Son of God is a 2014 American epic biblical film directed by Christopher Spencer, and produced by Mark Burnett and Roma Downey.

The film retells the life of Jesus Christ and is an adaptation of the ten-hour miniseries The Bible,[5] which aired in March 2013 on the History channel, and immediately following the movie begins another TV series called A.D.

The film stars Diogo Morgado, Greg Hicks, Adrian Schiller, Darwin Shaw, Sebastian Knapp, Joe Wredden, Simon Kunz, Paul Marc Davis, Matthew Gravelle, Amber Rose Revah, and Roma Downey.

Thirty years later, an adult Jesus travels to Galilee and begins recruiting followers, James, his brother John, Peter, a fisherman, Matthew, a tax collector and Mary Magdalene.

He enters the city on the back of a donkey and is met by a huge crowd of supporters, who lay palm leaves in his path.

Caiaphas, the head of the Pharisees, is afraid that Jesus' presence in the city will further agitate his people, who are already in a near state of revolt against the oppressive Romans, led by Pontius Pilate.

Caiaphas believes if the Pharisees killed Jesus on Passover, it would start a riot, so he turns him over to the Romans for the punishment.

A battered and bloodied Jesus then carries a cross to Golgotha and is nailed to it by the mocking Roman guards, who earlier had placed a crown of thorns on his head.

Before the cross is put into place, Pilate orders a sign attached to it, reading: "The King of the Jews", much to Caiaphas' dismay.

[5][7] However, the film does not include scenes featuring Satan (played by Mohamen Mehdi Ouazanni) due to claims that the actor resembled the United States President Barack Obama.

[9][non-primary source needed] The film's casting director Carl Proctor, claimed that the resemblance is entirely accidental.

The site's critics consensus reads, "The faithful may find their spirits raised, but on purely cinematic terms, Son of God is too dull and heavy-handed to spark much fervor.

Nell Minow of Beliefnet gave the film a B grade, saying "It tells the story in a westernized, conventional manner that can seem superficial at times, more a cinematic Sunday School lesson than a movie.

[...] Accompanied by a score that sounds recycled from The Fountain, the most famous scenes are trotted out: "I'll give my stone to the first man who tells me that he has never sinned"; the loaves and fishes; the resurrection of Lazarus; the last supper.

It's unlikely Paul Verhoeven will ever get to make his historical Christ movie, but to the extent that Son Of God has a measure of dramatic impact, it's how it illustrates the radicalism of Jesus' message and the threat it posed to the establishment.

At any rate, the core ideas are more compelling than the bad effects shots of Jerusalem, the cheesy CG water-walking, or whatever exchanges require the actors to emit something other than a declarative shout.