In the beginning there was nothing and then there was light. Or in the instance of The Carpenter’s Son, in the beginning there was the dogmatic Joseph, played by Nicolas Cage, awestruck by the light of God while his wife, Mary (FKA Twigs), wailed in agony delivering none other than son of God. At this point I should note that none of these names are ever uttered, but for simplicity I will address them as such. This isn’t the birth of Jesus Christ that many children will soon be enacting across the country. In fact, it’s much more Old Testament than that. Gone is the barn, the manger and the shepherds, and in its place only a dreary cave, in which Joseph and Mary have sought refuge away from the massacre of the innocents.
To decry The Carpenter’s Son for its historical inaccuracy due to FKA Twigs’ iPhone face or the multitude of modern accents that populate ancient Bethlehem is besides the point. Director Lotfy Nathan intended on an heretical tale of the Messiah as is clear from its casting. If you need a reason to go see The Carpenter’s Son it most certainly would be to see what crowds this unlikely pairing of Cage and Twigs will draw, if any – a mixture of electro-pop fans and irony-pilled cinephiles I’m guessing.
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It’s adapted from the apocryphal ‘The Infancy Gospel of Thomas’, a scripture far from the biblical canon and often questioned over its authenticity, describing Jesus’ early life. And so The Carpenter’s Son moves swiftly on from the babbling babe to the hormonal years, where the moody teenage boy’s (Noah Jupe) holy paternity is called into question as, like many his age, he has fallen in with a really bad crowd.
While most biblical cinema focuses on Jesus’ later years from his apostles to his crucifixion – The Life of Brian, The Passion of Christ, Jesus Christ Superstar – there is something intriguing about Nathan’s choice to go off-(good)-book. Not only is there more room for horror, as this particular gospel follows Jesus as he is plagued by supernatural occurrences, but as the Son of God struggles to get to grips with inhuman gifts he is soon feared and revered for them, not dissimilar to Teen Wolf or Twilight. The fear of the public gaze is universal in puberty and yet amassing the attention of so many eyes in actuality is rarely felt. This sudden attention is now experienced more often by young stars than prophets, making pubescent Jesus’ problems closer to that of a burgeoning Timothée Chalamet than a fledgling supernatural creature.
However the stroppy soon-to-be saviour of humanity struggles to demonstrate the extreme weight of his burdens, or much teenage rebellion at all, offering only sullen looks while Satan tempts him away from his pious father figure. Nicolas Cage at this stage in his career is more a caricature of his previous performances than anything else, even so this depiction of Joseph seems rather subdued for the exaggerated actor. Pair this with FKA Twigs’ Mary who is more wooden than anything in the carpentry workshop. All together making for a rather confused tempo, disappointing from this surprising line up.
It appears that while Nathan’s intentions were sacrilegious he has strayed too far from the path. Though not beyond salvaging as The Carpenter’s Son offers some moments of biblical horror, including an Hieronymus Bosch-like depiction of hell, it doesn’t succeed in pushing past mild discomfort. There is still not enough to drag it down into truly blasphemous depths.