Easter celebration movies
MOVIES!, beginning at 12 p.m. TCM, beginning at 8 p.m.
MOVIES! and Turner Classic Movies each offer a celebration of today’s Easter holiday with film lineups. The triple feature on MOVIES! airs throughout the afternoon and is devoted to faith-inspired titles, beginning with Demetrius and the Gladiators, a 1954 sequel to 1953’s The Robe. Victor Mature stars as the title character, and the cast also includes Susan Hayward, Ernest Borgnine, Michael Rennie and Anne Bancroft. Next is The Bible (1966), director John Huston’s nearly three-hour epic featuring five main sections that dramatize the Bible stories about the creation, the Garden of Eden, Cain and Abel, Noah’s Ark, and Abraham, as well as shorter segments based on the building of the Tower of Babel and the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Among The Bible’s large cast are Michael Parks, Richard Harris, George C. Scott, Ava Gardner, Peter O’Toole and Huston himself as Noah, the narrator and the voice of God. The Easter lineup on MOVIES! concludes with Come to the Stable (1949), a comedy/drama based on a true story about two French religious sisters (played by Loretta Young and Celeste Holm) who come to
a small New England town and involve the townspeople in helping them build a children’s hospital. Young received a best actress Oscar nomination, and Holm was nominated for best supporting actress along with co-star Elsa Lanchester.
Turner Classic Movies’ Easter Sunday prime-time double feature includes a mix of the secular and the sacred. The evening begins with Judy Garland and Fred Astaire in 1948’s Oscar-winning Easter Parade, the musical featuring classic Irving Berlin tunes like “Easter Parade,” “Steppin’ Out With My Baby” and “A Couple of Swells.” The second film on the bill is the 1961 biblical epic King of Kings, a dramatization of the life of Jesus (portrayed by Jeffrey Hunter).