Product Details

• Actors: Daniele Liotti, Enrico Brignano, Jose Sancho
• Directors: Umberto Marino
• Format: Full Screen, Closed-captioned, NTSC
• Language: Italian
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Ignatius Press
• DVD Release Date: January 1, 2005
• Run Time: 95 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000MTEKGE
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #67,064 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

The first major feature length drama on the life of St. Anthony of Padua, one of the most popular saints in Christian history. Made in Italy with top-notch acting talent, and superb cinematography, this is an outstanding film on the inspiring life of St. Anthony. It presents Anthony as a strong and appealing person who sacrificed wealth and popularity for the Kingdom of God. It beautifully portrays the power of his preaching, the holiness of his life, his love for the poor and oppressed, and the wonders of his miracles. (Italian with English subtitles). Publisher: Ignatius Press Format: DVD Run time: 95 minutes

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

50 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Moving Film on Incredible Saint, April 21, 2007

By 

A. Ryan (Spokane, WA. USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Saint Anthony (DVD)

Finally, a dramatic feature film on the life of St. Anthony, one of the most popular saints in Christian history. And this film beautifully captures the spirit and life of St. Anthony. One of a series of outstanding recent feature films on saints lives produced in Italy (see SAINT RITA, ST. JOHN BOSCO, PADRE PIO:MIRACLE MAN, SAINT FRANCIS), this is wonderful from start to finish. Daniele Liotti is excellent as Anthony, presenting a captivating performance of Anthony as a somewhat complex man who was born into a privileged life, was very talented, and left it all to serve Christ and his fellow man as a Franciscan priest. Liotti convincingly portrays Anthony as a man who struggled with the decision to sacrifice everything for Christ, as well as with the challenges he faced as a priest, including dark nights of the soul, persecution and death threats, and staying humble in the face of his great spiritual gifts from God, including miraculous healings, countless conversions and powerful preaching. The film also has glorious cinematography, and a lovely music score. Highly recommended. Not to be missed!

32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exceptionally Beautiful Film, November 18, 2007

By 

Anne Rice "Anne Rice" (Little Paradise, California) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Saint Anthony (DVD)

The high production values, the beauty, and the superb script and acting are a joy. Here is a profound, meaningful, and consistently moving film about one of the world's greatest saints. The casting of Daniele Liotti was genius, as the man is unforgettably powerful both before and after his commitment to Christ. He is quite simply a gorgeous actor, but the beauty is unquestionably spiritual as well as physical. I found the entire film engaging, and the end particularly touching. These Italian films ( see the one on St. Francis)coming to us through Ignatius Press are fabulous. Reading the subtitles is simple, and the soft, gentle voices of the actors are rich and musical as they underscore the written words. Highly recommended. And buy it as a gift for those devoted to this great saint, or those who know nothing about him. They'll all love it.

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars St. Anthony--good movie, poor biography, February 6, 2011

By 

Madeline P. Nugent "author" (Middletown, Rhode Island) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Saint Anthony (DVD)

I have written two books on St. Anthony of Padua (Anthony: Words of Fire, Life of Light, published by Pauline Books and Media and Praying with Anthony of Padua, published by the Word Among Us). Anthony: Words of Fire, Life of Light is a biography of St. Anthony as told through the eyes of those who knew him. Anthony, as a saint, truly converted me while I was writing this book. So I was very anxious to see this movie on St. Anthony because he is such a powerful saint with such a dramatic life. And I was so terribly disappointed in the film because the Anthony it portrays is not the Anthony of history. The one redeeming aspect of the movie, that I felt was done very well, was Anthony's compassion and intercession for the debtors of Padua. But the rest of the movie was disappointing to me. Here are just some of the things that the movie portrayed that are not in any of the histories:

1. That Anthony killed a man in knightly combat.
2. That Anthony had a girl friend by any name (she is called Teresa in the movie)
3. That Anthony was depressed

Here are some wonderful, true incidents in the life of St. Anthony that were not in the movie but, in my opinion, should have been:

1. The power of his preaching. The preaching he is shown giving is sappy, in my opinion, when we actually have volumes of his stirring sermon notes and lofty and beautiful theology. I could have preached better than he did in the movie.
2. The confrontation with heretics (he was called the Hammer of Heretics) yet his love for them. We have hints of this in the movie but don't get a good sense of why he had enemies (the religious and political controversy involving Catharism is not explained well enough).
3. His miracles such as the poor woman's broken wine glass restored or the maid that ran through the rain with vegetables for the friars and didn't get wet or the band of robbers that went to hear him and were all converted.

A great deal of the movie concerned fiction that is not in any of the biographies of the saint while leaving out some of the major and powerful aspects of his life. The movie is worth seeing, but it falls short of the saint. I hope someone remakes a movie of St. Anthony and sticks close to his life as we have it historically because such a movie would be stirring indeed.