THIS is a great Christian film!

Yes, my absolute favorite part of this great Christian film was when God flew down like a Close Encounter of the Third Kind manifestation and started murdering Poneras and his loons. Oh, it was so Christianly good!

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OK, so what's the speed of dark?

This film does more harm to all but the most educated Christian than any 10 of the Hollywood films that mock Christianity and Christians.

The "worst" movie claim is almost always a rhetorical phrase, but this truly has a strong chance at making any short list of attempts to find "the worst film in all of film making history".

For reasons I still fail to understand, I do actually enjoy this movie (in moderation). However, everytime I watch it, I notice more problems.

1) The title makes no sense. For one, while Jude is presented as the protagonist for most of the film, he is implied to commit suicide at the end of Act 2 and it just carries on without him. So why is his name in the title? Another thing: what exactly is this "Judas Project?" That makes it sound like Jude is the result of some genetic experiment, which was never hinted at in the film itself. Never once do they make reference to any kind of project whatsoever.

2) Paneras' statement that Jesse should be killed that the nation might be saved makes even less sense. In John, one gets the idea that Caiaphas said that to justify killing Jesus because, if Jesus declared Himself king, Rome might move in and wipe them all out. JCS actually did a very good job of conveying this. However, here it doesn't even come close to being understandable because he says it *to* the political leaders with whom he already has an alliance.

3) The "Feeding of the 5000" scene is so strangely shot (focussing on the photographer rather than the main characters) that one wouldn't even know that a miracle had taken place. In another film, this could have been intentional, but this movie is very clear that Jesse performs miracles. Also, the crowd is very small and has cars. Both of those facts detract from the miraculous aspect and just create plot-holes. Additionally, the song playing over this scene makes references to various gospel-accounts that never made it into the film.

4) The sequence in which Jude tosses the breifcase and then goes driving loses any and all relevence once the breifcase hits the ground. Why was he driving? What did he do when he got there? Why did we have to watch him weave in and out of traffic? Is the beach as his destination supposed to be important? We learn nothing new from this scene whatsoever.

5) The actors playing Jude and Jesse look too much alike. This may have been intentional, but it just results in a rather confusing experience. I have had several people ask me which one was which even a good way into it.

6) Almost the entire last fifteen minutes is montages of flashbacks. Especially since quite a few of these were footage we hadn't seen before, it is really hard to tell that the resurrection scene is happening in the present. Even beyond that, when most of the third act is montage after montage, something's wrong.

7) The crucifixion doesn't work. So, in a modern day retelling of the ministry of Jesus rather than having the Christ-figure go through lethal injection or the electric chair (a la The Green Mile) or even something remniscient of a crucifixion (a la Godspell), we still have to do crucifixion on what is essentially a cross? Who would even think of such a death nowadays if not for Jesus? Plus, if Cunningham is supposed to be the president (I think), why does he feel compelled to have this execution in secret? So many things just don't add up.

8) While I am usually the one who says that, if it's a good movie, the special effects quality doesn't matter, I will put down my foot on this one and say that these special effects suck. Even compared to SE from that same era, they are pieces of crap. Even more than that, a lot of the time, they aren't even necessary. During any scene with CGI clouds, I have to ask, have these people never heard of filming on a cloudy day? Why did we have to see Jesse's spirit come out of his body and turn into a mini-cyclone? Were people just going to assume he was faking it? The scene with Paneras in the cemetary has possibly the worst of all of them but I'll explore this scene more in depth soon.

9) Paneras in the cemetary was just a stupid scene, even from conception. Why in the world would Paneras run to a cemetary? I get that they were attempting to show the souls reconciled to God because of Jesse's death, but it just comes off like trying to rip off Ghostbusters II...badly. And, yeah, the judgment of God pouring out on Paneras. I'm not going to say much but I will say this: when he's screaming, his mouth doesn't even move; he actually looks rather calm considering he's being sent to Hell.

10) The one shot of Jude shouting, "Why?!" is shown three times: once in the in media res opening, once when it actually happens, and once as a flashback (see 6). That's one time too many for a single shot. We got the point. Let it die.

11) When Jude is given the silver by the assasin, several things are amiss. For one, if this assasin is slated to be killed along with Jesse (which still doesn't make sense to me), why is he the one sent to deliver the silver? Also, the dialogue in this scene feels forced, as if they just wanted to make sure that the audience understood Jude's motivation, as if pretty much all of his lines up to this point didn't make it clear.

12) There are only five disciples. I get that they didn't have a huge cast, but this just seems odd. Most notably, the transfiguration scene just seems to be slighting Jude and the one whose name I guess is Andy. Okay, leaving Jude out of the transfiguration makes sense, but what happened to Andy? Did he just piss Jesse off that morning? Why was he left out? It's not as if one more person would've diluted the personal nature of the scene. Come to think of it, why was Andy in the movie anyway? He never did anything, said anything or was even given any attention. It seemed like he was just there to make their ranks look *that much* bigger, which he failed at. Also, with just five followers, why did Jesse strike Paneras and Cunningham as a threat?

13) Jesse should've been named Josh. Joshua is the same name as Jesus, just translated differently. I could be wrong, but I don't think Jesse has any etymological relation to Jesus. To quote Jude, "Why?!"

14) This is hardly my area of expertise, but several of my friends have described the songs in this movie as cheesy. I myself almost never know when something is cheesy, so I rely on the reactions of those around me.

15) Considering the Cold War situation (which, oddly enough ended the year after this film came out) which was even mentioned as a minor plot point in the film, why was a Russian woman Cunningham's spokesperson? I get that not all Russians are Communists, but I would've liked an explanation for this. As it is, it seems like profiling. I've heard it said that you can tell what country the US is at war with by what nationality the film villains from that era tend to be. This seems to enforce that.

Ugh. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that MovieMn1982 is dead wrong when (s)he says that "THIS is a great Christian film! THIS is the way it's supposed to be done...EVERYONE SEE IT!" This movie is terrible and has very little going for it, if anything. While I will still pop it in every couple of months and enjoy it, I cannot but say that it stinks. Christians have this tendency to watch secular films and judge them solely on moral grounds, while they'll watch Christian films and immediately assume that those are fantastic. Believe me, I was raised looking at movies this way and have only recently started to develop a critical opinion. I now see that this and many other "great" Christian films are, simply put, garbage on film trying to be good entertainment.


"I'm the RA, and as the RA, I'm supposed to be the fun-sucker. I *beep* the sun."
-Abe Christiansen