157 replies to this topic

[freemo]

When is this movie due out?

Feb 25th (Ash Wednesday) I think.

It will have the subtitles, doesn't worry me that much. More disappointed to hear that they cut the scene where Pontius Pilate washes his hands, although it's understandable.

[IndyB007]

This month you say? If it comes here, then I must see it. Thanx for the heads up!

[PrinceKamalKhan]

Here are a couple of interesting websites on it:

http://www.passion-movie.com

and

http://www.thepassionofthechrist.com

I can't wait to see it myself and I laud Gibson's faith and courage throughout this project.

[IndyB007]

Hey, it is coming here. Guess I'll have to go then....

[PrinceKamalKhan]

Ash Wednesday is here. Is anyone planning to see it opening day?

[freemo]

No, I'll probably get to it on teh weekend or next week.

Can anyone who sees it before then please not post any spoliers.

[Xenobia]

For those folks that might have forgotten, if you are talking about "The Passion" and think you are coming to a spoiler, you can always use the spoiler commands which are [spoiler] [ / spoiler] without the spaces before and after the slash.

-- Xenobia

[Jim]

For those folks that might have forgotten, if you are talking about "The Passion" and think you are coming to a spoiler, you can always use the spoiler commands which are [spoiler] [ / spoiler] without the spaces before and after the slash.

-- Xenobia

Assume people know the story.

[freemo]

Yeah, I meant that as a joke (didn't mean it to be a poor one though). Sorry.

[Agent 76]

Great movie will be this one!

MODERATORS NOTE: Image removed due to bad taste.

[Blofeld's Cat]

Great movie will be this one! 

MODERATORS NOTE: Image removed due to bad taste. 

Agent76, it's not a funny subject.

Some of your posted images may amuse a few members, but others are either copyrite infringements or are inapropriate.

Please refrain from posting an image every time you post something.

Thank you.

[Agent 76]

ok...

[Four Aces]

...from the expression "passion play" (the origin of which I'm a little uncertain of) to descibe a dramatization of the crucifixion/resurrection...

The "passion play" is held in Oberamagau, Germany if I recall correctly. This is a town in the German Alps.

4A

P.S. Ludwig's castles are nearby: These would be Hohenshcwangau, Neuschwanstein, and Linderhof [with the grotto].

Edited by Four Aces, 25 February 2004 - 05:58 PM.

[Jaelle]

I'm amazed at how zencat and others around here are so positive about Gibson's retrograde beliefs and "The Passion." Having recently lectured Loomis on another thread about criticizing a film without having seen it, I should just shut up but I won't. I'll be a hypocrite about it, ok? I wonder if this was a film made by some obscure filmmaker if you'd all be so welcoming of it. Is it just because it's made by Mel Gibson that it so excites you? And what is about Gibson and his constant desire to play characters who always undergo torture, beatings and horrific deaths? The man loves to be a martyr.

I was raised a Catholic, I know the faith well. I went to Catholic school from elementary school straight thru to high school. I went to Saturday and Sunday catechism school. My elementary school was an old-world continental Portuguese Catholic school that taught a lot of the old Catholicism. (Oh btw, the only thing I appreciate about the film is that it exposes modern western audiences to Aramaic, a language I've heard often when I've traveled in the Middle East. In the last decade, US and UK bombs destroyed several Chaldean/Assyrian Christian villages in Iraq---those are people who still speak Aramaic, the language that Jesus spoke).

Gibson and his father are members of an extremist evangelical Catholic sect who thoroughly reject the Vatican II reforms of the early 60s. I've met these people. I seriously doubt many of you here would think much of their views. Those reforms brought the Catholic church into the 20th century (tho not entirely, some would argue). Those reforms enabled the mass to be spoken in the vernacular tongue so that ordinary people--incl. poor people throughout the world--could understand the services they attended. Gibson still wants services to be said in Latin.

BTW, the Latin spoken in the film is a ridiculous historical inaccuracy---it should be Greek and Aramaic spoken by the non-Roman characters, Latin only by the Romans and only to themselves, not non-Romans. Those Vatican II reforms changed the Church's entire attitude toward Jews, proclaiming an historical apology to Jews for centuries of horrific violence committed by Catholics toward Jews in the name of what had been taught by the Church for centuries: that Jews were Christ-killers. Gibson and his father reject those reforms. Under pressure, Gibson cut out a crucial line from the film (it appears in the New Testament) in which the Jewish priest Caiaphas says that the death of Christ will be on the head of Jews forever. The Vatican II reforms changed the entire relationship of priests and their congregations, enabled nuns to dress in normal clothing and interact with their communities freely, approved a more flexible and more human interpretation of the Bible, allowed women to take greater responsibility in the church, allowed husbands and wives to separate and so much more that made the Church a far more humane and modern institution. People think the Church needs to make a lot of changes today and it does. But compare today's Church to the one that existed prior to Vatican II, and these same critics would be utterly shocked at what they'd see. Those reforms acknowledged and accepted evolution and other scientific theories (like the one that proved that the earth was NOT the center of the universe!)

Gibson wants all those reforms changed. Gibson's religious views are akin to fundamentalists like Falwell and Robertson or conservative imams preaching from mosques that today's Muslims have embraced western values too much and that they must go back to a past of moral purity that never existed. (And forget gays of course! They don't even exist in Gibson's religious worldview!)

BTW, the term "the Passion" (yes, it's capitalized) is a Catholic religious term that refers to Christ's suffering from the moment he was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane to his death. The original word "passion" has evolved over the centuries to mean something else today. It used to mean "suffering," "endurance." "Passion plays" were reenactments of the stations of the cross and the crucifixion. The "stations of the cross" are the different locations of the route where Jesus carried the cross to Mt. Golgotha, the hill where he was crucified. Those different locations of the route were when Jesus stumbled and fell from the weight of the cross. At one station for example, there is the famous story of a man who dared to give him a sip of water and was beaten for it. Throughout history in Europe, passion plays were reenacted at important holy days throughout the year. And it was at these times that horrific pogroms were committed against Jews, Muslims, other non-Christians and Christians who were deemed heretics. I won't got into the sort of violent acts that these good Christians committed. It would turn your stomach. They were very creative.

And no, I don't intend on seeing this film. Not for any moral or political or religious reasons. But because I know I won't be able to withstand the violence. And also because of what I discuss below, in an excerpt of part of a discussion I've been having with several friends and colleagues online about this film. We're a large group of Christians, Jews, Muslims, atheists, agnostics, Buddhists, Hindus, New Age types. And yes, we all do manage to keep civil with one another.

I also post the article that I refer to in my comments:

"Hello again everyone:
I found this article to be the first one to point out (in a much clearer way than I had considered it) the one real problem I have with Mel Gibson's Catholicism. I don't agree with those who worry about its "anti-semitism" because I think it merely portrays the biblical "history" that it was Jewish priest authorities and Jewish mobs who demanded Christ's death. Many Jewish scholars have themselves written about how the rabbi judges of the time--the sanhedrin--often demanded from the Roman occupiers executions of criminals and "troublemaking rabblerousers" who challenged their authority within the Jewish population of Judea. Jewish religious historian Baruch Kimmerling wrote in a recent article in the Israeli daily Haaretz that "if Jesus Christ existed, it was certain that Jewish leaders viewed him as a threat to their religious and political authority; recall that just before his arrest, Jesus had thrown out the moneychangers in the central Jewish temple. This was a subversive, seditious act and probably sealed his fate with the sanhedrin." My own view is that everyone on both sides of this question (Christian anti-semites and Jewish groups who accuse Gibson of anti-semitism) seems to forget that this entire story is about a Jew--Jesus Christ--who generates a large following among Jews and who causes serious conflict among Jews. Everyone forgets that this is indeed a Jewish story. Yes, it was Jewish authorities and a Jewish mob who demanded Christ's death. It was also Jews who followed him with devotion, accepting him as their messiah; it was these Jews who vocally opposed his death, and begged the Romans for mercy. I haven't seen the film but maybe Gibson emphasizes the Jews who demanded Christ's death too much while not making it clear enough that there were Jews in that crowd, among his followers, who risked their own lives while begging for his life. Maybe it's that choice in emphasis that generates the charges of anti-semitism in the film.

My real problem with Gibson's film is the same problem I have with evangelicals of the extreme variety; and Gibson and his father are Catholic evangelicals. Like Protestant evangelicals/born again types, they focus to such an extreme degree on Christ's violent suffering and death, and not so much on his resurrection and his teachings throughout his short life. My Catholic upbringing drummed into me the central importance of Christ's resurrection as THE cornerstone of the Catholic faith. But these evangelical types (the same nutjobs who comprise Bush's base constituency and to whom he constantly panders) seem to glory only in Christ's blood and death. Active, evangelical Shiite Muslims are the same way: they focus so intensely on the suffering and death of Ali, the grandson the Prophet Muhammed who was betrayed by the first sultan of Baghdad in the 7th century AD. Sunni Muslims and more secular Shiite Muslims view them as extremists who forget Muhammed's more humanistic and universal teachings. All these evangelical types focus so much on blood, death and suffering. The last two quotes in this article say it all for me; they're very relevant not just to Christians but also to Muslims and Jews. And it's a shame that Muslims aren't being included in these dialogue circles going on around the country about the movie. Muslims have a good middle road view of Jesus: unlike Jews, they revere him as a great prophet blessed by God, and they're very sensitive to cultural portrayals of him; unlike Christians, they do not view him as a god but as merely a good man who tried to bring his people closer to God. Nor do they believe that he was crucified. After the article below, I've included an interesting brief comment from an imam at a California mosque who saw the movie.

Of course, as some of you already know, I say all this as a "devout agnostic" who's often flirted with atheism. There's no such thing as a Catholic who's a true atheist. The most he or she can be is a Catholic atheist. The Catholic brainwashing can never be expunged, I don't care how hard you try. :-D I also say all this as someone who refuses to see the film not for any political or moral reasons but simply because I know I won't be able to endure the gore and torture. Whether or not Christ really existed is a question I can never answer but I was taught the image of a man who to this day I regard with great respect, admiration and childlike attachment. It's hard enough watching anyone undergo all that torture, it's even harder for that Catholic child within me to watch Jesus Christ endure it. It was difficult for me as a child to watch all those biblical Hollywood movies that my family watched all the time (and still does), the ones that depicted Christ's suffering. I remember crying so much and asking my mother why those nasty people had to be so cruel to Jesus. And those movies were pretty tame by today's standards. But even today as an adult and sophisticated non-religious person, I know there's no way I'll be able to take Gibson's undisciplined indulgence on the gore and cruelty inflicted on a figure who for me has always represented only gentleness, kindness, love and forgiveness."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE NEW YORK TIMES
February 25, 2004
'Passion' Disturbs a Panel of Religious Leaders
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN

CHICAGO, Feb. 24 — An interfaith panel of eight Christian and Jewish clergy members and laypeople who gathered to watch "The Passion of the Christ" on Monday night admitted they had very different expectations for it. The Greek Orthodox clergyman said he was predisposed to like it; the Methodist minister and the Roman Catholic priest were curious, but wary of its claims of Gospel authenticity; and the Jews were afraid that it would inflame anti-Semitism.

But after the showing, in a late-night discussion around a table at the First United Methodist Church at the Chicago Temple, the panel members were in full agreement: they were disturbed by what they had seen. They said the movie — which was produced, directed and largely financed by the actor Mel Gibson — deviated in bizarre ways from the Gospel accounts, fell flat emotionally and was numbingly violent.

The Christians said they had been dismayed to see the inspiring prophet Jesus reduced to a mere victim. The Jews said they were horrified to see the Jewish high priests rendered as bloodthirsty schemers demanding Jesus' death over the protests of a sympathetic Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor.

" `The Last Samurai' gripped me more than this movie did," the Rev. Robert H. Oldershaw, pastor of St. Nicholas Roman Catholic Church in the suburb of Evanston, said, referring to a Tom Cruise movie. "Mel Gibson says it's a literal interpretation. It's not. It's Mel Gibson's interpretation."

The Rev. Philip L. Blackwell, senior pastor at First United Methodist Church, said: "I found myself distanced from Jesus because of the violence. I could not identify with him."

He and others said they checked their watches during the showing because they found it tedious.

For months, Mr. Gibson has sought to build an audience for his film by showing it to sympathetic Christians. Many invitees were evangelicals and some were Catholic, but most were theological and social conservatives who shared Mr. Gibson's sense that Hollywood was hostile to Christians. Many of these early viewers called the film a transcendent spiritual experience and promised to turn out crowds to share it.

But with the movie opening nationwide on Wednesday, religious Americans who were excluded from the promotional screenings are now getting a look, and judging from the group here, their reactions may not be so uniformly positive. Those at the table here, who gathered at the request of The New York Times, did not pretend to speak for the full range of religious Americans, but they did represent people who were literate in the Scriptures, devout in their faiths and concerned about the future of interreligious relations.

The round table dialogue was also a precursor of similar events scheduled across the country in response to debate about the movie. The eight people who convened to discuss the movie here had just attended a showing arranged by the Chicago office of the American Jewish Committee in collaboration with half a dozen churches. About half the audience was Jewish, and about half Christian.

A handful walked out during the film. One, a Christian, told companions she could not stand the violence.

Christian and Jewish leaders are planning a number of interfaith events in the coming weeks, in churches, synagogues and universities. They are using the film to re-examine topics like historical evidence on the death of Jesus, the role of Passion plays in fanning hatred of Jews, and the Vatican II teachings of the Catholic Church that absolved Jews collectively of the accusation of deicide.

After the film, over plates of cookies at the Methodist church, Emily D. Soloff, executive director of the Chicago chapter of the American Jewish Committee, told the gathering that the way Jews were portrayed in the film "made me squirm."

Other Jews and some Christians at the table agreed. They said they were appalled by scenes of an unruly mob of Jews and by how the Jewish priests looked like modern-day rabbis in full beards, some in the blue-striped prayer shawls still worn by Jews.

"This movie has the potential for undermining the progress we've made in relations between Jews and Christians," Ms. Soloff said.

She said she was not concerned about how the movie would affect Christian and Jewish leaders who had worked at building bridges, but about those who had not. "I'm worried about the movie as a popular culture artifact," she said. "How many people think of Charlton Heston as God? This is an ugly film to become your standard image of Jews."

With criticism of the film growing in recent weeks, Mr. Gibson tried to alleviate the concerns of some Jews by removing a scene of the Jewish high priest Caiaphas's declaration: "His blood be on us and on our children." The line is from the Gospel of Matthew and has often been cited as the definitive source for the deicide accusation against the Jews.

But Mr. Gibson removed the line only from the subtitles, not from the film, said Rabbi David F. Sandmel of KAM Isaiah Israel Congregation in Chicago. He is also a professor of Jewish studies at Catholic Theological Union.

The film's dialogue is in Aramaic and Latin, and for those who know Aramaic, the Jewish mob is still heard yelling the curse in Aramaic, Dr. Sandmel said.

"What happens when this comes out in the director's cut on DVD?" he asked, or when it is translated for release in other countries?

Mr. Gibson has depicted his film as a true recounting of the last 12 hours of Jesus' life. But the Christian and Jewish clergy at the table were troubled by embellishments that they said had no basis in Scripture.

Among them: Jesus is taken to the temple to be condemned by the priests. A raven plucks out the eye of the thief being crucified on the cross next to Jesus. And the wife of Pontius Pilate brings a pile of fresh linens to Mary to wipe Jesus' blood from the ground after he is whipped by sadistic Roman soldiers. The group agreed that the gesture underscored the film's sympathetic treatment of a Roman governor so brutal he was eventually recalled from his post.

The Very Rev. Demetri C. Kantzavelos, chancellor of the Greek Orthodox Diocese of Chicago, was disturbed that the actors speak Latin, and not Greek, the lingua franca. Inaccuracies like these, he said, undermine Mr. Gibson's claims to authenticity.

"I came predisposed to like it," Father Kantzavelos said. "I really wanted to like the movie, and I don't."

He and the other Christian clergy members agreed that the movie was based on a "theology of atonement" familiar to evangelicals, one that emphasizes Jesus' suffering and sacrifice over his resurrection.

They noted that the movie had opened with a passage from Isaiah: "With his stripes we are healed."

Mr. Blackwell, the Methodist pastor said: "If your theology is blood, and you're washed clean in the blood, then the more blood and suffering the better because the more salvation there is in it. If that's your theology, the more stripes, the more you are healed.

"For me the question is: Is unrelenting violence redemptive?" Mr. Blackwell said. "What happened to the revelatory preaching of Jesus and his love?"

********************************************************************
From THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER / February 25, 2004

Reaction of IMAM YASSIR FAZAGA to "The Passion":
"Jesus is not the possession of Christians only.
There are 1.4 billion Muslims that do believe in Jesus, peace be upon him. Maybe not in the exact same way as Christians, but he is a very important figure in Islam. I thought that I would come to this movie and learn more about the values that he taught and the principles that he lived by.
I appreciated the suffering that he has done, but as an "unchurched" person or an outsider, I really do not think it has added any more knowledge to me about the character of Jesus, except his commitment to his beliefs.
I really do not get the point of why the violence was the focal point of the movie, but then I am coming from a non-Christian point of view.
I liked that they would show the suffering of Jesus ... and then Jesus would say: 'Love your enemies.' It was skillfully placed in the midst of the suffering, but I think that message was lost in the violence.
In principle, we appreciate that people of the caliber of Jesus are being paid attention..."
____________________________________________________________________Imam Yassir Fazaga, 31, is the religious leader of the Orange County Islamic Foundation mosque in Mission Viejo.

[Jaelle]

This is a very good letter to the editor from the Israeli daily, Haaretz:


Letter to the Editor

Gibson's choice

Much has been said and written about Mel Gibson's new movie "The Passion of The Christ." Besides its controversial description of events and people, the timing of its release in a period of rising world anti-Semitism raises the question of the motivation of those involved with project.

To add to it all, there is an incredible embracing of the movie by church leaders of all denominations, including school viewings, uncritical reviews, passionate defenses of Gibson, and his beliefs.

To put things in perspective, lets assume for a moment that a Muslim director, or producer , whose father was an anti-Christian propagandist, would have decided to make a movie about the Inquisition.

The script would have included scenes of unspeakable cruelty against Moslems and Jews, with the Christian clergymen, nobility and the common folks shown as enjoying every barbaric act perpetrated against the "unbelievers" who had refused to convert, or those who were accused to have done it without proper conviction.

We could have been able to witness, maimings, decapitations, people being skinned alive or burned on scaffolds to the satisfaction of the crowds, with appropriate music and close-ups. Let's also assume that the movie would have been released simultaneously in about 3,000 theaters in the Middle East, Indonesia, Pakistan, Nigeria, Iran or Saudi Arabia.

Religious schools would have bused the pupils to see the movie, while mullahs, imams and ayatollahs would have declared the picture a "must see" for every true believer. One could easily imagine the outrage of the "civilized" countries about inflammatory descriptions of events 500 years ago and would have asked whether it was an attempt to further fuel the anti-Christian sentiments in the Islamic world.

With the shoe on the other foot, how many of today's Gibson supporters would enjoy seeing such a movie?

Jack Chivo

West Vancouver, Canada

http://www.haaretz.c...SubContrassID=0

[Xenobia]

Jaelle, I am with you all the way.

The problem I have with this film, based on what I have heard from folks who have seen it is, it focuses only on the suffering and death of Christ. This is not what make sthe religion. It's the fact that (as Christains believe) he rose from the dead, and thus triumphs over death, that makes for the faith.

I can only wonder if by concentrating so much on Christ's suffering that somehow Gibson is trying to free himself from whatever guilt he feels in his life, over things he thought he did wrong.

-- Xen

[Jaelle]

I've read a lot of reviews of Gibson's film. This one is the absolute best I've yet read, by one of my favorite critics.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE LOS ANGELES TIMES

http://www.calendarl...0,2945729.story
MOVIE REVIEW
'The Passion of the Christ'
A narrow vision and staggering violence make this a film that will separate people rather than bring them together.
By Kenneth Turan
Times Staff Writer

February 24 2004

Combining the built-in audience of the Bible, the incendiary potential of "The Birth of a Nation" and the marketing genius of "The Blair Witch Project," the arrival of Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" feels like a milestone in modern culture. It's a nexus of religion, celebrity, cinema and mass communication that tells us more about the way our world works than we may want to know.

The film left me in the grip of a profound despair, and not for reasons I would have thought. It wasn't simply because of "The Passion's" overwhelming level of on-screen violence, a litany of tortures ending in a beyond-graphic crucifixion.

And it wasn't because of the treatment of the high priest Caiphas and the Hebrew power elite of Jesus' time — a disturbing portrait likely to give, I feel sure unintentionally, comfort to anti-Semites.

Instead, what is profoundly disheartening is that people of goodwill will see this film in completely different ways. Where I see almost sadistic violence, they will see transcendence; where I see blame, they will see truth.

In effect, aspects of Gibson's creative makeup — his career-long interest in martyrdom and the yearning for dramatic conflict that make him an excellent actor, coupled with his belief in the Gospels' literal truth — have sideswiped this film. What is left is a film so narrowly focused as to be inaccessible for all but the devout.

Those factors have made "The Passion" a film that will separate people rather than bring them together. Normally these kinds of disagreements don't matter, but with a film like this, "You just don't get it" confrontations have sad echoes of savage conflicts that have lasted for centuries. It has the potential to foster divisiveness because of the way it exposes and accentuates the fissures in belief that otherwise might go unnoticed. We all know where the road paved with good intentions leads, and it is not to the gates of heaven.

The film, in Aramaic and Latin, has some 4,000 prints headed for theaters for an Ash Wednesday official opening that starts at midnight tonight. As such, it is one of the largest releases ever — an unheard-of situation for an unapologetically religious film in a defiantly secular, not to say sinful, time.

It is a truism of moviegoing that who you are going into the theater determines how you perceive what's playing on the screen. But rarely, if ever, do those differences focus on something so central to people's lives as religious belief, on questions of life, death and eternity for which individuals have given their lives — both willingly and unwillingly — for what seems like all of recorded time. Which makes every place you want to go toe-to-toe with "The Passion of the Christ" a minefield likely to go off.

Only a star of Mel Gibson's magnitude could have gotten a film like this done, could both afford to foot the estimated $25-million-plus bill and have the prestige and charisma to attract talented collaborators like cinematographer Caleb Deschanel, two-time Oscar-nominated editor John Wright and actor Jim Caviezel, who plays Christ. Gibson's celebrity put this film on the map, giving it the kind of visibility that last year's unheralded but related "The Gospel of John" couldn't dream of.

Given that, it shouldn't be surprising that what's immediately most evident about "The Passion" is its complete sincerity. This is Gibson's personal vision of the greatest story ever told, a look inside his heart and soul. Gibson even personally provided, according to composer John Debney, the despairing wail that accompanies Judas' suicide. When the director writes in the introduction to the film's coffee-table book that he wanted his work "to be a testament to the infinite love of Jesus the Christ," there is no reason to doubt him. Which makes it even sadder that "The Passion of the Christ" does not play that way.

None of the film's problems, however, is immediately visible when its story of the last 12 hours of Christ's earthly life begins with a mobile camera gliding through the fog-shrouded Garden of Gethsemane and finding Jesus in agonized prayer while an insidious Satan (actress Rosalinda Celentano with shaved eyebrows and a dubbed male voice) looks on.

The filmmaking here is conventionally imagined but, like Debney's score, energetic and propulsive. Gibson has directed twice before, including the Oscar-winning "Braveheart," and he knows how to get the effects he wants. He's made a good choice in using Caviezel as his star: The actor, himself a devout Catholic, brings an involving gaze and a convincing presence to the role. And the filming in Aramaic and Latin was an inspired notion that gives the proceedings a reality and believability (though some experts feel Greek would have been spoken) they might not otherwise have.

The first hint of trouble is in a brief flashback to Caiphas, the Jewish High Priest (Mattia Sbragia) arrogantly tossing a purse containing the legendary 30 pieces of silver to Judas (Luca Lionello) in such a way that they fall and humiliate the traitor.

In the iconography of the passion, Judas is one of the great villains, and he's usually portrayed in Western art as well as previous films as the most wretched of creatures. Yet in this scene he is treated with more dignity and sympathy than Caiphas, who gives a first impression of smug and unctuous arrogance that the rest of "The Passion" only reinforces.

And we do see a great deal of the richly dressed, obviously well-fed Caiphas the rest of the way. In addition to paying Judas, this powerful Jew is the one who sends armed men to arrest Jesus, manipulates his trial before the Sanhedrin and stage-manages his appearance before Pontius Pilate (Hristo Naumov Shopov).

The Roman governor, nominally in charge, is portrayed as a study in impotent agony, reluctant to hand over Jesus but powerless before the strength of the Jewish mastermind's manipulations. He gives up Jesus to be first tortured and then crucified after a huge crowd of Jews, which earlier had taunted and spit on the man, screams over and over for his head.

What are we to make of this front-and-centering of the Jews in Jesus' plight? In dramatic terms, Gibson and co-screenwriter Benedict Fitzgerald likely decided a great hero needed an equally powerful and well-defined antagonist to enhance the story, so why not Caiphas? As Paul Lauer, marketing director for Icon, Gibson's production company, told the New York Times, "You can't get away from the fact that there are some Jews who wanted this guy dead."

Making this choice easier for Gibson is that traditionalism, the schismatic Catholic offshoot to which he belongs, believes in the literal truth of the Gospels.

Its followers believe that apostles were on the scene and simply wrote down everything they saw. This includes Matthew 27:25, the passage where the Jews say, "His blood be on us, and on our children." As Gibson, who filmed that scene but ultimately cut it, told the New Yorker's Peter J. Boyer, "It happened; it was said." Most biblical scholarship, however, suggests otherwise, considering that the Gospels, written at a time when it was politic to make nice to the Romans by minimizing their involvement in Christ's death, were not eyewitness accounts but products of a particular time and place.

The filmmakers feel too much is being made of all this. They quite sincerely believe, as Caviezel told Newsweek, "We're all culpable in the death of Christ. My sins put him up there. Yours did. That's what this story is about." Plus they point to the small moments in the film where Jews are shown in a favorable light, including a disconcerting use of recognizable lines from the Passover Seder in a scene between Mary (Maia Morgenstern) and Mary Magdalene (Monica Belluci).

But, unfortunately, what is on the screen contradicts what is in the filmmakers' hearts. Those brief moments aside, it would be impossible for any disinterested viewer (if one could be found) to escape the fact that "The Passion" does not just mention in passing but is centered dramatically on the culpability of the Jews. This notion, sometimes called blood libel or blood guilt, has led to untold suffering and death over hundreds and hundreds of years, should have given someone, even a believer, pause.

As for the film's violence, it too starts early and stays late. Jesus is badly beaten and humiliated, dangled over a bridge by the chains he's bound in, before he's even brought before Caiphas. He's accused of blasphemy and black magic and then shunted back and forth between Pilate and King Herod, neither of whom, absent the persistence of the Jewish elite, would have the stomach to pass any kind of judgment.

Finally, in desperation, Pilate orders Jesus flogged by Roman soldiers.

This is no ordinary movie flogging. This is an unspeakably savage, unrelenting real-time beating, first with a cane, then with an especially barbarous instrument the press material identifies as "a flagrum, or 'the cat o' nine tails,' a whip designed with multiple straps and embedded with barbed metal tips to catch and shred the skin and cause considerable blood loss." All of which is shown in a kind of horrific detail that would be unthinkable in a film that could not claim the kind of religious connection this one does.

When this torture, gruesome enough to disgust even the hardened Romans, is done, the Jews, to Pilate's evident disbelief, are still not satisfied, even insisting that the subhuman murderer Barabbas be released and Jesus, soon to be fitted with a graphically embedded crown of thorns, crucified. Which is what happens, but not all at once.

For "The Passion of the Christ" spends a considerable amount of time on meticulously detailing the agonies of the road to Calvary as well as the tortures of the actual Roman crucifixion, including unblinkingly graphic close-ups of the actual nailing and a shot of a bird pecking out the eye of one of the thieves crucified alongside Jesus. These sequences, shot during an Italian winter, were so intense they nearly did Caviezel in, causing a lung infection and severe hypothermia, all on top of the blistering, shoulder dislocation and actual wounding he experienced during the whipping sequence.

The filmmakers insist that this violence is essential because it is an accurate depiction of what a crucifixion was like (they refer to a Journal of the American Medical Assn. article called "On the Physical Death of Jesus Christ") and because it makes real the extent of the sacrifice Jesus made for humanity. But there's more to the story.

For one thing, close readers of the film have said that some of the tortures are added on: There is no scriptural source for the cross falling over so that Jesus falls on his face. If ever there was a film that wasn't crying out for more violence, this is it.

It's also important to point out what film critics have noticed for years: As an actor, Gibson has always had a taste for playing heroes who are physically martyred and put through the tortures of hell. His William Wallace is disemboweled in "Braveheart," the characters he plays in both "Payback" and "Ransom" are savagely beaten and his "Lethal Weapon" hero is nearly electrocuted. The violence in "Passion" is stomach-turning in part because that's the way Gibson likes it. In fact, he likes it worse. When asked by a friendly questioner during an outreach screening if he could have toned the film down, the director replied, "Dude, I did tone it down."

The problem with "The Passion's" violence is not merely how difficult it is to take, it's that its sadistic intensity obliterates everything else about the film. Worse than that, it fosters a one-dimensional view of Jesus, reducing his entire life and world-transforming teachings to his sufferings, to the notion that he was exclusively someone who was willing to absorb unspeakable punishment for our sins.

Despite brief flashbacks that nod to Jesus' other words and thoughts, no hypothetical viewer coming to this film absent any knowledge of Christianity would believe that this is the story that gave birth to one of the great transformative religions as well as countless works of timeless beauty.

And without belief, this film does not add up. Without training in or exposure to Christianity, you are likely to feel as flummoxed by what you're seeing as Western missionaries did when they observed pagan rituals to which they lacked any emotional connection.

Ash Wednesday, "The Passion's" official opening, is a day of penance, a day when, according to the Columbia Encyclopedia, "ashes are placed on the foreheads of the faithful to remind them of death, of the sorrow they should feel for their sins, and of the necessity of changing their lives." At a moment when different systems of religious belief are causing tremendous violence and conflict, perhaps it's also a day to reflect on something else: that a film intended to inspire and invigorate those who believe they are the exclusive possessors of the truth about God is perhaps not the best way to make the world a more humane, a more livable, a more peaceful place.


'The Passion of the Christ'

MPAA rating: R, for scenes of graphic violence.

Times guidelines: An unrelenting, unprecedented display of realistic violence.

James Caviezel...Jesus

Maia Morgenstern...Mary

Monica Bellucci...Mary Magdalene

Mattia Sbragia...Caiphas

Hristo Naumov Shopov...Pilate

An Icon Productions presentation in association with Newmarket Films. Director Mel Gibson. Producers Mel Gibson, Bruce Davey, Stephen McEveety. Executive producer Enzo Sisti. Screenplay Benedict Fitzgerald, Mel Gibson. Cinematographer Caleb Deschanel. Production designer Francesco Frigeri. Set decorator Carlo Gervasi. Editor John Wright. Music John Debney. Special makeup and visual effects Keith Vanderlaan. Running time 2 hours, 6 minutes. In general release.

[Xenobia]

What no one seems to be picking up on, and this disturbs me a bit, is that Satan is played by a woman...and she is obviously a woman.

It seems like everyone but those who fit the Gibson hero-type take a beating in this film.

Again, I add the caveat that I have only seen still shots and snippets. I will go see it, but I must confess, I am predeposed to not liking it.

-- Xenobia

[Jaelle]

BTW, one more thing: that line that Gibson cut out (under pressure) is still present in the movie. It's just not translated in subtitles.

Remember that this movie is going to other countries, including the Middle East where some people know Aramaic. The film emphasizes the total corruption and cruelty of the Jewish priests and the Jewish mob. Stop and think for a moment the consequences of such a film in today's international climate, and in that region of the world.

[Xenobia]

I don't want to think about it J. That's what scares me most of all.

Guilt is a powerful thing, and if Gibson wants public pennance, let him do it as the LA Times reviewer suggests...in films like Braveheart and Ransom.

-- Xen

[Sensualist]

I just saw the movie. I think it's fantastic. Surreal. Engaging. Gripping. (And it's the first 'foriegn language' film i've seen at the theatre ever!)

Jaelle, you've obviously not only rejected the idea of seeing this movie but also rejected the teachings of Jesus Christ in favour of some high intellectual dabblings bordering on ethiesm (sp.).

Fine and dandy.

Your two main arguments against watching the movie (from what I can gather by your writings) are:

1...It's too violent to the point of all encompasing violence. Since you have not seen the film, I find it rather laughable!

Having just seen the film, there is a lot of LOVE, TENDERNESS and FORGIVENESS in this movie. There is ART in this movie. There are interesting/slightly different MUSICAL CUES in the score. The violence at least has a point to it unlike most 'Hollywood' entries today. Etcetera, etcetera....

2...Mel Gibson is not a fan of Vatican II. And, as a result, that simply rubs YOU the wrong way. Get over it. We're talking about a movie, not about your support of Vatican II. Ever thought of separating your prejudices againt Mel/his dad and watching the movie as a stand alone piece of movie-making? As I said, fine and dandy. Each to their own.

Finally, we live in a world where there are a lot of IGNORANT people who do the OPPOSITE of what Jesus told us to do to one another (in the name of 'religion', no less!) Your condemnation of a movie you've yet to see, is, in itself, an act of ignorance.

-------------

Further thoughts:

(Satan is played by a woman, but it was not readily appearent unless you KNEW the cast list before hand. Satan came across as asexual.)

Jaelle, don't cloud your thinking based on extraneous factors. In fact, Jaelle, i'm a bit dissapointed in you for pontificating on a movie you've already made up your mind about and have not seen. And all those history lessons. For what? To cloud other CBn-ers judgments so that they erroneously sympathise with your world view on a subject that very few of us on this planet have ANY truthful understanding?

As I said at the top, I saw lots of moments of tenderness, kindness, love, 'humanity' and forgiveness during the narrative proper, as well as the flash-backs of Jesus and the others that are intertwined with-in.

Both the Jews as well as the Romans were treated even-handidly. A matter-of-factly.

On Mel Gibson: If it took Mel Gibson's passion, vision, balls/risk-capital and marketing gimickry to get my backside in the seat at the theatre today, so be it. (And, further, if it took an act of 'Hollywood' to get me to take a closer look at my faith for the umpteenth time, then so be it as well.)

In the end this is a James Bond site. I do, however, take exception to comments made about Christianity by those who've rejected it for all the wrong reasons when the overiding and central message remains clear and eternal: LOVE YOUR FELLOW HUMAN. PERIOD.

Edited by Sensualist, 27 February 2004 - 02:57 AM.

[TGO]

For once, I mostly agree with you, Sensualist. But, I can understand why people have disassociated themselves with religion. It seems to be a very powerful tool of manipulation, and people are beginning not to like that.

That said, I'm probably going to see it on the weekend.

[Sensualist]

For once, I mostly agree with you, Sensualist. But, I can understand why people have disassociated themselves with religion. It seems to be a very powerful tool of manipulation, and people are beginning not to like that.

That said, I'm probably going to see it on the weekend.

Unfortunately, TGO, most organizied religions around the world do not PRACTICE what Jesus Christ TAUGHT.

In addition, I find the so-called critics' reviews of this movie completely one-sided. They failed to see/chose to ignore the elements sans the violent bits.

In fact, the violence wasn't disturbing in the least. The only elements that were disturbing (to me) were those involving demonic depictions.

What all the writers who choose to crucify Mel Gibson and his movie have ignored are the elements of forgiveness and love that's inherent through-out the flick.

In addition, Gibson took a huge RISK to bring this project together. He didn't even have a top ten distributor. Now he's going to COIN IT BIG. Good for him! The movie's opening world-wide with un-precedented pub and ALL on the Antepodean's shoulders.

God bless 'em! I recon it totally shatters the box office for an R-rated flick not released by a mighty distributor in the wed-sun frame!

My admiration for the chain-smoking maniac has gone through the bloody roof!

And, down with all those semi-geopoliticizing/quasi-theologizing cinema critics. Their work is best taken with a huge grain of salt.

Make up your own mind instead of reading other peoples' opinions...Looks like some CBn-ers have taken to cutting-and-pasting other peoples work, peppering it with histrionics and endless intellectual mumbo-jumbo in order to MASK their lack of wanting to see what the fuss is about themselves.

Shame, really.

Edited by Sensualist, 27 February 2004 - 03:22 AM.

[License To Kill]

I'm really excited to see this film.

[Sensualist]

I'm really excited to see this film.

And, i'm excited about going to see it AGAIN!

(Mind, it is the only movie for which I did not buy popcorn* and candy! A tradition begun and, I suppose, ended by this unique piece of film-making)

*Well, it really and truly isn't a popcorn and candy sort of flick! Unlike Bond of course...

Note on The Passion's Bondian Connections:

Mel Gibson was offered the part of 007 but he only wanted to do a one picture deal. The beautiful Monica Bellucci is in this film and is definitely Bond Girl material!!!

Edited by Sensualist, 27 February 2004 - 05:59 AM.

[Xenobia]

I just watched Mel Gibson on "The Tonight Show" with Jay Leno, and unfortunately, it became clear to me that Mel Gibson's heart was in the right place, but when he edited the film, his hands were not.

Gibson said something to the effect of his film being about love and tolerance or tolerance and forgiveness, since that is what Christ was about. He's half right, that is what Christ is about, (IMHO). Christ is all about love, and love leads to forgiveness because love can triumph over pain, which hate is.

However, if you fail to show the extent of Christ's act you are missing the point. Christains believe to be that He suffered and died for our sins, which Mel covers quite well, but that is not the end of the story. Christ then rose from the dead and again, as Christains believe, was ascended into Heaven, body and soul in one piece. Christ's love for us lead him to trimuph over sin and even over death. That is true act of Love -- that it truly does conquer all.

I also saw, for the first time, the scene at Gethsemene with the Devil. Of course everyone is entitled to their opinion, but to me it was clear, even in disguise that Satan was a woman; she looked like one and she sounded like one, and that's not fair. Satan has always been portrayed as MALE fallen angel. Making him a her is just -- bizarre.

And speaking of bizarre, that's what trying to equate The Passion of the Christ to Kill Bill is -- bizarre. Yes, KB may be more violent than Gibson's film, but Tarentino wasn't setting out to make The Passion of the Bride. They are two completely different films, made for two (I hope) completely different reasons. Yes, the torture and crucifixion of Christ was brutal, and that violent, but he didn't need to linger on the images the way that he does. And again, the morale of Christ's life wasn't His death, but His triumph over it!

I appreciate what Mel Gibson tried to do, but I can't help but feel sorry for him. He truly did miss the point of Christ's life.

-- Xenobia

PS: If anyone cares to read it, I attached in MS word form my blog entry on this matter.

Attached Files

•  Passion_of_my_faith.doc   25KB   8 downloads

[Monique]

He missed the point of Christ's life??????? I cannot believe some of your comments Xenobia! Mel should want public penance??? He feels guilt about things he has done??? Tell me, what has he done??? That is so presumptuous, especially since you haven't even seen the movie. I have seen it, and I assure you, he "gets" it. As Sensualist pointed out it was an intense, thought provoking piece of art, and it shouldn't be yet another reason for people to bash or distance themselves from religion. I have some major issues with my Catholic faith, but for once this movie made me sort of forget the man made laws and focus on what really was the reason he died for us. The violence was excruciating and very difficult to watch, and I am extremeley squeamish when it comes to bloody scenes. But I figured if he truly went through all of that, the least we could do is sit in a comfortable movie theater and be aware of his suffering for an hour.

And Jaelle, yes Gibson does make it clear that there were Jews that risked their own lives defending this senseless act, And Jesus was fully aware of those that stood up for him. There are so many scenes that are just so moving, especially the ones with Mary.

In regards to the devil being female, at first I thought it was a man..it is a bald character, and there is nothing feminine about her. My best guess is that he tried to make it a unisex sort of symbol as sin is not unique to just man.

At the end of the day, love it, hate it, dispute it, see it, don't see it, fear it, or denounce it, but don't fault Gibson having the guts to express his vision.

[Sensualist]

I'm amazed that fine, intelligent CBn-ers are showing their lack of good judgement by openly coming here on these forums and criticising a film they have NOT seen. How dumb is that?

It's akin to bashing Thunderball or Moonraker or Die Another Day without having sat through a viewing of it!

Finally, with all due respect Xenobia, WHY should I read your "blog entry" when you haven't even SEEN the movie yet?

WHY?

I'd rather go see The Passion again, and very soon, before reading anything written on the subject. (Btw, The Passion is called 'The Passion' simply because THAT's what the movie is ABOUT. (It's not about The Ressurection.))

Edited by Sensualist, 27 February 2004 - 10:49 AM.

[Sensualist]

One wonders that those in this thread that have been critical of the film/Mel Gibson ad nauseum BUT have yet to actually see the film merely ought to just deleat their posts...

[Loomis]

...Mel Gibson is not a fan of Vatican II. And, as a result, that simply rubs YOU the wrong way. Get over it. We're talking about a movie, not about your support of Vatican II. Ever thought of separating your prejudices againt Mel/his dad and watching the movie as a stand alone piece of movie-making?

Exactly. I appreciate the filmmaking brilliance of Eisenstein and Riefenstahl, yet I am neither a Communist nor a Nazi. Let's review the film THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST, shall we, rather than what we perceive Gibson's religious beliefs to be? And let's not make Gibson (who is not, so far as I am aware, setting himself up as a religious authority or a cult figure)/TPOTC carry the can for all the past and present crimes of the Catholic church.

I am not, and have never been, a Catholic; and neither am I religious. Still, I'm looking forward to seeing THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST, but only because I'm led to believe it's an enormously accomplished piece of cinema. Until I have viewed it, I shall reserve judgement.

That said, I find it hard to believe that many of the commentators attacking Gibson would be so harsh on a religious film by an Orthodox Jewish filmmaker, or a conservative Islamic director. Why is Christianity in general, and Catholicism in particular, seemingly always fair game for mockery?

Also, most of the criticisms I've read against Gibson/TPOTC seem horribly facile:

- Gibson is said to be a right-leaning Christian with a strong and narrow moral outlook. He may therefore be assumed to be a bigot, a Holocaust denier and an all-round hater, and may be lampooned and lumped in with the likes of Jerry Falwell. (Can you imagine how grossly insensitive and unfair it would be to, on the basis of SCHINDLER'S LIST, accuse Steven Spielberg of being cut from the same cloth as Meir Kahane and Baruch Goldstein?)

- Gibson financed the film. It is therefore just a shallow "vanity project".

- Some of the historical details are inaccurate (which is unsurprising, really). Therefore the film has no value.

- The film dwells on Christ's suffering. It thus distorts his life and message. (Well, when did Gibson claim he was going to show The Whole Truth about Christ and Christianity? No film or other work of art can ever show more than a partial picture of anything. One might as well slam SCHINDLER'S LIST for failing to do full justice to the Holocaust.) Gibson is therefore a martyrdom-obsessed masochist on a "poor me" kick.

- The film is antisemitic because a number of people, Jews and non-Jews, have said so, and no one will dare to disagree with them. (Safer to let an accusation of racism pass and be grateful you're not the one on the receiving end of it than to challenge it and risk being tarred with the same brush.)

A couple of questions:

Xen, so what if the Devil is portrayed by a woman in the film? Hardly a first (and, while we're on the subject of firsts, Gibson's not exactly the first person in history to suggest Jewish involvement in the death of Christ). Besides (as I think someone's mentioned on this thread), Gibson's Satan is intended as an androgynous figure.

Jaelle, do you really feel that THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST may lead to violence against Jews in the Middle East? I mean, it's not as though the haters out there need any lessons or encouragement in their hatred.