A celebrated filmmaker takes a fresh look at lives of sanctity in the docudrama series “Martin Scorsese Presents: The Saints.” Two roughly hour-long episodes of the eight-part program are currently streaming on Fox Nation.
Two more installments will become available each Sunday through Dec. 8. The remaining four parts will be released in April and May of 2025, their arrival timed to coincide with Holy Week and the Easter Season.
Hosted, narrated and executive produced by Scorsese, the profiles cover close to two millennia of Church history, beginning with St. John the Baptist, and demonstrate the diverse ways in which individuals renowned for their holiness have responded to God’s call.
The first story is that of St. Joan of Arc, the 15th-century mystic who played a dramatic role in the Hundred Years’ War between England and France. Her unlikely rise from country peasant girl to brilliant warrior and confidante of France’s King Charles VII is recounted through a vibrant dramatization energized by Liah O’Prey’s passionate performance as the Maid of Orleans.
Each biography concludes with a four-way discussion of that episode’s subject. Participants in these talks, which are led by Scorsese, include Jesuit Father James Martin, author of “My Life With the Saints.”
Not all the comments made during these colloquies will strike viewers of faith as congenial. But, overall, they do provide some contemporary context.
The second episode made available for review – and the last of the current quartet scheduled to air – focuses on St. Maximilian Kolbe, a Polish Franciscan priest. Father Kolbe perished in the Auschwitz Concentration Camp on Aug. 14, 1941 after volunteering to be starved to death in place of another prisoner who had a family that was dependent on him.
While the heroic circumstances of St. Maximillian’s demise are fairly well known, this series does a good job of depicting the varied and innovative ministry he carried out, both in Poland and abroad, before his arrest by the Nazis. Despite chronic ill-health, he established a publishing house, as well as his homeland’s first Catholic radio station.
Scorsese and his collaborators also present a carefully balanced view of the relationship between Father Kolbe’s publicly announced anti-semitic sentiments and the practical humanitarianism that led him to treat all those in need equally. His solidarity with a Jewish fellow captive condemned to death alongside him is particularly moving.
The scenes that depict St. Joan’s earthly end do not ignore the agony involved in being burned at the stake. Those devoted to St. Maximilian’s last days are equally blunt in depicting the fact that those selected for starvation were stripped naked before their final confinement. Multiple male cast members are thus seen fully nude.
Stories of torturous martyrdom are, by definition, not fit fare for kids. But the parents of older teens will have to judge whether the spiritual value to be derived from these programs outweighs visuals that might otherwise be considered inappropriate for any but adults. As for grown TV fans, they’ll find much to appreciate in this well-crafted handful of hagiographies.
