King of Kings

King of Kings (1961) — watch online Nicholas Ray's sweeping biblical epic on iFILM. The MGM production runs nearly three hours and charts the life of Jesus Christ, from his birth in Roman-occupied Judea through the events at Golgotha. Jeffrey Hunter plays Jesus, with Robert Ryan as John the Baptist and Rip Torn as Judas.

Ray treats the story as political history as much as scripture. Roman governors cycle through, rebel leaders like Barabbas operate in the hills, and the population is split between those demanding an armed uprising and those drawn to a teacher who arrives without a sword. Jesus steps into that pressure and refuses to be what any faction wants him to be — which is precisely what makes him impossible to ignore and impossible to allow.

Filmed in Spain with a cast of thousands, the script came from Philip Yordan and the score from Miklós Rózsa, who brought the same orchestral weight he had applied to Ben-Hur two years earlier. One of the most expensive productions MGM had mounted at that point. Watch King of Kings online on iFILM.