Customer Reviews

The Passion Trilogy

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The Kingdom of Heaven and He Is Risen were produced years ago and are quite good. The animation is only as good as the old Saturday morning cartoons, since these kind of productions are of necessity low budget. But the writing and direction are great, resulting in stories that are fleshed out but still true to the scriptural narrative, and actually blend elements from the different gospels and from within each gospel very coherently. Something this has, that most dramatizations of Christ's resurrection don't have, is John's account of Jesus' appearance to his apostles in Galilee, during which he asks Peter, "Lovest thou me?" and urges him to "Feed my sheep". It's done pretty well. Worthy Is The Lamb is a more recent production, with animation shifted from South Korea to India or Pakistan, and a new writer. It takes a very emotional subject, Christ's suffering in the garden, during his trial, and on the cross, and actually makes it pretty stale. However, most kids with an interest in Bible stories will probably like it. Of course these stories are simplified for children, but even so, Caiaphas and his cronies are a little too one-dimensional, diabolically evil characters, and almost painful to watch at times. I'm sure they were all too concerned about their own influence, and that jealousy played a large part in their desire for Jesus' blood, but blindly misguided as they were, they likely had some genuine concern for saving the people from a false messiah. The inclusion in this title of Old Testament prophecies that mirror the events of Christ's last day in mortality is a nice touch though. The price of this trilogy is worth the two good titles, even if you decide to toss out the latter.

Of note, this trilogy and the entire Animated Stories from the Bible series is produced by Nest, a family/moral values animation company that is owned and operated by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or the Mormons. In fact, their first animated scripture stories were from the Book of Mormon. However, because of the difficulty in making a profit from products like this, the company does its best to hide its ties to Mormonism so as to not turn off the evangelical Christian community and its buying power, because of the (like Caiaphas) misguided antagonism of many evangelicals against Mormons. Productions like this should be enough to demonstrate to any honest person that Mormons, like the producers of these cartoons, are not part of some bizarre cult as some evangelicals claim, but really do worship the biblical Jesus as Savior of the world.

I like how Jesus Christ is depicted in these movies; loving, wise and patient. I don't always like how the apostles are depicted. But then again, they were human. These movies are made very true to form and are some of the best I've found on the market.
Just a heads up: if you want to try before you buy... I know the company offers a free movie to try. Great deal and it let me see for myself if there was anything to be worried about. I think the fighting and discrimination is sad between people that claim to believe in Jesus.

My parents got these for my younger siblings when I was in my mid to late teens. My siblings LOVED them. I thought they were very well done. Simple, but good. And though made by a Mormon company, were very accurate biblically.

I was planning on buying some for my children, but didn't realize they were so expensive. ;-) I will have to put them on their wish lists for the grandparents to buy.

I read the other reviewers comments to get a decent understanding of this video series and entered a theological debate. Seriously?! The beauty of being a "fearfully and wonderfully made" creature of the almighty God is the element of Free Will. I do not ascribe to the heretical views of the Church of the LDS but I do accept their individual right to choose "whom they will serve." That being said as I recall this video series is well executed, teaches basic/fundamental bilical fact and has a nice soundtrack in the background.

If this is in fact produced by NEST (a Mormon campany) then I can not trust that it will be scripturally sound and will not buy it. Any mormons or Christians reading this might want to pick up a copy of the book "mama, mormonism and me" by Geer...a "former" Mormon who's grandfather was one of the founders of that faith. She eventually became a Christian (very very revealing book) and led her dying mormom mother to the TRUE Christ. The Mormons understanding and teaching of Christ and Christianity's Christ are VERY different.