Jesus of Montreal

JESUS OF MONTREAL (1989) - Jan. 24, 2005
Though the film starts out well enough, with a group of actors working to put together a somewhat radical passion play, it quickly loses steam. At around the mid-way point, the actors perform their play, which seems to be performed almost in its entirety in the film. The movie never quite regains its footing after that, and towards the end goes way way over-the-top with the religious symbolism (absolutely no subtlety here -- by the time the protagonist is in a hospital bed at the end of the film in Christ pose, it's like, enough! We get it). At a running time of two hours, the film is at least forty minutes too long and it feels it. **1/2