Jesus Christ Superstar (1973)

It's a stone-cold certainty that my Picturenose partner and fellow Expatica contributor Colin Moors will have a few words to say about this choice of film for a nostalgia trip - musicals are his cinematic bête noire and, as for religion, don't even think about it.

Just as well my decision was approved by Expatica's editor Paul then, isn't it - like me, he's obviously a sucker for the 'let's do the show right here' 1970s shtick but, in fact, as we both know, there is in fact a great deal more to Jewison/Webber/Rice's iconoclastic, deliberately anachronistic take on the greatest story ever told.

And, let's face it, the death of Jesus Christ and the events that led up to it is a yarn for all times, regardless of whether you believe the man was mere flesh and blood or much more.

I'm assuming you know the story. What is perhaps most interesting, from a narrative sense, about the film and the show that preceded it, is the perspective from which we see the events of the final few weeks in Christ's life - namely, Judas Iscariot (Carl Anderson).

While gifted, high-pitched singer Ted Neeley as Christ works very well in the film's more emotional numbers (such as Gethsemane (I Only Want To Say and Hosanna), the story's driving urgency comes almost completely from Anderson's spitting rage and frustration which, perhaps ahead of any other interpretation of Our Lord's betrayer, allows an insight into the desperate motivations of a man at the end of his tether, with genuine sympathy the inevitable, human reaction. A startling turn.

Of course, cynics will grumble that this interpretation, much like the original show, is locked in the 1970s, and may it rest in peace there. Pooh-pooh to them - details are still sketchy, but it's looking like a 2010 remake is on the cards, and hooray say I because, sorry, I love both the show and film.

Jewison was an interesting (and, it must be said, unexpected) choice of director - while very much the man of the moment when the film was made (in the few years prior, he had made Fiddler on the Roof (1971), The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), In the Heat of the Night (1967) and The Cincinnati Kid (1965)), but his style was not considered at the time suitable by many critics. Never mind that - with only a few lapses into inappropriate slapstick (which were in the original show anyway, to be fair, such as the jaunty, irritating King Herod's Song), Jewison, helped by Melvyn Bragg's nuanced screenplay additions,  brings all the key characters to life.

Barry Dennen is another standout as Pontius Pilate, while Bob Bingham brings a rough, merciless masculinity to his portrayal of Caiaphas. In addition, the director's insertion of lumbering tanks and jet planes (you'll know 'em when you see 'em), which would have seemed clumsily obvious in lesser hands, here contribute enormously to the film's symbolic magic. And, for my own part, I still find Neeley's death of Christ among the most moving ever committed to film.

There's not really much more to say, is there? I think it's safe to say by now that you know whether or not you're going to like it but I recommend watching Gethsemane on youtube to find out what the buzz is…

Happy Easter.

(or is it Hippy Easter? PM)

108 mins.

Out now...

Chéri
Stephen Frear’s pre-Second World War Paris drama, Chéri, seems likely to divide audiences. The director of The Queen (2006) offers a love story that is as beautiful on the eye as its leads Michelle Pfeiffer, who plays retired Courtesan Lea and Rupert Friend, the titular young son of her colleague and rival Mme Peloux (Kathy Bates), but which doesn’t quite deliver the descent into emotional hell of its source novel. Lea and Chéri share a six-year love affair, with forces such as Peloux, a bitter, spiteful woman and her jealousy of Lea and frustration with her son ranging against them. When the relationship comes to an end, Chéri begins to retreat into a fantasy world

Pfeiffer takes the plaudits here, with a moving, smart and witty performance, while Friend, although clearly a talented actor, could have been given so much more to work with in Christopher Hampton’s adaptation of Colette’s novel. Much to enjoy, but much could also have been improved.

100 mins.

James Drew