THE TOP 10 MOST LOVED AND REVERED RELIGION-THEMED FILMS OF ALL TIME
With Dietrich Bruggemann’s award-winning drama based on an extreme Catholic sect STATIONS OF THE CROSS hitting UK cinema screens on 28 November, we look back at films that have propelled stories around faith into the spotlight – sometimes to critical acclaim and other times to public outcry.
From controversial dramas to silent realism from Pasolini to Scorsese, here are our most-loved and revered religious films of all time:
1. STATIONS OF THE CROSS (2014)
dir. Dietrich Brüggemann
Maria is 14 years old. Her family is part of a fundamentalist Catholic community. Maria lives her everyday life in the modern world, yet her heart belongs to Jesus. She wants to follow him, to become a saint and go to heaven – just like all those holy children she’s always been told about. So Maria goes through 14 stations, just like Jesus did on his path to Golgatha, and reaches her goal in the end.
2. FILL THE VOID (2012)
dir. Rama Burshtein
A young Hasidic Jewish woman is pressured into an arranged levirate marriage to an older widower.
3. OF GODS AND MEN (2010)
dir. Xavier Beauvois
Under threat by fundamentalist terrorists, a group of Trappist monks stationed with an impoverished Algerian community must decide whether to leave or stay.
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