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THE
TOP 5
PROJECT

WEEK NO. 39
Main Page (including links to all past Top 5 weeks)

THE TOP 5 RELIGIOUS FILMS:

view full results       see how points are awarded
Rank Film Points L #1
#1 La Passion de Jeanne d'arc (Carl Th. Dreyer, 1928) 42 10 6
#2 Andrei Rublev (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1969) 30 7 4
#3 Ordet (Carl Th. Dreyer, 1955) 27 9 1
#4 Diary of a Country Priest (Robert Bresson, 1951) 22 8 1
#5 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968) 19 4 3
tie Au hasard Balthazar (Robert Bresson, 1966) 19 4 2
L=How many lists each film appears on             #1=How many number one votes each film recieves

Winning rather handedly this week (and not surprisingly at all) was Dreyer's La Passion de Jeanne d'arc with 42 points and being named the number one pick 6 out of 10 times. Second place went to Tarkovsky's Andrei Rublev garnering 30 points with 4 out of 7 first place votes. Next came Dreyer once again, this time with his Jesus allegory, Ordet. It racked up 27 points for a third place finish. Rounding out the top 5 were Bresson's Diary of a Country Priest with 22 points and in a tie for fifth place, Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey and Bresson's Au hasard Balthazar, each with 19 points.

Other strong contenders were Viridiana (Buñuel), Life of Brian (Terry Jones), The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese), Day of Wrath (Dreyer), Winter Light (Bergman), Nazarin (Buñuel) and The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Pasolini).

Individual lists:

David Sterritt
Chairman, National Society of Film Critics

  1. Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson, 1966)

  2. Francisco, giullare di Dio (Rossellini, 1950)

  3. Nostalghia (Tarkovsky, 1982)

  4. Je vous salue, Marie (Godard, 1985)

  5. Die Große Stille (Gröning, 2005)



Carrie Rickey
Film Critic, Philadelphia Inquirer

  1. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

  2. Diary of a Country Priest (Bresson, 1951)

  3. L'Argent (Bresson, 1983)

  4. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...Spring (Kim, 2003)

  5. Revolt of Job (Gyöngyössy & Kabay, 1983)



David Ehrenstein
Film Critic & Entertainment Writer
Author, Open Secret: Gay Hollywood 1928-1998

  1. Un condamne a mort s'est schappe (Bresson, 1956)

  2. Teorema (Pasolini, 1968)

  3. Stromboli, Terra di Dio (Rossellini, 1950)

  4. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

  5. The Film That Rises To the Surface of Clarified Butter (Owen Land, 1968)



Jeffrey M. Anderson
Freelance Film Critic, Combustible Celluloid, cinematical.com
Las Vegas Weekly, San Jose Metro, etc.

  1. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  2. Diary of a Country Priest (Bresson, 1951)

  3. The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988)

  4. Simon of the Desert (Buñuel, 1965)

  5. Kundun (Scorsese, 1997)

Runners up: The Ten Commandments (DeMille, 1956), Ordet (Dreyer, 1955), The Exorcist (Friedkin, 1973), Nazarin (Buñuel, 1959), The Holy Girl (Martel, 2005), Winter Light (Bergman, 1963), Dogma (Kevin Smith, 1999), Keeping the Faith (Norton, 2000), Bee Season (McGehee/Siegel, 2005).

Note: I haven't yet seen Pasolini's The Gospel According to St. Matthew; I rented it but wound up with a dubbed version, so I'm waiting until I can see it subtitled.


Christopher Null
Founder, Publisher & Editor-in-Chief, Filmcritic.com

  1. The Exorcist (Freidkin, 1973)

  2. Monty Python's Life of Brian (Terry Jones, 1979)

  3. Elmer Gantry (Richard Brooks, 1960)

  4. Inherit the Wind (Stanley Kramer, 1960)

  5. Ben-Hur (Wyler, 1959)



Dennis Schwartz
Film Critic Ozu's World Movie Reviews

  1. Tibetan Book of the Dead (McLean, Hayashi & Mori, 1994)

  2. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

  3. Diary of a Country Priest (Bresson, 1951)

  4. Nazarin (Buñuel, 1959)

  5. Leon Morin, Priest (Melville, 1961)



Film Prophet
Film Critic, FilmProphet.com

  1. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  2. Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1969)

  3. The Crucible (Hytner, 1996)

  4. Faust (Murnau, 1926)

  5. O Brother, Where Art Thou? (Coen, 2000)



Michael Parent
Film Student

  1. Andreï Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1969)

  2. La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  3. Journal d’un Curé de Campagne (Bresson, 1951)

  4. The Seventh Seal (Bergman, 1957)

  5. Last Temptation of the Christ (Scorsese, 1988)

Runners-up: Ben-Hur (Wyler, 1959), Jesus of Nazareth (Zeffirelli, 1977), The Ten Commandments (DeMille, 1956).


Matt Severson
Film Enthusiast

  1. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  2. Gates of Heaven (Morris, 1978)

  3. The Devils (Russell, 1971)

  4. The Seventh Seal (Bergman, 1957)

  5. Diary of a Country Priest (Bresson, 1951)

Runners up: Ordet (Dreyer), Winter Light (Bergman), Viridiana (Buñuel), Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson), Rosemary's Baby (Polanski), Deliver Us From Evil (Berg), The Dekalog (Kieslowski), The Exorcist (Friedkin).


Kevin Cassidy
Film Enthusiast

  1. Ben-Hur (Niblo, 1925)

  2. Day Of Wrath (Dreyer, 1943)

  3. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  4. After Life (Kore-eda, 1998)

  5. The Dekalog (Kieslowski, 1989)



Dan Jardine
Film Critic, Cinemania

  1. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  2. Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1969)

  3. Spirited Away (Miyazaki, 2001)

  4. Groundhog Day (Ramis, 1993)- It's a Buddhist tract, baby.

  5. Diary of a Country Priest (Bresson, 1951)



Mathew Viola
Film Fanatic

  1. Crimes and Misdemeanors (Allen, 1989) - Humans seem to harbor an innate, deep-seated fear of nihilism, of the almost certain possibility that reality does not conform to our most cherished concerns, that all our efforts are futile and absurd, and that ultimately nothing matters. Religion and morality are the boards and beams out of which bulwarks of comforting delusion are constructed against the harsh truth of nihilism. Few filmmakers dare to consider this issue, let alone base an entire film around it. That Woody Allen, one of the screen’s great comedians, should grapple with so troubling an issue with such uncompromising rigor is a testament to his intellectual courage. His theme, that objective morality and God are mere figments, couldn’t be bleaker. In a cold, indifferent universe, where innocent life can be snuffed out and sucked into the vacuum of eternity without consequence, where can we possibly find solace? Love? Alas, Woody casts a suspicious eye even at romantic love, which seems to have more to do with Darwinian sexual selection than with Cupid. How can we believe in an idealized, spiritual concept of love, as conceived by misty-eyed poets, when our affections are so often determined by the superficially pleasing attributes of others, such as beauty, charm, success, wealth, or confidence; when men seemingly come equipped to deposit their seed in the nearest nubile young hottie; or when women, no matter how independently-minded, tend to gravitate toward alpha males, no matter how shallow and conceited they may be? Bold, insightful and thought provoking, Woody peels away human delusion and exposes a most unpleasant truth: we’re flailing away blindly in an amoral and godless universe, one bereft of cosmic justice, spiritual love or ultimate purpose. Oh yeah, it’s funny too.

  2. El (Buñuel, 1952) - In L’Age d’or, Bunuel showed, with typically wry wit, how natural sexual impulses, when blocked, tend to manifest themselves in perverse, unnatural modes of expression, as when, memorably, the sexually frustrated heroine is moved to lustfully suck the toes of a marble statue. In El, Bunuel explores a similar theme, though his subject this time is the irrational jealousy of a respectable, foot-fetishist churchgoer. Soon after marrying the lady whose foot drove him to distraction during a Good Friday service, our hero’s deeply ingrained sexual neuroses, firmly rooted in the repressive practices of the Church, come to the fore, specifically his Madonna-whore complex, which manifests itself in his disturbing, utterly irrational jealousy over the slightest hint of his wife’s infidelity. Even the most innocent of events, like his wife’s chance encounter with an old flame, sparks paranoid suspicions of her unfaithfulness. The potent cocktail of paranoia, jealousy, repressed lust and sexual guilt coursing through his system intoxicates his reason, renders him impotent, and ultimately compels him to commit a ghastly act against his wife involving needle and thread – the sewing of a “chastity stitch” if you will. This guy makes Jake La Motta look like a model of connubial sensitivity. Thankfully, his wife escapes this fate and ends the marriage. In the end, our hero, unable to deal with his sexual pathology, adopts the ascetic lifestyle of a monk, apparently in a futile attempt to exorcize the diseased sexuality from his body. But there’s little hope of that. In a deliciously ironic conclusion, his paranoia proves to be a self-fulfilling prophecy, as his behavior has driven his wife into the very relationship it was intended to prevent, which only further reinforces his delusional beliefs. Bunuel spent a good part of his career mocking the Church, and El represents his most scathing, wickedly funny effort.

  3. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928) - Working from actual historical records, Dreyer’s aim was to make the viewer feel as if he were an actual onlooker at the trial. Employing a host of cinematic effects intended to create a highly subjective perception of events, Dreyer achieves a staggering sense of immediacy and vividly conveys the torment to which Joan was subjected during her final hours. As Joan’s persecutors scream at her in righteous fury, spittle spraying from their mouths, Dreyer’s uncomfortably tight close-ups capture every lump, wart and wrinkle on their faces, while extreme low angle shots of them looming menacingly over Joan (and us) emphasize their power and dominance. The camera, meanwhile, seems to be in continuous motion, frequenting panning back and forth across the panel of inquisitors, whose smug faces suddenly materialize from the edges of the frame, heightening the sense of claustrophobic terror Joan must have experienced, trapped as she was in a small room full of hostile male accusers.

    Joan herself is depicted in perfect counterpoint to her tormentors: whereas they display abject cruelty, Joan exhibits supreme piety; they yell and scream, Joan weeps and prays; they appear smug and mean, Joan looks humble and holy. Time and again she flusters and frustrates her inquisitors with pious responses to their hostile questioning, prompting them to employ increasingly diabolical methods of coercion and intimidation. But no amount of belittling, humiliating, or threatening can snuff out Joan’s spirit; even through the tears, every drop a testament to her humanity in the face of inhumanity, her face seems to radiate with holiness. Secure in the conviction that God has bestowed His grace upon her, she steadfastly refuses to recant her claims, and embraces her matrydom with the nobility of a saint. Were it not for Falconetti’s deeply heartfelt performance, the film’s obvious acceptance of Joan’s divinity would be more problematic, especially the unfortunate final intertitle that explicitly tells us Joan’s soul has ascended to heaven. But I defy even the staunchest atheist not to be profoundly moved by Falconetti’s haunting visage, whose exquisite expressiveness registers the full range of distinctly human emotion. The historical Joan may not have been immortal, but Falconetti’s portrayal of her certainly is.

  4. The Wicker Man (Hardy, 1973) - Anthony Shaffer’s screenplay, about a devoutly religious policeman, brilliantly played by Edward Woodward, who travels to a remote Scottish island inhabited by pagans to investigate the disappearance of a young girl, is structured as a mystery thriller. Yet this is like no other mystery. Although Woodward’s investigation is engrossing enough, the film’s true subject is the clash between Christianity and Paganism. Woodward, an upright and uptight Christian, becomes morally indignant upon witnessing the “perverse” displays of free love among the pagans. Of course, his indignation is as much a product of his repressed lust as it is of his spiritual convictions, and so he finds himself struggling to resist the temptations of the beautiful pagan seductress, Britt Ekland, even as his efforts to convert these “heathens” to his “one true God” prove pathetically futile.

    But this is no simplistic anti-Christian, pro-pagan tract. The film has a creepy, unsettling aura because, even though the pagans appear to be friendly, happy people who like to sing and dance a lot, there seems to be something dark and sinister lurking beneath their jovial surface. And, indeed, Woodward’s investigation leads him to the conclusion that they are planning to ritualistically sacrifice the missing girl as an offering to the sun god in exchange for a bountiful crop. However, in one of the great twist endings of all time, the true resolution of the mystery is revealed to Woodward, and it is more shocking than he could have ever imagined: it is he, a good Christian, who was the intended sacrificial offering all along. The final scene, one of the most haunting in cinema history, powerfully exposes the potential barbarism inherent in religious extremism, forcefully demonstrates the absolute futility of faith in the face of an uncaring universe, and strongly asserts that all religious belief is fundamentally irrational and absurd. Because, really, what’s more believable: that a blood sacrifice will bring about a bountiful crop or that Woodward will gain salvation in heaven? As the giant Wicker Man burns, Woodward futilely prays for deliverance to the mute, indifferent heavens, while the joyous pagans celebrate their appeasement of a nonexistent deity. One can only stare aghast at the tragic folly of it all.

  5. Monty Python’s Life of Brian (Jones, 1979) - In its own silly way, the Python troupe’s hilariously irreverent mock religious parable contains more genuine insight into the human phenomenon of religious faith than the combined films of Bresson, Tarkovsky and post-Vampyr Dreyer.

Honorable Mentions: L’Age d’or (Buñuel, 1930), Black Narcissus (Powell, 1947), Viridiana(Buñuel, 1961), Nazarin (Buñuel, 1959), Simon of the Desert (Buñuel, 1965), Marjoe (Smith, 1972) The Devil’s Playground (Schepisi, 1976), Priest (Bird, 1994), The Magdalene Sisters (Mullan, 2002).


Doug Pratt
DVD Critic, DVDLaser.com

  1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968)

  2. Monty Python and the Holy Grail (Gilliam & Jones, 1975)

  3. It's a Wonderful Life (Capra, 1946)

  4. I Confess (Hitchcock, 1953)

  5. The Exorcist (Friedkin, 1973)



Joel Webb
Film Enthusiast

  1. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  2. Viridiana (Buñuel, 1961)

  3. Into Great Silence (Gröning, 2005)

  4. Winter Light (Bergman, 1962)

  5. Intolerance (Griffith, 1916)

Special mention for the many other religious (or religious inspired) films of Dreyer (Ordet, Day of Wrath), Buñuel (L'Âge d'or, Simon of the Desert), Bergman (The Silence, The Seventh Seal), Tarkovsky (Andrei Rublev, The Sacrifice), and Bresson (Journal d'un curé de campagne, Au hasard Balthazar).

Five more: Black Narcissus (Powell & Pressburger, 1947), The Burmese Harp (Ichikawa, 1967), Essene (Wiseman, 1972), The Holy Mountain (Jodorowsky, 1973), and of course Life of Brian (Jones, 1979).


Jesse Richards
Filmmaker

  1. The Passion of Joan of Arc ( Dreyer, 1928)

  2. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

  3. Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter... and Spring (Kim, 2003)

  4. Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1966)

  5. Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson, 1966)



Steven Tomlinson
Film Librarian, Montreal

  1. Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1969)

  2. Gospel According to Saint Matthew (Pasolini, 1964)

  3. Stalker (Tarkovsky, 1979)

  4. Wise Blood (Huston, 1979)

  5. Simon of the Desert (Buñuel, 1965)

Runners-up: The Flowers of St. Francis (Rossellini, 50), Nazarin (Buñuel, 58), Ordet (Dreyer, 55), Journal d'un curé de campagne (Bresson, 51).


Bill Georgaris
They Shoot Pictures, Don't They?

  1. Diary of a Country Priest (Bresson, 1951)

  2. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

  3. Viridiana (Buñuel, 1961)

  4. The Passion of Joan of Arc (Dreyer, 1928)

  5. The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988)

A mixed bag of other contenders: 3 Godfathers (John Ford, 1948), Barabbas (Richard Fleischer, 1962), The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1964), Kundun (Martin Scorsese, 1997), Monty Python’s Life of Brian (Terry Jones, 1979), Wise Blood (John Huston, 1979), Andrei Rublev (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1966), Bad Lieutenant (Abel Ferrara, 1992), Black God, White Devil (Glauber Rocha, 1964), I Confess (Alfred Hitchcock, 1953).


Jerry Johnson
Film Enthusiast

  1. Day of Wrath (Dreyer, 1943)

  2. Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson, 1966)

  3. The Flowers of St. Francis (Rossellini, 1950)

  4. Viridiana (Buñuel, 1961)

  5. Winter Light (Bergman, 1962)



Brian Leonard
Film Enthusiast

I suppose that most people, when they think of "religious films", think of films that either chronicle the lives of religious figures (The Greatest Story Ever Told) or deal with specifically religious experiences (Whistle Down the Wind) or with religious holidays. Sure, all of these can be religious films, but as pretty much a heathen, I tend to think of films which can *give* you a religious or spiritual experience as among the best religious films.

So:

  1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968) - certainly this film comes closest to expressing my religious views, and it was indeed a spiritual experience for many.

  2. Fahrenheit 451 (Truffaut, 1966) - first of all, I think this film has been vastly underrated (it doesn't help that the director himself disliked it, although I think he mostly disliked *making* it). Secondly, if you think about it, the film really shows the beginning of a quasi-religion and parallels early Christianity.

  3. Resurrection (Petrie, 1980) - this to me is the ideal dream of what a true religious experience could be. Ellen Burstyn's performance is magnificent.

  4. The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988) - I am not now and never have been a Christian; however, this film is the most powerful argument for Christianity I've ever seen. Ironic considering all the protests and the Blockbuster ban.

  5. The Rapture (Tolkin, 1991) - and here's the argument against Christianity. Well, evangelical Christianity, anyway.

Runners-up: My Night At Maud's (Eric Rohmer, 1969)--one of the most intriguing talky films ever. Does one dare defy Pascal's Wager?

Shadows of (Our) Forgotten Ancestors (Sergei Paradjanov, 1964)--haunting and beautiful.

Kundun (Martin Scorsese, 1997)--is this the most ignored/underrated Scorsese film? As lives-of-religious-figures films go, this has got to be near or at the top of the list.

Wings of Desire (Wim Wenders, 1987)--another religion-based dream on film.

Being There (Hal Ashby, 1979)--Peter Sellers made probably the best Christlike figure ever on film.

Wise Blood (John Huston, 1979)--another film that seems to have been forgotten, but this dark satire deserves a DVD release.

Three by Ingmar Bergman: The Seventh Seal (1957), Winter Light (1962), and Cries and Whispers (1972). From easily-parodied symbolism to individual existential despair to ultimate existential despair.

Hester Street (Joan Micklin Silver, 1975)--a tough look at the Jewish assimilation experience at the end of the 19th century.

Monty Python and the Holy Grail (Terry Gilliam/Terry Jones, 1975)--Life of Brian would be the obvious choice, but I was never crazy about that film. Maybe it was the choice of name...

Dogma (Kevin Smith, 1999)--I guess devout Catholics (including Smith?) can see this as a loving prod at the Church's circles-within-circles. I guess.

Viridiana (Luis Bunuel, 1961)--I doubt that there are any devout Catholics who see *this* as a loving prod...

Crimes and Misdemeanors (Woody Allen, 1990)--the major Allen film that explicitly addresses the question of God.

Brainstorm (Douglas Trumbull, 1983)--despite my best efforts, I still can't get this film out of my head. I don't know if it's the virtual sex or virtual death that does it.

The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (Peter Jackson, 2001 – 2003)--another epic with religious/spiritual overtones.

Big Fish (Tim Burton, 2003)--perhaps the oddest choice on here, but a very spiritual film.

Miracle on 34th Street (George Seaton, 1947), White Christmas (Michael Curtiz, 1954), and A Christmas Story (Bob Clark, 1983)--No way I'm not going to list these, even though they mostly deal with the secular side of Christmas--or seem to, anyway.


Clark Day
Film Enthusiast

  1. The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988) - I was raised Episcopalian and we learned a rather liberal version of the liturgy, so when this film came out we heard little uproar at our alter. This film and its exquisite score from Peter Gabriel did nothing but reinvigorate my faith in God. The idea of Jesus as a man connects with any clear thinking believer. A fantastic film.

  2. Wings of Desire (Wenders, 1987) - My good friend, DC, introduced me to Wenders during my Scottish year abroad in 1989. First there was An American Friend, then Alice in the Cities, Paris, Texas, then the phenomenal Until the End of the World. Second only to "UTEOTW", and vastly superior to Faraway, So Close, and of the Meg Ryan vehicle, City of Angels -- Jesus Christ!

  3. It's A Wonderful Life (Capra, 1946)

  4. The Dekalog (Kieslowski, 1989)

  5. A Charlie Brown Christmas (Melendez, 1965)



Wirkman Virkkala
Editorial Consultant & Film Enthusiast

  1. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968) - Why call it a religious movie? Well, it

    • contains an origin myth;
    • features a capella singing and
    • inexplicable objects of attention;
    • is paced very slow, like a religious ceremony rather than a standard "Hollywood" flick;
    • features a theme of eternal life, or the rebirth of a soul;
    • makes precious little sense to people with no imagination.

  2. The Devils (Russell, 1971) - This is easier. It is obviously a religious movie:

    • it's about a priest;
    • it's about the process of becoming a good man, using religion (if heretical);
    • it's about how some (most?) people will fake religious experience in order to persecute someone;
    • it's about the union of church and state;
    • it contains the best use of a crucifix in the movies (a scene alas cut -- suppressed -- in most cinematic distributions).

  3. The Life of Brian (Jones, 1979) - This comedy is about religion is an obvious choice, included because it is so funny, satirizing religious enthusiasm so well. Besides

    • it is very reverential to the figure of Yeshua all the while being
    • irreverent about religious people and their
    • amazing ability to accept all sorts of nonsense as religious truth, and (yes, again) their
    • prediliction for violence and persecution.

  4. Winter Light (Bergman, 1962) - Anguish in the modern world, where God's silence bothers a man of the cloth. What makes it great is not a result of its religious elements, as such, but because it is

    • thoughtful,
    • quiet, and
    • beautiful.
    Hey, wait: some people consider these three qualities absolutely necessary for the religious experience! Maybe I should move it up on my list.

  5. The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988) - This film retells a retelling of an oft-told religious story, that of Yeshua the Messiah. But

    • it's of a humanist bent,
    • it offended a lot of religious people,
    • its crucifixion scenes had the historical weirdness of bending the legs of the condemned so as to allow the genitalia to be tucked out of sight, for squeamish audiences. (Face it, crucifixions staked up people in the nude; Yeshua's mother saw her son's dangling . . . humanity.)

What makes it a great movie is that it brings in the audience to contemplate the difference between normal life and that of a life of religious mission. It is in no sense orthodox, but, in helping people see what was "at stake" in the traditional story of Yeshua's death -- being a savior and not being just another good person -- the actual effect produced was likely and most often in aid of Christian reverence, not corrosive of it. That is, to the people who watched it.

Most "religious" films are -- because of the religious element -- very bad. Earnest solemnityis a staple element of standard religious piety, and hard to work into film, at least without laughing at it. Take a favorite Sword and Sandals film of mine: "The Egyptian" (Michael Curtiz, 1954). The solemnity with which the Pharaoh Akhenaten is presented, as sort of a pre-Christ religious figure, almost puts it on an Upchuck Inducement List. But the story, otherwise, is not bad, and the music quite wonderful.

"Ben-Hur" (William Wyler, 1959) and "The Ten Commandments" (Cecil B. DeMille, 1956) are better; both are spectacles, and contain some great elements. But both also contain some of the most delicious bits of over-acting of all time. "The Ten Commandments," especially, is outrageously histrionic, portentous and pretentious. It deserves top placement on some list, just not this one.

"Dekalog" (Krysztof Piesiewicz and Krysztof Kieslowski, 1989), is not one film, but ten "Made for TV" films. Still, I'd place at least one of them as Number Six on my favorite Religious films list, if not the whole series itself. True, in a sense they are tangential to religion, mainly being explorations of themes suggested by the Ten Commandments. But they are undeniably great. There is no risible solemnity; they are truly serious works.

Perennial favorites among serious Hollywood treatments of religion, such as "Inherit the Wind" and "The Apostle" strike me as over-rated.

Of course, there are many religions in the world aside from Judaism and Christianity. My Top Five list references only one, and a science fictional one at that. The only Muslim film I've seen, "The Message" (Moustapha Akkad, 1976), was not as bad as I feared it would be, but not as good as I had hoped. "Siddharta" (Jorge Polaco, 2003), a fine retelling of Herman Hesse's Buddhistic tale, is lovely but not great. For the life of me, I can't think of any great films based on Greek myth or religion.

"Mononoke-hime" (Hayao Miyazaki, 1997), a brilliant fantasy wherein we learn how to "kill a god," cannot quite make the cut of great films.

My favorite religious tales of all time, "Gilgamesh" and "Jonah," have not been made into acceptable films, as far as I know. "Baraka" (Ron Fricke, 1992) would probably make Number Seven on my Top Religious Films list; it is lovely in places, and reverential in a New Agey sort of way. It is also tedious for too-long stretches, and its message is muddled. Typical problems for a religious . . . anything.


Hans Lucas
Film Student

  1. Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1966)

  2. Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson, 1966)

  3. Il Vangelo secondo Matteo (Pasolini, 1964)

  4. Francesco, giullare di Dio (Rossellini, 1950)

  5. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

Runners-up: Sunrise (F.W. Murnau, 1927), La Passion de Jeanne d'Arc (Carl Th. Dreyer, 1928), Journal d'un curé de campagne (Robert Bresson, 1951), Ikiru (Akira Kurosawa, 1952), Nazarin (Luis Buñuel, 1959), Nattvardsgästerna (Ingmar Bergman, 1962), 2001: A Space Odyssey (Stanley Kubrick, 1968), Stalker (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1979), Dekalog (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1989).


Ben Dalton
Film Student & Enthusiast

  1. Andrei Rublev (Tarkovsky, 1964)

  2. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

  3. Nazarin (Buñuel, 1959)

  4. Winter Light (Bergman, 1962)

  5. Diary of A Country Priest (Bresson, 1951)



Jesse Walker
Film Enthusiast and Managing Editor, Reason Magazine

  1. The Rapture (Tolkin, 1991)

  2. Life of Brian (Jones, 1979)

  3. The Apostle (Duvall, 1997)

  4. Nazarin (Buñuel, 1959)

  5. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)



Kevyn Knox
Film Critic, Essayist + Historian

  1. Au hasard Balthazar (Bresson, 1966)

  2. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick, 1968)

  3. Viridiana (Buñuel, 1961)

  4. Ordet (Dreyer, 1955)

  5. The Sacrifice (Tarkovsky, 1987)

No. 6: The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Pasolini, 1964)

*points are given as follows: for numbered lists, first place recieves 5 points, second place recieves 4, third place 3, fourth place 2 and fifth place gets 1 point; for unumbered lists, each film will recieve 3 points; total points are then tallied up and a comprehensive Top 5 list is created


The Top 5 Project is on Hiatus until after the NYFF

We will return in mid-October

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