Page - 77 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 05/01

filming biblical stories and the life of Jesus.35 Ever since then, a steady flow of versions of the life of Jesus has continued, produced by filmmakers for the gen- eral public or for religious groups. Films on Jesus continue to stir polemical re- actions and public debate as well as supporting missionary work and religious propaganda. Although the new medium was perceived as associated with the profane, especially in relation to producers and companies that were in the business, this new form of communication was deemed very relevant by indi- vidual churches.36 Between 1897 and 1927, the date of Cecil B. DeMille’s great masterpiece The King of Kings (US 1927), a number of silent films devoted to Jesus’ stories ap- peared in Italy, France, Germany, northern Europe and the United States. The first moving images were linked to passion plays, some of which were already famous in Europe. In 1897, La Bonne Presse, a French Catholic organization in- terested in countering the rise of secularism, commissioned the filming of a passion play, shot in Paris, that is known as Léar Passion of the Christ (Albert Kirchner, FR 1897).37 In the same year, the Höritz Passion (1897) was filmed in Bohemia. This filmed passion play involves the interaction of the documenting of a local performance and the presentation of moving images depicting biblical stories. Moreover, it offers a structure that links the New Testament with stories of the Old Testament as guided by the logic of typological hermeneutics. These examples of a first filming of passion plays can be considered a combination of performances: the passion play itself, the filming and production, the official performance in Philadelphia, with ‘reading commentary’38 and live music.39 The producers were not responsible for the story, which is framed in medieval nar- rative form although it was much changed to feed and nurture religious tourism in the 19th century. The Mystery of the Passion of Oberammergau (Henry C. Vincent, US 1898), filmed on the roof of the Grand Central Palace Hotel in New York with profes- sional actors, had a similar layering. Its creation was complicated, the result of a combination of texts and images vaguely associated with the passion play performed in the Bavarian village of Oberammergau since 1634, when it had been given as a ritual of thanksgiving after the community’s deliverance from the plague. The play, which involved the whole community, was staged every 35 Baugh 1997; Malone 2012; Alovisio 2010; Viganò 2005. For more general entries see Campbell/ Pitts,1981; Cartmell/Whelehan 2007. 36 Shepherd 2013; more problematic Baugh 1997. For a more accurate historical overview Fritz/Mäder/ Pezzoli-Olgiati/Scolari 2018. 37 Baugh 1997; Shepherd 2016, 3 for the sequence of images and secondary literature. 38 A ‘reading commentary’ of biblical silent films is a proper comment meant to guide the public and avoid theological misunderstanding. 39 Shepherd 2013. The Historical Jesus and the Christ of Early Cinema | 77www.jrfm.eu 2019, 5/1