Skip to content
Ripened GrainGrain
New GrainRipened HarvestJournal

Jesus Film Project

JESUS (the Jesus Film)

A 1979 life of Christ taken almost entirely from Luke's Gospel, shot in Israel with Brian Deacon as Jesus. It has since been dubbed into well over a thousand languages and is, by most counts, the most-watched film ever made.

ProvisionalFilm & seriesNon-denominational
Where to watch

Why this is listed

It is here for what it is, not for how it plays: the single most widely translated Christian film in existence, free, and often the only version available in a given language. If you work cross-culturally or your household reads a language the market ignores, this is the practical answer.

Before you press play

The script is drawn from Luke with light harmonisation from the other gospels, so there is very little invented dialogue — the licence is in casting, staging and the flat, expository style rather than in the story. The crucifixion is depicted with 1979 restraint but it is a real execution and it is not brief. The film ends with a spoken invitation to receive Christ and a prayer to repeat; that appeal is the film's stated purpose rather than an add-on, and it has been criticised as a mass-evangelism instrument, particularly where it is shown to audiences with no other exposure to the text. Know that going in and it is a fair, plain, unembellished Luke.

Suited to Adults. Age judgements are ours, not a rating board’s — you know your own family.

How to start

  1. Open jesusfilm.org (opens an external site) and read what Jesus Film Project says about itself before you read anything else.
  2. Read the note above first. It is there so an evening does not go wrong twenty minutes in.
  3. Watch it yourself before you watch it with children, if there are children.
  4. Read the passage it dramatises alongside it. The point is to send you back to the text, not to replace it.
  5. Afterwards, ask what the story added and what it left out. That conversation is worth more than the film.

Close to this

  • Film & seriesVerified

    The Chosen

    The Chosen, Inc.

    A multi-season drama about Jesus told mostly from the disciples' side, with each of them given a life, a temper and a backstory before they are called. Released free, and by a wide margin the most-watched thing in this section.

    Cost
    Free
    Time
    Weeks
    Where
    Online
    Who for
    Adults · Series

    Last verified September 8, 2026

  • Film & seriesVerified

    The Bible's Buried Secrets

    NOVA / WGBH and Providence Pictures

    A two-hour NOVA special on the archaeology of ancient Israel: where the Israelites came from, when the Hebrew Bible was written, and what has and has not been found in the ground. Filmed on site across the Middle East with excavation footage and digital reconstruction.

    Cost
    Free
    Time
    A few hours
    Where
    Online
    Who for
    Adults · Documentary

    Last verified September 8, 2026

  • Film & seriesProvisional

    Dispatches from the Front

    Frontline Missions International

    A documentary series in journal form that follows gospel work in hard places: Southeast Asia, the Balkans, West Africa, India, Ethiopia and South Sudan, North Africa, China, Indochina and the Middle East. Each episode visits believers and churches on the ground rather than reporting from a studio.

    Cost
    Low cost
    Time
    Weeks
    Where
    Online
    Who for
    Adults · Documentary

    Last verified October 24, 2026