Advent is a time to reflect on the incarnation, and Father Dave welcomes Catholic director D.J. Caruso to discuss his new Netflix film “Mary” all about the Blessed Mother. The film stars young Israeli actors as Mary and Joseph, as well as two-time Academy Award Winner Anthony Hopkins as King Herod.
Father Dave begins, “When preaching about Mary, I often say to imagine what that was like for a young, probably teenage girl in that society and all the layers that we don’t even know two thousand years later. What I appreciated about what I saw in the film is that I now get a little more to fill in my imagination. A lot of the film is not found in the Scriptures, but more like her origin story.”
D.J. responds, “We know what we have in the Scriptures; everyone is very familiar with that. But I thought, gosh, it would be so amazing to have a more immersive experience with her and see what it was like through her eyes.”
“When she accepts the Fiat, it doesn’t mean that her life is going to be any easier,” he continues. “There are going to be struggles and things that she keeps overcoming. I wanted to put the audience right in the room with Mary so they can experience [that] with her and feel it.”
D.J. notes, “When I started to really dive into what Mary did, it took such great courage. The sacrifices she made to bring this love and gift into the world. If we just focus on that, then this movie could be for anybody with a Christian or non-Christian background. They can see what an amazing young woman she was.”
He shares how his friendship with Bishop David O’Connell, the late auxiliary bishop of Los Angeles, informed the film. “[Bishop O’Connell] adored Mary. He was the one that really got my wife and I much closer to Mary and said, ‘Look, she’s your intercessor,’” D.J. says. “He said to me, ‘Do me one favor: Give Joseph a voice.’ We don’t really get to hear from Joseph in the Scriptures. So we worked really hard to give Joseph a voice and to make him come more alive. Like Mary, he had apprehensions and fears about jumping into this mission.”
LISTEN: Fatherly Advice – Relating to Mary
Father Dave notes how he found D.J.’s portrayal of Mary and Joseph falling in love beautiful and powerful. D.J. responds, “That was important to me, because even though it is a marriage of circumstance, we know these stories so well and always jump in at the same point. But what did it feel like the first time that Joseph saw Mary?”
While the film has a wide audience on Netflix, D.J. shares his family’s reaction after showing them the movie. “My 16-year-old daughter said to me, ‘Dad, I didn’t know Mary was so cool,’” he says. “I thought, okay, if I could get that across to a younger generation, and they can see Mary as a contemporary besides just being the holy mother of God, then to me, the movie is a success.”
