Jesus, Mary and Joey (2005) Online

Thank God (no irony) that the producers of this film wisely decided to change it's title from the off-putting Jesus, MARY AND JOEY to the more enigmatic WELCOME BACK MISS MARY. An overtly religious film that does not discomfit by being heavy-handed, WELCOME BACK MISS MARY was written by the star, Vincent Pagano, and may well be the story of his own spiritual journey.

Mary (the lovely Marley Shelton) socially resurfaces after a long absence. As it turns out, the former "scary Mary" is now a cancer survivor, and attributes much of her recovery to her faith in God. She witnesses her faith by working with young cancer patients. Although Mary is Born Again, she wants to experience life in all its facets and fullness.

Vivacious, sexy and sweet, she captures the heart of Joey (Vincent Pagano), a local boy from a staunchly, energetically Italian family. Joey's colorful, riotous family is the exact opposite of Mary's, who are straitlaced to the point of painfulness.

As Joey's feelings for Mary grow, he adopts a kind of shrill religiosity that grates badly on his friends and family, and takes a Wall Street job offered to him by Mary's disapproving father, both to give the boy a leg up in life and to separate him from Mary. Made unhappy by his choices and the circumstances of his life, Joey experiences a crisis of faith.

Vincent Pagano' script is touching, funny and wistful, as well as being utterly sincere. Joey's (and Mary's) respective questions of faith are well-addressed here and never become leaden, not least of all because Mary lacks any pretentiousness or self-righteousness. She merely believes---questions the why, but has faith in the how of the universe.

This reviewer is generally not a fan of religious-based programming but enjoyed this film, so take that as a definite endorsement.

For a "little" film, WELCOME BACK MISS MARY has a stellar cast which includes Stacy Keach, Charles Durning, Olympia Dukakis, and of course the aforementioned Vincent Pagano and Marley Shelton.

I had never heard of this movie and happened upon it. I was strangely drawn to it and found it very sweet and endearing. I enjoyed the storyline and was moved by the fact that, although the characters are all different and at times argumentative, they learn to accept one another and their differences. As a Chrsitian, I enjoyed the fact that we can embrace our differences; we have the same common goal. I thought it was definitely watchable and hope to see it again and share it with others. It is very refreshing to see a movie written by a young man, that contains this sort of content. I also appreciated that he didn't write the characters to seem perfect, yet flawed as they are, they are lovable.

Jesus, Mary and Joey played at the Kansas Film Festival on 09/11/05. I guess this film has been sitting on the shelf for a while but it was delightful. Steller cast which includes Jennifer Esposito, Charles Durning, Tess Harper, Olympia Dukakis, Dan Lauria, Jason Gedrick, Stacy Keach and others. A wonderful Romantic comedy with a close knit Italian-American family, the Vitellos youngest son Joey falling in love with a fundamentalist WASP-y girl Mary played by Marley Shelton (nice to see her again). This is a religious romantic comedy that asks questions about faith, hope and love. Joey meets Mary and starts questioning his Catholic faith. Mary who went though a serious illness when she was younger starts questioning her religion (not her faith). Her father played by Stacey Keach puts the "fun" in fundamental but isn't all that helpful. I usually don't like films about religion but this is something special. Both Mary and Joey learn that faith and love matter, not dogma. And the course of true love (both with each other and God) never runs smooth. Wonderful film and the photography is beautiful. See it and you'll have good Karma.

I just saw this little charmer under the title of

WELCOME BACK MISS MARY on Showtime ON DEMAND, I just wanted to kill some time & watch anything before my main film tonight.

This was a nice surprise, with basically a little or no name cast, this is a very well thought out screenplay, The author seemed to hit all the right notes, in what could have been a sloppy cliché ridden script. OH yes there still are clichés, but handled deftly, the acting is a pure delight by all the large cast. I know I want to see some of these actors again.

Next I have to look this film up to see when & if it was a theatre release, & when it will be on Showtime again, as I will want to record & keep this one.

Rating *** (out of 4) 88 points (out of 100) IMDb 8 (out of 10)

I laughed and was inspired as I watched this sensitive portrayal of a complex relationship between Joey, a young Roman Catholic, and a born-again young lady named Mary. The central characters were complex, not the one-dimensional types often seen in this kind of story. (I am tired of seeing born-again Christians portrayed as either "holier-than-thou" or hypocrites.) Additional characters were somewhat zany and made this a really funny movie to watch. I especially enjoyed the contrast between the two families, although they were too stereotypical. The most appealing feature of the movie is the development of the dynamic relationship between Joey and Mary and also the growth of Joey's character. The script was written by Vincent Pagano, the actor who played Joey, and I would like to see more from him.

This movie was sold to me under false pretenses. I thought it was a romantic comedy, but it's just a religious promotional film. The characters and acting isn't all bad, but the story is weak at best.

What I got out of this was: "We're Christians, we are good because of our faith in god, and everyone that don't believe in god are immoral, horrible people." As a person that believe in science and facts, and take fairy tales as what they are, fairy tales, this was a 1h45min waste of time for me. If they had toned down the Jesus part and focused more on romance and comedy, it would have been watchable, but as now, it's not, unless you're extremely religious, but then you don't need to watch it, since you have already bought into the propaganda.

This is a real disappointment for a film with such a fine cast. Despite the attempt to promote religious tolerance, understanding and disapproval of religious pretentiousness, it still comes across as an attempt to promote Anglo-American Christianity by using skeptics, who are, of course, presented as somewhat immoral characters.

The film seems to be promoting a message that says "It's okay to accept others who are different then you, but only as long as they're devout, Anglo-American Christians", which, I suppose, is okay if you want to show the film in an Anglo-American church, but besides being somewhat pretentious, it's also just a boring subject.

If I could re-write the script, I would re-write it so that the point it makes is that Christians aren't good people because they're Christians, but rather that good people are Christians because they're good people. This point seems to get lost in this film.

It's about on the level of "Pat Boone talks to Teens about S-E-X" and "Tough Guys Find God".

There was a story here. A tranche of Providence Italianosity. But those bits are just filler for the real story which is, I don't know, "Jesus Saves".

Imagine a Catholic Woody Allen making his 1st HS film. He shows some family interaction (pretty good), then characters find a way to talk about whether or not god exists and question their own existences; introduce a sub-plot about the family store being sold (this is OK), then characters find a way to talk about whether or not god exists and question their own existences; the once ugly female lead is now a babe, then characters find a way to talk about whether or not god exists and question their own existences; keep repeating.

The script is so contrived that it hurts your teeth; the characters and actors are bland; the story is right out of "Ministers talk to young people about STDs". Touchstone sucks and it's way better than this pap.

It's awful and really should be a 1 or 0.

There are many movies that has a very stereotypical portraits of Christians - either they are all holy good(often in chrisitan movies) or they are all hippocrates(in non-chrisitan) - this one was different. The plot is based in a community where Christianity is kind of accepted, but traditionalized in the roman catholic way - and everyone come along quite well it seems. But the problem begins when someone, Joey, begins to take his faith more seriously(because of Mary). He does not become a holy man - but he struggles still in the search - and even when he believe he has found Him. Even Mary struggles somehow, both her strict chrisitan parents and Joey's devoted catholic mother - all do - in their own way. As in real life. And this is one of the few movies I have seen that being shown without making much effort to preach one type of Christianity. Neither does the movie cover up the message as so many Hollywood movies tend to do, and even some Christian movies.

I can understand that people does not like and criticize this movie for the message it brings, because it is - believe it or not - Christian, but I cannot understand why people wish the movie had a more humanistic message like soooo many other Christian themed Hollywood movies often have. It would only ruin the movie, because the church and Christianity is not that, and it would make the movie lose its edge and reality aspect into a wishful thinking kind of chrisitiany of the directors mind only to please the world(major audience). It's easy to rate a movie bad, because you don't like the message, even thou the movie itself is not bad - I think this movie show that its right where it should be, and it does it pretty good.

I love the fact that this movie IS a romantic comedy. I love romantic comedies. It's kinda typical in the storyline(but well made and acted) - but in addition you get the Christian theme that is one of my favorite subjects. It's also a typical comedy because of the characters, lines and warm humor etc. Too few movies, especially romantic comedies, like this are made.