Muhammad in film

The depiction of the Islamic prophet Muhammad (as with other visual depictions) is a controversial topic both within and outside of Islam. Although the Quran does not explicitly forbid images of Muhammad, there are a few hadith (supplemental teachings) which have explicitly prohibited Muslims from creating visual depictions of figures. Because the different branches of Islam use different Hadith collections, there is a split on this issue between the two major denominations of Islam, Sunni and Shia Islam.

Most Sunni Muslims believe that visual depictions of all the prophets of Islam should be prohibited^[1] and are particularly averse to visual representations of Muhammad.^[2] In 1926, Egyptian actor Youssef Wahbi was in discussions to play Muhammad in a film financed by the Turkish government under Atatürk. When the Sunni Islamic Al-Azhar University in Cairo heard about it, scholars there released a fatwa stipulating that Islam forbids the depiction of Muhammad on screen and King Fuad then sent a severe warning to the actor, threatening to exile him and strip him of his Egyptian nationality. As a result of the controversy, the film was abandoned.^[3]

In Shia Islam, scholars historically were also against such depictions, but have taken a more relaxed view over the years and images of Muhammad are quite common nowadays.^[2] A fatwa given by Ali al-Sistani, the Shi'a marja of Iraq, states that it is permissible to depict Muhammad, even in television or movies, if done with respect.^[4]

Notable films

L'Inferno

Dante's Inferno, originally released in Italy as L'Inferno, was one of, if not the first depiction of Muhammad in a feature-length film. The depiction of Muhammad in L'Inferno is very brief and very unflattering. It has a brief section in which Muhammad is being tortured in Hell with his chest opened, exposing his entrails.^[5]

The Message

Mohammad, Messenger of God, released in the US as The Message, was the first major film about Muhammad. The film was released on January 1, 1976 and on July 29 of the same year it had its premiere in "Plaza", a London cinema. There are two versions of the movie, an English one and an Arab one. The Arab version had also its premiere in a London cinema, Curzon, on August 19, 1976. Both versions were screened till September 29. So the English version was shown for nine weeks, and the Arab version for six weeks.

When director Mustafa Akkad was shooting the film, he made use of an American cast and an Egyptian cast. In the English version Anthony Quinn played Hamza, Michael Ansara Muhammad's principal opponent Abu Sufyan, and Irene Papas Abu Sufyan's wife Hind. In the Arab version these roles were played by Egyptian actors. However, in a number of overall shots, in which a large group is acting, such as the Battle of Badr, it can be heard that the scene is shot only once, as the actors shout "Allahu Akbar", whereas in other similar scenes the director opted for "God is great".

Although the movie is about Muhammad, the director decided to shoot the film so as to not depict Muhammad. Akkad frequently changed the position of the camera at moments when Muhammad would be brought into vision. When Muhammad was essential to a scene, the camera would show events from his point of view.^[6]

The Message became very popular, not the least in the circles of Muslims, for example in Africa, and Asia. Even so, two well-known fatwas from Al-Azhar University and Shiite Council of Lebanon were issued about The Message.

It is certainly probable that this is not the result of the creativity of the filmmakers but of the rules announced by the Islamic scholars of the Azhar and the Shia Council of Lebanon, who prohibited any representation of Muhammad's wives as well as of Muhammad himself.^[6]

Muhammad: The Last Prophet

Muhammad: The Last Prophet is an animated film produced by Badr International according to the same principles as "The Message". Its director is Richard Rich. The movie was released in 2004 and it was screened in a limited number of movie-theatres in the United States and the United Kingdom. The film focuses on the early period of Islam.

Muhammad: The Messenger of God

In October 2012, Iranian director Majid Majidi began shooting a film titled Muhammad: The Messenger of God with plans to show Muhammad on screen, though not his face, as per Shia tradition. The film world premier was on 27 August 2015.^[7]

The Lady of Heaven

In June 2020, Deadline Hollywood announced that Enlightened Kingdom were producing The Lady of Heaven which would be the first film that shows the face of Muhammad.^[8] In order to respect aniconism in Islam, Muhammad was portrayed by light and cinematic effects as opposed to being portrayed by an actor or single individual.^[9] The producers of the film also discussed how they tackled the very challenging aspect of depicting a Muslim holy personality.^[10] A trailer for the film was released on 23 December 2020 followed by a US theatrical release date a year later on 10 December 2021.^[11]^[12]

Later projects

There are some new films currently being produced about Muhammad, considered the "second of their kind" (referring to Western films respecting the portrayal of Muhammad).^[13]^[14]

In October 2008, Producer Oscar Zoghbi, who worked on the original The Message, stated that he would shooting a remake called The Messenger of Peace, to be shot around the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.^[14]

Film producer Barrie M. Osborne has been hired as an adviser on a possible series of epics about Muhammad. The films, which are financed by a Qatari media company and will be supervised by the Egyptian cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi, are unlikely to depict Muhammad at all on screen as per Sunni tradition which sees all renderings of the prophets as blasphemous.^[13]^[15]

List of films

Date	Production company	Title	Country of origin	References
Unknown	History Channel	Muhammad: Biography	UK	^[16]
Unknown	Unknown	Muhammad: A Mercy to Mankind
March 10, 1911	Milano Films	L'Inferno	Italy
September 3, 1977	Moustapha Akkad	The Message (or Mohammad, Messenger of God)	UK, USA	^[17]^[18]
2000	PBS	Islam: Empire of Faith	USA	^[19] ^[20]
March 12, 2002	Mpi Home Video	Story of Islam	USA
December 17, 2002	PBS	Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet	USA	^[21]^[22] ^[23]^[24] ^[25]
May 2, 2004	BBC	A Muslim In The Family	UK	^[26]^[27]
November 14, 2004	Fine Media Group	Muhammad: The Last Prophet	USA	^[28] ^[29]^[30]
October 21, 2004	National Geographic	Inside Mecca	USA
2005	BBC (BBC Four)	An Islamic History of Europe	UK	^[31]^[32] ^[33]
2005	BBC	The Smell of Paradise	UK
March 2, 2006	Towers Productions	Secrets of the Koran (Decoding the Past)	USA
September 25, 2006	Quantum Leaps; EDS	Understanding Islam: The Signs of the Last Day	Turkey
July 2011	BBC (BBC Two)	The Life of Muhammad	UK	^[34]
July 2012	Nakoula Basseley Nakoula	Innocence of Muslims	US
December 10, 2012	Enlightened Kingdom	The Lady of Heaven	UK
March 2015	Nurtaban Film Industry	Muhammad	Iran

References

^ Larsson, Göran (2011). Muslims and the New Media. Ashgate. p. 51. ISBN 978-1-4094-2750-6.
^ ^a ^b Devotion in pictures: Muslim popular iconography – The prophet Muhammad, University of Bergen
^ Alessandra. Raengo & Robert Stam (2004). A Companion To Literature And Film. Blackwell Publishing. p. 31. ISBN 0-631-23053-X.
^ "Istifta". Retrieved 2015-09-28.
^ Plate, S. Brent (2006). Blasphemy: Art that Offends. Black Dog. p. 39. ISBN 978-1-9047-7253-8.
^ ^a ^b Bakker, Freek L. (January 2006). "The image of Muhammad in The Message, the first and only feature film about the Prophet of Islam" (PDF). Routledge, "Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations", Vol. 17, No.1. Retrieved 2007-07-06.^{[permanent dead link]}
^ "MUHAMMAD THE FILM EVENT OF 2015 TO HAVE WORLD PREMIERE AT THE MONTREAL WORLD FILM FESTIVAL". ffm-montreal.org. Archived from the original on 22 July 2015. Retrieved 22 July 2015.
^ D'Alessandro, Anthony (2020-06-29). "Enlightened Kingdom Sets 'Lady Of Heaven'; Feature About Lady Fatima, Daughter Of Muhammad". Deadline. Retrieved 2020-06-29.
^ Al-Habib, Yasser. "The Lady of Heaven". Alhabib.org. Retrieved 2021-02-15.
^ Blyth, Antonia (2021-07-14). "How 'The Lady Of Heaven' Producers Tackled The "Very Challenging" Aspect Of Depicting A Muslim Holy Person – Cannes Studio". Deadline. Retrieved 2021-07-16.
^ "The Lady of Heaven, The Untold Story". KinoCheck. Retrieved 2021-07-16.
^ "The Lady of Heaven". AMC Theatres. Retrieved 2021-10-28.
^ ^a ^b Child, Ben (March 15, 2013). "Qatar and Iran on rival missions to make films about prophet Muhammad". The Guardian.
^ ^a ^b "Movie planned on life of Mohammad". Reuters. Oct 27, 2008. Retrieved 2009-01-29.
^ MTV
^ "The Prophet Muhammad". History Channel Asia.com. Retrieved 2008-12-31.^{[permanent dead link]}
^ Kifner, John (2008). "Mohammad Messenger of God (1976) Alternate Titles: The Message, Mohammad: Messenger of God, Al-Risalah". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2008-02-01. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "Overview for Mohammad Messenger of God (1976)". tcm.com. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "The Making of Islam: Empire of Faith". PBS.org. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "Islam: Empire of Faith Homepage". PBS. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet PBS Homepage". PBS. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
^ "Muhammad: Legacy of a Prophet (2002) at IMDb". IMDb. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
^ "Unity Production Foundations - Details (SYNOPSIS)". Archived from the original on 2008-07-30. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
^ "Islam Project.org". Archived from the original on 2008-12-12. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
^ "20,000 Dialogues". 20,000 Dialogues. Archived from the original on 2009-02-07. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
^ Childs, Roger (1 May 2004). "BBC News article "A Muslim in the family"". BBC. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ Omaar, Rageh. "BBC (Religion & Ethics: Islam) Essay: A Muslim in the family". BBC. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "Muhammad, the Last Prophet (2004) Profile". Yahoo. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ Stevens, Dana (November 13, 2004). "Animated Retelling of the Birth of Islam (Film Review)". The New York Times. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ Metacritic.com. "Muhammad: The Last Prophet Metacritic.com reviews". Metacritic.com. Archived from the original on 2018-12-26. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ Omaar, Rageh. "An Islamic History of Europe". Rageh Omaar. BBC. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "An Islamic History of Europe BBC Educational Archive". Archived from the original on 2007-10-23. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "Bringing to Life the Islamic History of Europe: A Video Documentary Testimony". MuslimHeritage.com, BBC Four, Rageh Omaar. Archived from the original on 2013-01-04. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
^ "Rageh Omaar to present The Life Of Muhammad for BBC Two". BBC. 2011-06-20. Retrieved 2013-02-01.