Castle-Hughes’s Mary doesn’t emerge as vividly as Joseph or Elizabeth, though she has some strong moments.

Eschewing the standard Middle-Eastern musical textures used in Bible films from The Last Temptation of Christ and The Passion, Mychael Danna’s score relies instead on traditional Christian music, including chant and early Christmas melodies, such as O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.

The film’s faults, such as they are, tend to be of omission rather than commission. At the Annunciation, we have Mary’s words “Let it be done to me according to your word” — but not “I am the Lord’s handmaid.” (Alas, Gabriel (Alexander Siddig) greets Mary with the rather limp “Favored one” rather than the traditional “Full of grace.”)

Likewise at the appearance to Zechariah, Zechariah raises the issue of Elizabeth’s advanced years, but doesn’t ask the doubting question “How shall I know this?” (the counterpoint to Mary’s believing but wondering question “How shall this be?”). Nor does he receive the stern angelic reply, “I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of the Lord.”

These omissions are all the more curious precisely because the whole challenge with these scenes is the paucity of source material. One can understand the filmmakers’ reluctance to add dialogue to the immortal words of the Annunciation — but why not at least use all the words that are there? And why underplay Zechariah’s doubts, or the sternness of the angel’s reply? It would only make his muteness more intelligible.

Mary’s Magnificat, at one point omitted altogether, is treated only briefly and in part, in a voiceover at the end of the film. The shift itself actually makes sense — yet why omit the magnificent opening line from which the prayer takes its name (“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit exults in God my savior”)? Why include “The Lord has done great things” but omit “for me”?

Perhaps most glaringly, while The Nativity Story depicts the Magi visiting King Herod, it omits Herod’s consultation with the scribes and the citation of the Bethlehem prophecy of Micah 5:2, which isn’t mentioned at all. Instead, Herod already has his eye on Bethlehem because of Caesar’s decree, which would send the coming Son of David back to his ancestral home. (Unfortunate as this is, it’s far better in this regard than Zeffirelli’s “Jesus of Nazareth”, which not only omits the Magi’s visit to Herod altogether, but specifically makes a point of their snubbing Herod, who is seen fuming about the foreigners who have crossed his borders but refuse to come see him.)

Historical purists may object to the juxtaposition of the shepherds and the wise men (pastores et magi) on the night of Christmas, though this conflation is a well-established tradition in depicting the Nativity. The broad comic-relief use of the Magi may seem jarring to some; certainly it underscores the family-film milieu.

Despite its limitations, The Nativity Story is bound to become regular Advent and Christmas viewing for countless Catholic and Protestant families. I’m sure it will be for ours. We’ll still watch It’s a Wonderful Life at Christmas, but now we’ll also have The Nativity Story, just as we have The Miracle Maker for Easter.

The Nativity Story has been a long time coming. It’s a most welcome addition now that it’s finally here.

As a religious film, The Nativity Story occupies comfortable territory, as neither epic nor low-budget biblical recitation.

In the '60s, films about Christ's life leaned toward the extravagant, and Mel Gibson's 2004 movie, The Passion of the Christ, was no small undertaking. By contrast, independent studios are producing Christian films on microbudgets, aimed mostly at church congregations.

But The Nativity Story, the tale of Jesus' conception and birth, features enough recognizable names (Keisha Castle-Hughes, CiarᮠHinds, Shohreh Aghdashloo) that it doesn't play like a dry pew-filler. The re-creations of the ancient biblical cities also bear the stamp of a good production. advertisement

But director Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen) wisely keeps the story to scale, realizing that it centers on a young woman, Mary (Castle-Hughes), faced with convincing her skeptical relatives that her conception was immaculate.

Even though most of the Western world knows the story, Hardwicke manages to build suspense. She starts her film, which is largely based on the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, with Roman soldiers rousting Bethlehem in a search for the Messiah, then tells the rest in flashback.

Intercut with scenes of Mary's life is the story of three wise men, who are tracking a celestial event they believe is linked to the coming of a savior. They also provide comic relief, which keeps The Nativity Story from turning into a Sunday school filmstrip.

Anytime we find ourselves relaxing a bit, Hardwicke cuts back to paranoid King Herod (Hinds), who fears a prophecy that will topple his rule. Hinds, who played Caesar in the HBO miniseries Rome, remains convincing here. He brings to life the regal cruelty of a tyrant.

As Herod wrings his hands, Mary and her family are trying to survive under the heel of the cruel, tax-happy Romans, who often arrive with sword and shield to squeeze more money out of the locals. She's married off to Joseph (Oscar Isaac), but custom prohibits them from having sex for a time.

With Nazareth buzzing over talk of a coming messiah, Mary sees a vision of the angel Gabriel (Alexander Siddig), who tells her she's pregnant with the son of God. Anticipating trouble, she leaves to stay with her cousin Elizabeth (Aghdashloo), who is too old to bear children but finds herself pregnant anyway. (Her husband had been struck mute after receiving the prophecy of their coming child, who would become John the Baptist).

Of course, when Mary returns to Nazareth, the family worries about a scandal, because she's pregnant and has not consummated her marriage. She tries to explain the circumstances, but her father and Joseph aren't buying her story.

This leads to the film's finest sequence, in which we see Mary huddled against a wall, and angry villagers about to stone her. Someone walks up to Joseph and hands him a stone, and he considers it in his hand.

I don't want to give away how the scene plays out, but we know, of course, that Mary survives. But in the way that Hardwicke stages the sequence, The Nativity Story becomes the anti-Passion, a movie that makes a statement against violence rather than exploiting it.

In large part, The Nativity Story is about blind faith, especially that of Mary and Joseph. But Hardwicke humanizes them so they're not musty constructs. At one point, Joseph questions whether he's up to the task of raising the child.

Hardwicke then manages to turn The Nativity Story into an engaging chase, as Mary and Joseph travel to Bethlehem, and Herod (who ordered all men to return to the place of their birth) looks high and low for the savior. Again, we know the ending, but the director still makes us a little nervous.

Of course, that only means that The Nativity Story is a real movie, as welcome in theaters as it will be in churches.

by Tony Medley

This is an amazingly faithful rendition of the story of the birth of Jesus as told in the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke without being too gushingly devout. In 102 mesmerizing minutes, it recreates that world with what appears to be admirable accuracy (although, I admit, I wasn't actually there at the time). Regular readers of this column will be shocked to learn that I found little to criticize. To anybody who attended Catholic grammar school, this will be a lovingly familiar story (anybody but Bill O’Reilly, I mean; Bill claimed decades of Catholic school education and then spouted to the world saying that the Immaculate Conception was the virgin birth. Exacerbating the misinformation he disseminated to millions of people who trust him, he then refused to correct it. In fact, the Immaculate Conception refers to Mary being conceived without the stain of Original Sin and has nothing to do with the birth or conception of Jesus, but you wouldn’t know it by listening to Bill and Judge funnyhair (Napolitano), both of whom claim something like three decades of Catholic education between them. Bill will probably see this film and wonder why they didn’t name it “The Story of the Immaculate Conception”).

But I digress. This movie, which is so good it got an ovation at a media screening, something that usually only occurs at virulently leftwing films, is a realistic, faithful telling of how Mary and Joseph came to be at that stable in Bethlehem where Mary gave birth to Jesus.

There are lots of things I liked about this film. The first is that Mary (Keisha Castle-Hughes, who made such a smashing debut in “Whale Rider, 2002) looks like she’s a young woman of around 15, which is what Mary was supposed to be when Jesus was born. She is far and away the best Mary ever to appear on film. Joseph (Oscar Isaac) looks to be in his young 20s. I always pictured him as much older, like 35.

The ambience of the film looks like it is right on. The poverty of the people is captured with clarity; the villages look like they must have looked 2,000 years ago. Bethlehem, in particular, looks like something I’ve never imagined, but is probably pretty accurate. And the stable in which Jesus is born is also something that doesn’t look like what we see on Christmas Day, but is probably just exactly the way it was, filled with sheep and no furniture, except the manger which becomes Jesus’ first bed.

Mike Rich’s script is rich in speculation. We know virtually nothing about Mary’s life and parents, and even less about Joseph, so Rich has created a story line that fills in perfectly with what we know from the Gospels. The lines he has Mary say to the Angel Gabriel that we know as the beautiful prayer The Magnificat are spoken with such every day realism that you don’t really recognize that you are hearing a famous prayer until you think about it. This emphasizes the strength of the film. Rich and Director Catherine Hardwicke make Mary and Joseph and everyone else real people, not cardboard saints with halos around their heads. They are just simple people struggling to make it through a very tough life. Even after the extraordinary events start to occur, they take them more or less in stride.

Most movies need a bad guy, and Ciaran Hinds creates a wonderful one as Herod, the ruler who is so worried about the Messiah that he kills 40 little boys in Bethlehem 2 years-old and under.

One of the better things that Rich has done is spend quite a bit of time on Joseph. He is as much a character in the film as Mary, and he’s the guy who steps up and gets everything done. The Gospels kind of ignore poor Joseph, but he had to be the type of man we see in this film in order to get done what had to be done.

Unlike Mr. O’Reilly, I paid attention in grammar school and know the story of the Nativity like the back of my hand. I can see nothing to criticize in Rich’s script. As to Hardwicke’s direction, it was superb, except for one scene. I didn’t much like the ray of light she had pointing directly on the manger from the star that led the Wise Men to the stable. That was a little too miraculously over the top for a film that in all other aspects seems deadly accurate and matter-of-fact.

In fact, I think that Hardwicke has directed a masterpiece here. For anyone who isn’t that familiar with what Christmas is and only thinks of it as a Nativity scene and a time to exchange presents and take a holiday, this is a must see. For Christians who know the story, they will be heartened to find that Hollywood has treated it with respect and not changed a hair on the basic story’s head while amplifying what we don’t know with intelligent speculation.

BY BILL ZWECKER

Humble beginnings
Hardwicke's 'The Nativity story' makes saga of Jesus birth all the more powerful with recreation as life as it was 2,000 years ago

Along with the Easter story, nothing from the Bible has received more attention from Hollywood than the birth of Jesus Christ.
As we approach this year's Christmas season, this simple yet world-changing tale again makes its way to the multiplexes. Despite being released in this filmmaking era so dependent on special-effects and computer-generated visual wizardry, director Catherine Hardwicke's ''The Nativity Story'' is a refreshingly unadorned example of straightforward storytelling.

Certainly, there is ''movie magic.'' After all, Hardwicke is a contemporary filmmaker and understands how to use technical tricks to transport her audience. She makes good use of CGI frequently and effectively for many of her backgrounds. Even illustrating the miracle of Jesus' conception, or God informing Mary -- and later Joseph -- of their roles in Christ's birth, it's all done with a lovely, light touch.

It was a bit surprising at first to learn that Hardwicke, known for her terrific but very gritty and contemporary films such as ''Thirteen'' and ''Lords of Dogtown," was on board to direct this movie. This subject matter was not the kind of material one would have expected from the filmmaker. After seeing this film, and thinking about Hardwicke's background, I think it suddenly all makes great sense.

Before turning to directing, Hardwicke had built a strong reputation as an outstanding production designer. Clearly her eye for detail added greatly to the over-all look of the film. Even more important, her previous work as a director has proved she understands the lives and conflicts present in young people as they come of age. She knows how to depict teen angst and pain, and the difficult process of making decisions -- no matter how old a person is.
Given that Mary of Nazareth was in her early teens when she gave birth, the pairing of this teen-oriented director and this story of the most famous teenage mother of all time proved propitious.

The production design is splendid. The homes of Galilee and Judea, more than 2,000 years ago, are little more than caves or huts. The clothing is rough and textured. Life was hard, food was extremely basic and not very plentiful.

Even when taking us to the court of King Herod, Hardwicke stays on message. After all, a regional monarch of that era -- in essence, a vassal of the Roman Empire -- was basically a local administrator, little more than a tribal chieftain. Hardwicke makes that point clear -- Herod is shown as being not too separated from his people, only in a physical sense. His spiritual separation is as deep a chasm as has always been demonstrated in previous films about Christ's birth.

Unlike in previous retellings of this important story, screenwriter Mike Rich has fleshed out a reasonable backstory about Jesus' earthly family. We get a sense of what likely occurred as Mary's unenthusiastic and reluctant hand was promised in marriage to the somewhat older, but kind and stable Joseph.

We are also introduced to the sense of outrage felt by Mary's family and community when she returns pregnant after visiting her cousin Elizabeth. It is this grittier, uncomfortable version of the Christmas Story that adds even more heft to this special film.

While the look, feel and direction of ''The Nativity Story'' are all strong, it is the superb casting choices that ultimately make this such a wonderful film.

Keisha Castle-Hughes, who first enchanted us with her Oscar-nominated performance in ''The Whale Rider,'' is luminous as Mary. This amazing young actress -- still in her teens -- communicates so much with her eyes, emoting just the right expression for what (we can only surmise) the real Mary must have felt and gone through.

Newcomer Oscar Isaac is another perfect choice -- a sensitive young man who delivers beautifully as the conflicted, yet oh-so-trusting Joseph.

Irish actor Ciaran Hinds gives us a King Herod who is not only corrupt, evil and devious -- but clearly so vulnerable and threatened and afraid of his fate.

In the somewhat smaller role of Elizabeth, the cousin of Mary and mother of John the Baptist, Shohreh Aghdashloo, also strikes the right chords playing a woman well past what then was considered childbearing years.

Throughout the film, we are given the sense of how cruel life was under the unrelenting power of Rome, how the lives of common people were considered so expendable. A telling moment comes when a poor man desperately begs to keep his donkey from being taken as a form of payment for the taxes he's unable to remit in hard currency. The loss of that animal virtually sentences the man to bankruptcy, but when he's out of ear-shot, the Roman soldier/tax collector snidely tells his aide, to kill the poor beast of burden. ''We already have enough.''

Perhaps the most unusual twist to Hardwicke's retelling of the Christmas Story is how she presents the Three Wise Men -- Melchior, Balthasar and Gaspar. Played engagingly by veteran actors Nadim Sawalha, Eriq Ebouaney and Stefan Kalipha, this trio of mysterious kings adds some surprising comic elements to a storyline that one wouldn't expect to find funny.

This intriguing trio's banter is often very humorous and does work in a strange yet believable way.

Movie review: 'The Nativity Story'
By Michael Wilmington
Tribune movie critic

November 30 2006

Few stories are more familiar than the one told in "The Nativity Story"--a new film about the trials of Mary and Joseph, the journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem and the birth of Christ. So it seems a wonder at times that director Catherine Hardwicke and writer Mike Rich still manage to make the tale seem fresh and vital.

Their movie is reverent without seeming too pious-minded and loving without being sticky. And it has actors in the central roles, Keisha Castle-Hughes and Oscar Isaac, who are young, beautiful, even a bit lusty-looking, and who don't fit the usual cliched image of Mary, the immaculate virgin, and Joseph, her aging protector.

Hardwicke became famous for "Thirteen," a realistic contemporary drama about youthful delinquency and sexuality--and, as you'd expect, she doesn't deliver a typical religious movie. Covering the events from the time of Zechariah's vision in the temple up to Herod's massacre of the innocents, and the flight of Mary and Joseph into Egypt, Hardwicke and Rich retell the story with art and simplicity, without the characters becoming creche figurines.

Herod's massacre is their framing device. We see the mad monarch ordering the slaughter at the beginning, and then we move back to the events that led up to it: the birth of John the Baptist, the lunacies of Herod and his tax plan, the long journey of Joseph and Mary into Bethlehem, and the Nativity as witnessed by the shepherds and the Three Wise Men--Gaspar, Melchior and Balthasar. Throughout, Hardwicke keeps us aware of the danger and primitivism of the places around Mary and Joseph--and Jesus.

This movie isn't an intense visceral shocker like Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ." Nor is it a groundbreaking neo-realist depiction, like Pier Paolo Pasolini's 1964 "The Gospel According to St. Matthew"--although Hardwicke stages much of her film near the ancient but well-preserved Italian village of Matera, where both Gibson and Pasolini shot the main parts of their movies.

The moviemakers haven't embossed "Nativity Story" with greeting card imagery or sentimentalized, overdramatized or stuffed it with contemporary political parallels. Instead, they've told the story with a measured seriousness but also with an often fiery, youthful quality.

New Zealander Castle-Hughes, the young Oscar-nominated star of "Whale Rider," brings this film some of the liveliness and joy that infused that role. Isaac is a 2005 graduate of the Juilliard Academy, and he brings the part a freshness and vulnerability it usually doesn't have.

Herod is the Irish actor Ciaran Hinds, who played Julius Caesar in HBO's "Rome." Others in the cast include Hiam Abbass ("Paradise Now") as Anna, Mary's mother, and Shohreh Aghdashloo, the Oscar-nominated Iranian actress who played the wife in "House of Sand and Fog," is Elizabeth, Zechariah's wife and John's mother. A hunky-looking actor, Alexander Siddig, is the Angel Gabriel, and the interchanges among the Wise Men, especially the ones involving skeptical Gaspar (Stefan Kalipha), are often played for a bit of gentle humor.

Scriptwriter Rich, who initiated the project, has gone to great lengths to keep the characters plausibly motivated and the movie tasteful. And Hardwicke, who began her film career as a production designer, has done her best to make it look and sound beautiful. The modernistic score is by Mychael Danna, who works most often with Canada's often audacious experimentalist Atom Egoyan ("The Sweet Hereafter").

"The Nativity Story" surprised me. I didn't expect such an obvious art film approach. Yet the Bible, in the King James version, is great English literature, and it's just as capable of a more elevated style--as we see in John Huston's epic "The Bible"--as it is of the popular storytelling we see in the shamelessly operatic Cecil DeMille movies, or the gorier excesses of Gibson's "Passion." "Nativity Story" lacks a certain excitement and narrative depth, but it is capable of pleasing, on some level, believers and skeptics alike. Ironically, it became embroiled in a local political-religious controversy when the city turned down a proposed sponsorship from the film's studio for this year's Christkindlmarket--an arrangement that would have involved showing clips from the film.

I wasn't much moved by "Nativity"--perhaps it was too careful and intelligent--but, as I watched it, I could sense some of the urgency of its belief, the universality of its themes of God, loneliness and redemption. "Nativity" is a movie that may not take full advantage of its tale but doesn't betray it either.

mwilmington@tribune.com

I wasn't much moved by "Nativity"--perhaps it was too careful and intelligent--but, as I watched it, I could sense some of the urgency of its belief, the universality of its themes of God, loneliness and redemption. "Nativity" is a movie that may not take full advantage of its tale but doesn't betray it either.

The Nativity Story
Monday 4th December 2006
Simon Dillon reviews the film

The Nativity Story

My father, who tutors students in English, was recently shocked to discover one of his sixteen year old pupils did not understand a reference to Adam and Eve in a poem she was studying, because she had never heard of them. This is just one isolated example of increasing Biblical ignorance and for this reason alone, films like The Nativity Story are to be welcomed with open arms. Even though it is no groundbreaking masterpiece like Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, it is an intimate and well told picture in which the true meaning of Christmas is faithfully reemphasised.

Opening with the massacre of innocents in Bethlehem as Herod orders the deaths of babies two years and under, the story then flashes back to a year earlier, and the familiar events leading up to the massacre are simply but compellingly told. The cast all put in decent performances, especially Keira Castle-Hughes as Mary, finally an actress who is the right age. Best known as one of Natalie Portman's handmaidens in the Star Wars prequels and for her role in Whale Rider, this could well prove to be a career defining role.

Oscar Isaac is appropriately noble and supportive as Joseph, a kind but simple man suddenly overwhelmed by the significance of events taking place in his family. The excellent Ciaran Hinds gives Peter Ustinov a run for his money as the villainous King Herod (Ustinov was Herod in Franco Zeffirelli's Jesus of Nazareth). Elsewhere, the shepherds are represented by Ted Rusoff, who has a small but memorable role. The wise men - Nadim Sawalha, Eriq Ebouaney, and Stefan Kalipha - provide unexpected comic relief, and there are memorable bit parts from Shaun Toub as Mary's father, and Alexander Siddig as the Angel Gabriel.

The Nativity Story

Although the film doesn't go so far as to have dialogue in Latin, Hebrew and Aramaic (like the Passion), the entire cast look and sound Israeli, and everything appears grittily authentic. One would have expected such realism to clash with the fairytale-like tone of the story, yet it doesn't, probably because this "fairytale" is true.

Director Catherine Hardwick could hardly have picked a more different project given the subject matter of her two previous pictures, and she does the job well. With the help of cinematographer Elliot Davis she creates a number of memorable images including the emergence of the star over Bethlehem and some particularly nice shots of the journey to Jerusalem that will lose much when reduced by television.

Speaking of the journey, one thing Mike Rich's screenplay does very well is show just how gruelling and dangerous such an expedition would have been for Mary and Joseph. They are constantly in danger from hunger, rivers, and even the occasional poisonous snake (a not-so-subtle metaphor for the devil). One interesting scene has them arriving in Jerusalem, where Joseph remarks that it is a holy city, only to find thieves, fortune tellers, and market sellers everywhere; an interesting foreshadowing of John chapter 2 where Jesus cleared the temple.

I still prefer Jesus of Nazareth (the first episode dealt with the Nativity), but this is a good, solid picture, and the critical moment when Jesus is born is undeniably powerful and moving. Despite the presence of Herod's massacre (most of which occurs offscreen), the whole family should enjoy this when it comes out on the 8th of December. It's also a film Christians can recommend to their non-Christian friends. Biblical ignorance may be at an all-time high, but in a world where the meaning of Christmas is lost in an ocean of tinsel and Boxing Day sales, The Nativity Story couldn't have come at a better time. CR

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms.

''Nativity'' gives Christmas story a human edge

By MAL VINCENT, The Virginian-Pilot
© December 3, 2006

CLOCKING IN at just 90 minutes, “The Nativity Story” successfully visualizes one of the more familiar stories in world culture and gives it just a bit of human edge. It is a rare balancing act and one that is likely to please a mass audience while not overly angering the theologians, historians and critics who will, nonetheless, find plenty to question in it.

Keisha Castle-Hughes is a radiant and yet mildly rebellious Mary who suggests both faith and questioning at the same time. The charisma and edge that she brought to her Oscar-nominated performance in “Whale Rider” was no accident. (At age 12, she was the youngest actress ever to be nominated for best actress .)

In one of the few obvious sacrifices to commercialism, an action scene opens the film with a bang, depicting King Herod’s slaughter of the innocents to head off the prophecy of a newborn king. There is then a flashback to the town of Nazareth to depict the early, more tranquil years in the lives of Mary and Joseph. She is betrothed to him, over her mild objections. Elizabeth, Mary’s kinswoman, becomes the mother of John the Baptist, even though she is aged and previously barren. Mary is visited by an angel who tells her she is with God’s child, born by the Holy Spirit. For this crucial scene, director Catherine Hardwicke proves, as throughout, that simple is better. No cardboard wings. Just actor Alexander Siddig with a wisp of wind and an eloquent delivery.

Joseph is something of a hunk, as played by young Juilliard School grad Oscar Isaac. When Mary returns from a visit with Elizabeth, she is clearly pregnant. The village is in an uproar with threats of stoning her for adultery, but her husband believes her story about the archangel’s visit. Here, the film treads dangerously near a turn toward a teen drama, perhaps to attract young audiences – a suspicion encouraged by the fact that director Hardwicke is a veteran of such teen flicks as “Thirteen” and “Lords of Dogtown.” Wisely, though, Mike Rich’s screenplay avoids making it into a love story. Mary and Joseph are very much awed and challenged by the honor that has been given them while they still are grounded in this world.

Rich’s screenplay deftly blends markedly different Gospels of Matthew and Luke, the only biblical narratives of the birth. The Magi are only in Matthew, and the shepherds are only in Luke – yet both are here and subject to the challenge of the purists. Still, a Nativity story without both would leave quite a few mantel-manger scenes looking empty in homes this season. The writer, in a recent interview, said he thinks Catholics may object to showing Mary in labor, but he feels it was necessary to humanize the drama.

Aware of claims that Joseph was anywhere from 30 to 90 years old in varied accounts, he chose a young Joseph and almost makes the film into Joseph’s story – a man torn by his responsibility to do what is expected of him and yet wondering why it must be his wife.

The Magi are something of comic relief, whether intended or not – rich and reluctant, lumbering along on their camels and observing that they are hardly ever wrong.

Seeking a kind of “epic intimacy,” Hardwicke’s approach is better at the intimacy than at the epic, which is, perhaps, all to the good. The trip from Nazareth to Bethlehem is captured via stunning outdoor photography. Sandstorms, treacherous terrain, hunger and thieves are encountered.

Mychael Danna’s music, though, is an opportunity missed when you think what a monumental score could have, and should have, been composed for this story.

Herod is played younger than usual but with the same mincing evil by Irish actor Ciaran Hinds. Shohreh Aghdashloo, with a deep voice that would make Lauren Bacall and Marlene Dietrich sound like sopranos, brings great drama to the role of Elizabeth .

Gilda, the donkey, is a lumbering and winsome presence in what could be the top animal performance of the year if they still gave those awards.

Herod’s slaughter of the innocents, for which no historical support can be found, is somewhat restrained compared to what it might have been. Clearly the producers want this treatment to be acceptable for a family audience. The two scenes of childbirth , though, are graphic . The film is rated PG, but parents should make their own choice.

This film captures the essence of the hope and faith that was required and given by its two central characters. Even though the story is so familiar, it is successful in providing a sense of jeopardy that will sustain audiences. The essence of Mary’s faith is inherent in the moment when she comments, “Let it be done to me according to thy will.’’ Considering the pitfalls of trying to visualize such material, this is a worthy and balanced treatment.

The Nativity Story

By Isah V. Red

Forget about religion, just think you’re going to watch a love story. I am sure you’re going to love The Nativity Story like many who have seen it.

Catherine Hardwicke’s new film tells the story of Mary of Nazareth and Joseph of Bethlehem, whose simple lives will forever be changed with the birth of Jesus the night when the star of David comes forth and illuminates the dark sky in the still of the night.

Two young actors—Keisha Castle Hughes, an Australian who made her mark in Whale Rider, and Oscar Isaac, Guatemala-born Floridian whose busy career includes performing with a band and as actor in the theater—play the central figures of the biblical romance of Mary of Nazareth and Joseph of Bethlehem.

Hardwicke seems uninterested in making The Nativity Story a hard-selling Christian tale. In fact, I found the movie devoid of anything “missionary” in its subtext. Except for the use of Archangel Gabriel (played by Alexander Siddig) and the occasional ray of light from the sky to announce the presence of a “celestial being” and a thunderous voice (without a face) to represent God the Father… the only recurring motif that connects it to the Christian dogma is the flying dove (for the Holy Spirit) after a character encounter with a sign from “The Lord.”

Hardwicke hardly romanticized the story. In fact, casting Castle Hughes (unwed and pregnant) and Isaac and the rest of the ensemble who look like they are actually Middle Eastern people puts the story in a perspective so unlike earlier films based on either the Old or New Testament of the Bible.

While American critics found The Nativity Story vapid, hollow, and naïve, I found it actually edifying, considering I am not a fanatic of the Catholic religion.

I think it’s the fact that I saw the story of the birth of Jesus told in a more casual manner, in less dogmatic terms, has put a different perspective to my idea of The Nativity, which I must admit has been shaped by several years in the seminary, and my relatives in the sacerdotal vocation.

On a personal note, I’d like to congratulate Pioneer Films for bringing to the local screens New Line Cinema’s holiday film The Nativity Story. And while many distributors avoid the first two weeks of December in anticipation of the Metro Manila Film Festival, Pioneer mustered enough courage to make the film available to audiences beginning today.

Parents of all faiths should bring their children to watch The Nativity Story. It’s the best way to introduce them to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, which we all know as the Holy Family.