When I went to see “The Young Messiah” I was skeptical. I tried to read Anne Rice’s book this movie is based on, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, and was not impressed with some of the theology based on the Gnostic, apocryphal Infancy Gospel of St. Thomas. But the movie changed the events I had found concerning, and kept the excellent writing and character development. This movie moved me, and got me thinking for days afterward.I tried to read the book when it came out, but I just didn't find it very engaging and I didn't get very far in it. This even though I quite enjoyed Anne Rice's vampire novels.
Excerpt from Sr. Burns's review:
“The Young Messiah” is the best Jesus movie ever. Based on Anne Rice’s historical novel, “Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt,” it combines the latest and best in filmmaking, the dramatic arts, mature biblical scholarship, theology and imagination. It is biblically and theologically sound (always a tricky task when speaking about Jesus, but even more so the Child Jesus and his “human knowledge”–what did he/didn’t he allow himself to know in his humanity?) There has been some talk that “apocryphal writings” inspired some scenes. “Apocryphal” does not mean “Gnostic.” The apocryphal Proto-Evangelium of James was used by early Christians as devotional reading. But it’s not the Word of God.Overall, both of them liked it. But Sr. Burns warns: "DO NOT WATCH THE TRAILER. GIVES A BIT TOO MUCH AWAY!" Naturally, after that, I had to go and find the trailer. You can view it here.
I have lots of past posts on the publication of the book, for example, here. You can find others by running the search term "Anne Rice" through the search engine. I noted that the movie was coming here and here. Now that it's finally done, I'll have to see it.
Cross-file under New Testament Apocrypha Watch.
