From the beginning of the film Son of Man, we are introduced to the struggle that will unfold for the rest of the movie. We see that there is a conflict between Jesus and Satan, as well as a struggle for political and economic freedom. In the film, the character Jesus is represented much the same way that he is in the Gospels. Jesus gains a following of disciples, heals a dying child, resurrects a dead man, and cast a demon out of a young woman that was possessed much as he does in the stories from the Gospels. This traditional view of Jesus is tied into his being born in South Africa during a time of civil war. Jesus experiences children being beaten to death, radical groups killing others, and a constant military presence, Satan looming over each of these specific events.
The crucifixion scene is portrayed differently than in the Gospels. In the film, Jesus is brutally beaten and then carried to an open grave where he is then shot to death and buried. This is an important scene in terms of the political aspect of the film. Instead of being crucified and hung up in embarrassment, Jesus’s death is done in secret and with barely anyone there. In my opinion, it represents the secrecy and the corruption going on within the South African government at the time, in which anything or anyone that opposed them was done away with in secrecy and hidden. “Mary”, Jesus’s mother, and the disciples then take Jesus’s body and place it on the cross on a hill and use him as a symbol for their struggles.
There is a great amount of intertextuality between this film and the Gospels. As we discussed in class, the Gospels in this case would be source A and the movie would be source B. We see many different examples of this relationship including the shepherds, the disciples (excluding the women), some of the miracles he performs, his betrayal by Judas, and his being denied three times. The setting and time period of this film really solidifies Jesus as a political activist. I never thought about the urgency of the situation that he is faces with, in the Gospels and in this film.
The crucifixion scene is portrayed differently than in the Gospels. In the film, Jesus is brutally beaten and then carried to an open grave where he is then shot to death and buried. This is an important scene in terms of the political aspect of the film. Instead of being crucified and hung up in embarrassment, Jesus’s death is done in secret and with barely anyone there. In my opinion, it represents the secrecy and the corruption going on within the South African government at the time, in which anything or anyone that opposed them was done away with in secrecy and hidden. “Mary”, Jesus’s mother, and the disciples then take Jesus’s body and place it on the cross on a hill and use him as a symbol for their struggles.
There is a great amount of intertextuality between this film and the Gospels. As we discussed in class, the Gospels in this case would be source A and the movie would be source B. We see many different examples of this relationship including the shepherds, the disciples (excluding the women), some of the miracles he performs, his betrayal by Judas, and his being denied three times. The setting and time period of this film really solidifies Jesus as a political activist. I never thought about the urgency of the situation that he is faces with, in the Gospels and in this film.
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