It’s been a big year for Bible stories on screens. Prime Video’s House of David was a hit. The Chosen season five set theatrical records for the show. And in April, the animated Jesus movie The King of Kings became Angel Studios’s second highest-grossing feature film (behind Sound of Freedom).

Now there’s yet another animated Jesus movie in theaters, Light of the World, released September 5 and landing in the box office top 10 its first week. Released by the evangelistic nonprofit Salvation Poem Project, the film features old-school 2-D animation in the style of classic 90s Disney movies or the gorgeously animated Prince of Egypt. The retro-but-fresh style works beautifully and marks a welcome step forward in faith-based animation. It helps that veteran Disney animators Tom and Tony Bancroft (brothers) are the artistic force behind the film. There’s nothing cheap-looking or cheesy about the animation in this film.

But what about the story? Does Light of the World take Scripture seriously and present an accurate, compelling, and faithful rendering of Jesus?

Jesus Through the Eyes of a Youthful John

The film’s most noticeable narrative choice is to tell the story of Jesus through the eyes of the apostle John, but as if John were a 13 year-old boy when he met Jesus. Some viewers might find this jarring, especially since most film or TV versions of the “beloved apostle” render him as an adult man. But Christian tradition generally holds that John was the youngest disciple, quite possibly a teenager when he met Jesus. So 13 isn’t really that big of a stretch.

Plus, the choice of telling the story through a kid’s point of view helps make it more relatable for child audiences. As we see the tender emotions John experiences through the ups and downs of befriending and following Jesus, the story feels grounded in familiar relational dynamics. I liked the narrative frame of the film, which centers on John and his family (older brother James, father Zebedee, mother Salome) as they experience the world-altering drama of the Messiah’s ministry, death, and resurrection first hand.

There’s nothing cheap-looking or cheesy about the animation in this film.

As with any Bible adaptation, liberties are taken with the order, arrangement, and plot details of biblical scenes. Some of these are more noticeable than others, and perhaps questionable. But on the whole the changes don’t do violence to the biblical text, and some of the embellishments—particularly visual flourishes—creatively illuminate the story without distorting it. I particularly liked how the film depicted Jesus’s baptism visually, and how stories like the parable of the Good Samaritan are rendered in a different animation style. I also appreciated how the film’s handling of Jesus’s crucifixion doesn’t shy away from its darkness and violence—a rare but refreshing move in a genre that tends to soften the sharper edges of the story.

Telling Too Much of the Story

Light of the World is a kid-friendly telling of the Jesus story. It effectively incorporates humor (including silly physical humor like a running joke about John the Baptist’s appetite for locusts) and its brisk pacing is appropriate for short attention spans. But the value of the film’s concise narrative is also its greatest liability.

The challenge of telling the whole Jesus story in 90 minutes is that there’s simply too much plot to cram into such limited time. The result is a dizzying hyperspeed tour through an infinitely consequential story that demands each big moment have, well, an actual moment.

The value of the film’s concise narrative is also its greatest liability.

This is the Achilles’ heel of many Bible movies, including this year’s King of Kings. I disliked Kings because it told the beat-by-beat story of Jesus in a too linear, too comprehensive way, to the point that it felt predictable and boring. While Light is more engaging and surprising—in part due to its point-of-view framing around young John—it still suffers from an ill-advised attempt at comprehensiveness. Huge moments and countless miracles—the healing of Mary Magdalene, the paralytic man lowered through the roof, the fish in the nets, the water to wine, the Last Supper, the resurrection, the ascension—receive mere minutes, sometimes seconds of screen time. The plot beats are there but the significance and felt power often aren’t.

Narratively, TV’s spread-out form might simply be better for stories like these. House of David and The Chosen work well precisely because the multi-season series format allows for big Bible moments to be more developed, for the characters involved to be more textured and three-dimensional. The overall effect is more emotional potency, as we see biblical events through the perspectives of lived-in characters we’ve come to know and love.

One principle that would have improved King of Kings and Light of the World—and which I hope future Jesus movies take into account—is that less is more. Maximalist plots tend to flatten emotional impact; comprehensiveness tends to lessen each beat’s power. You only have an hour and a half to work with: narrow the story, go deeper, let big moments breathe. Remember: your film is not a stand-in for the Bible and doesn’t need to be. Let it render select parts of the Bible and point viewers to go to the source material for the full account.

Evangelistic Opportunity

In spite of these problems with a condensed and too-comprehensive narrative (which I don’t think kids will mind as much as I do), the film gets the simplicity of the gospel right.

Focusing in on the theme of light and darkness, and Jesus (the light of the world) conquering darkness (sin) through his death and resurrection, Light is a helpful articulation of the gospel. It doesn’t hide its evangelistic goal. The film ends with John leading his father in a prayer of salvation (we hear the words of The Salvation Poem), followed by a pre-credits call to action where John points to a QR code on screen if audience members want to decide to follow Jesus. This might feel a bit cringy, but it’s also understandable. The film really does have potential as an evangelistic opportunity. I hope lots of kids who don’t know Jesus have the chance to see it.

If you have kids, take them to see The Light of the World. It’s a worthy and edifying cinematic experience—especially compared to the alternatives in pop culture today. Better yet, have your kids invite an unchurched friend or two, and let the film spark gospel conversations.