{"id":6943,"date":"2016-02-18T13:02:12","date_gmt":"2016-02-18T18:02:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/?p=6943"},"modified":"2016-02-18T14:52:12","modified_gmt":"2016-02-18T19:52:12","slug":"at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html","title":{"rendered":"At the movies: &#8220;Risen&#8221; rises to tell a riveting Resurrection story"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here\u2019s today\u2019s dispatch from the crossroads of faith, media and culture.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"RISEN - Official Trailer #2 - Now Playing!\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/xxgm2TJr2m0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong><em>Risen<\/em> opens nationwide in theaters tomorrow (2\/19).<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Synopsis (from the film&#8217;s website):<\/strong> <em>Risen<\/em> is the epic Biblical story of the Resurrection, as told through the eyes of a non-believer. Clavius (Joseph Fiennes), a powerful Roman military tribune, and his aide, Lucius (Tom Felton), are tasked with solving the mystery of what happened to Jesus in the weeks following the crucifixion, in order to disprove the rumors of a risen Messiah and prevent an uprising in Jerusalem. Directed by Kevin Reynolds. Screenplay by Kevin Reynolds and Paul Aiello.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Review:<\/strong> Joseph Fiennes (who played another sort of Jesus pursuer in the excellent 2003 biopic <em>Luther<\/em>) does an effective job portraying Clavius, a Roman-era Lt. Gerard (of <em>Fugitive<\/em> fame) in hot pursuit of a man who has already been executed. Of course, his prey is actually in pursuit of him (and all of us) and also happens to be the Son of God.\u00a0 All in all, the film offers a truly original perspective on the days following the Crucifixion, strong writing and production values and excellent performances, particularly by Fiennes, Felton, Peter Firth (as Pontius Pilate), Maria Botto (as Mary Magdalene), Stewart Scudamore (as Peter) and Cliff Curtis (as Jesus).<\/p>\n<p>For those wondering when current-day Hollywood would seriously produce a quality faith-based biblical movie with genuine mainstream appeal, I think that significant moment in time has arrived. Although it&#8217;s not nearly as significant as the one depicted in the film. <strong><em>Risen<\/em> is Highly Recommended.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>John W. Kennedy is a writer\/development consultant specializing in teleplays, screenplays and novelizations<\/em>. He can be reached at <a href=\"mailto:john@jwkmedia.com\">john@jwkmedia.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em>Encourage one another and build each other up \u2013 <\/em><strong>1 Thessalonians 5:11<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here\u2019s today\u2019s dispatch from the crossroads of faith, media and culture. Risen opens nationwide in theaters tomorrow (2\/19). Synopsis (from the film&#8217;s website): Risen is the epic Biblical story of the Resurrection, as told through the eyes of a non-believer. Clavius (Joseph Fiennes), a powerful Roman military tribune, and his aide, Lucius (Tom Felton), are&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":225,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>At the movies: &quot;Risen&quot; rises to tell a riveting Resurrection story<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"At the movies: &quot;Risen&quot; rises to tell a riveting Resurrection story\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Here\u2019s today\u2019s dispatch from the crossroads of faith, media and culture. Risen opens nationwide in theaters tomorrow (2\/19). Synopsis (from the film&#8217;s website): Risen is the epic Biblical story of the Resurrection, as told through the eyes of a non-believer. Clavius (Joseph Fiennes), a powerful Roman military tribune, and his aide, Lucius (Tom Felton), are&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Faith, Media &amp; Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-02-18T18:02:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-02-18T19:52:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"John W. Kennedy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"At the movies: \"Risen\" rises to tell a riveting Resurrection story","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"At the movies: \"Risen\" rises to tell a riveting Resurrection story","og_description":"Here\u2019s today\u2019s dispatch from the crossroads of faith, media and culture. Risen opens nationwide in theaters tomorrow (2\/19). Synopsis (from the film&#8217;s website): Risen is the epic Biblical story of the Resurrection, as told through the eyes of a non-believer. Clavius (Joseph Fiennes), a powerful Roman military tribune, and his aide, Lucius (Tom Felton), are&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html","og_site_name":"Faith, Media &amp; Culture","article_published_time":"2016-02-18T18:02:12+00:00","article_modified_time":"2016-02-18T19:52:12+00:00","author":"John W. Kennedy","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html","name":"At the movies: \"Risen\" rises to tell a riveting Resurrection story","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/#website"},"datePublished":"2016-02-18T18:02:12+00:00","dateModified":"2016-02-18T19:52:12+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/e5d5ef9caeb6b01bcbf08ca6de6591c2"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/2016\/02\/at-the-movies-risen-rises-to-tell-a-riveting-resurrection-story.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"At the movies: &#8220;Risen&#8221; rises to tell a riveting Resurrection story"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/","name":"Faith, Media &amp; Culture","description":"Beliefnet Voices - John W. Kennedy","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/e5d5ef9caeb6b01bcbf08ca6de6591c2","name":"John W. Kennedy","description":"John W. Kennedy is the founder and Dir. of Development of The Creative Universe Entertainment\u2122, a media consultation and development company focusing on the creation, development and support of high-quality mainstream entertainment that upholds positive timeless values, including trust in God. Current projects include \"Bryant Park\" (an uplifting romantic-comedy) and \"Photo Finish\" (an award-winning sci-fi TV pilot). He has written over 100 children's novels based on episodes of the Cartoon Network series \"Ben 10\", \"Ben 10: Alien Force\", \"Ben 10: Ultimate Alien\", \"Ben 10: Omniverse\" and \"Generator Rex\" among others. He also writes Beliefnet\u2019s \"Faith, Media &amp; Culture\" blog. Previously, he has produced successful news and talk programming for CNN, Fox News, Pax TV and SiriusXM. Specialties: Script Writing, Movie\/TV Novelizations &amp; Adaptations, TV Content Creation and Development, Creative Consultation, Producing and Booking News and Talk shows. He can be reached for writing, producing and consulting services at 516-640-1182.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/author\/jkennedy"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/225"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6943"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6943\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6952,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6943\/revisions\/6952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/faithmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}