The Nativity Story | 
 enlarge | Director: Catherine Hardwicke
Actors: Keisha Castle-hughes, Oscar Isaac, Hiam Abbass, Shaun Toub, Ciaran Hinds
Studio: New Line Home Video
Category: DVD
List Price: $19.98
Buy Used: $8.25
You Save: $11.73 (59%)
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Rating:  197 reviews
Sales Rank: 1085
Format: Ac-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dvd-video, Full Screen, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled)
Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 101
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.3 x 0.6
MPN: TRNDN10668D
UPC: 794043106682
EAN: 0794043106682
ASIN: B000MGBM1I
Theatrical Release Date: December 1, 2006
Release Date: March 20, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: 1ST CLASS SHIPPING
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Product Description
A drama that focuses on the period in mary & josephs life where they journeyed to bethlehem for the birth of jesus. Studio: New Line Home Video Release Date: 09/30/2008 Starring: Keisha Castle-hughes Hiam Abbass Run time: 101 minutes Rating: Pg
Amazon.com
The Nativity Story is a remarkable, if frustratingly restrained, act of imagining the tale of Christ's birth as a flesh-and-blood drama actually set in Israel two millenia ago. Written by Mike Rich (Finding Forrester) and directed by Catherine Hardwicke (Thirteen), the film makes very strong impressions in a scene-by-scene way. Beginning with the slaughter (bloodlessly portrayed; this is a PG movie) of Bethlehem's innocents under orders from a paranoid King Herod (a dark and knowing Ciaran Hinds), the film then jumps back a year to the prophecy that informs Zechariah (Stanley Townsend) that his wife, Elizabeth (Shohreh Aghdashloo), will bear a child. Meanwhile, Elizabeth's cousin, the adolescent Mary (Keisha Castle-Hughes), struggles with her family to make ends meet and is promised to the carpenter Joseph (Oscar Isaac). Soon comes word to Mary, via an angel, that she will carry, while still a virgin, the long-awaited Messiah who will liberate the Jews from Herod and his Roman benefactors. Thus begins a detailed account of Joseph and Mary's hard travel to Bethlehem, while three Magi spend months crossing the desert trying to rendezvous with some point below the convergence of three heavenly bodies in the night sky. Hardwicke and Rich anchor all this in period detail, though what proves most moving are relationship nuances, especially the friendship and trust that emerge between Mary and Joseph after he is told in a dream that she speaks truthfully about her miraculous pregnancy. While The Nativity Story should appeal to almost anyone as a straightforward narrative, it is far from a secular version of the familiar Biblical tale, and thus feels a bit stifled. It might have been nice if the film could have breathed a little more with imagination, but The Nativity Story makes up for it by ingeniously weaving hints of things to come, later in Christ's life, into the action. --Tom Keogh
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| Customer Reviews: Read 192 more reviews...
 The real story January 7, 2009
This is a really good movie that shows the birth of Jesus without the Hollywood-style story changing that was so common in a lot of movies when I was growing up. If you are Christian, this is a must watch every Christmas.
 Good moviue % quick srvice January 6, 2009
Good move, one of the best nativity move so fare. Good quick service... stander mailing.
The Nativity Story January 6, 2009
This is a very lovely story and the venue was very appropriate for a child of 5 years old. She thoroughly enjoyed this gift. The story of Christ's birth and history of his being was portrayed in a beautiful and moving way.
 Pious, yet flat retelling December 29, 2008
There's little in "The Nativity Story" that would give even the most pious Christian the slightest case of reflux. Mary (Keisha Castle-Hughes) is pouty, but generally obedient to her parents. Joseph is a hardworking young carpenter with his eye on the girl. The wise men -- portrayed here as Babylonian house astrologers -- include the traditional white and black man, though curiously, the one from the Orient is another white guy. They do provide a few of the lighthearted elements in this otherwise safe film as they bicker about whether the journey to Bethlehem should be a spiritual one or an arduous one. Otherwise, all the traditional elements are here -- the announcement by an angel, a visit to a older pregnant cousin, a difficult, wind-blown trek to be counted in a census, camels on sand dunes, etc.
What's missing is any of the humanity of other versions. Actors read their lines without much conviction and with no sense that events could transpire in any way but the scripted one. When 3 stars (actually, 2 planets and a mysterious heavenly body) combine into a blinding spotlight (accompanied by a Star Wars light saber sound effects) no one reacts, as though such celestial light shows were run of the mill in the first century.
Every movie version of the Jesus story bring its own special touch. In "The Nativity Story," village life is depicted with loving attention to detail. Entire families sleep together in the same room, roofs are painstakingly wrought of wattle and daub and women spend lots of time toting jugs of water. And I think this is one of the few movies to depict Mary as having a living mother *and* father. The people of Nazareth act in true peasant fashion, holding grudges and having dirty faces and hands. Too bad the movie's writers didn't imbue the plot and dialog with the same sense of gritty realism. And history buffs might grind their teeth at some of the confusions, the most egregious being the equation of Roman and Herodian soldiers.
As it stands, "The Nativity Story" is decent Sunday school fare, with nothing controversial and nothing illuminating.
A must see for everyone! December 28, 2008
This movie shows how it all happened. In clear and meaningful way. Suitable for all ages. Not your typical movie about the Nativity.
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