The Passion of the Christ
2004
D: Mel Gibson
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Foreshadowing the increasingly anti-Christian attitudes of our society, this movie was a source of controversy for its alleged antisemitism. While those accusations were apparently vindicated by a drunken rant from Mel Gibson, no honest viewing of the film itself could yield that interpretation unless one were to the think the New Testament itself was antisemetic. Sadly, accusations of antisemitism are no longer a necessary pretext. Gibson, after all, has generally done a good job hiding his views when sober, although that may have been a bit forced in one of the Lethal Weapon sequels (Passion also features a villainous Roman soldier contemptuously snarling the word “Jew.”). In truth, the movie is a well-executed and theologically-accurate depiction of the Crucifixion.
To reinforce this controversy, the movie was also dismissed as fetishistic in its ultraviolence, a particularly hypocritical criticism coming from regular consumers of R-Rated movies. In fact, the movie’s violence is pretty tame compared to that of many horror movies. I’m usually not one to find gore tastelessly funny, but I will call out one moment I found unintentionally(?) funny: Jesus’ (Jim Caviezel) scourging ends with Abenader’s (Fabio Sator) walking in on it like, “Wtf is wrong with you idiots, you’re not supposed to kill him,” following immediately by the movie's cuting to a high angle shot of Jesus’ lying on the ground with a ridiculous amount of blood everywhere (another accidental chuckle comes from a slightly cartoonish moment in which Simon of Cyrene (Jarreth Merz) disappears over the horizon at the exact moment Mary (Maia Morgenstern) and Co. appear over it). A nitpick is that Jesus bleeds far more blood in this scene than the human body contains. Then again this could be possible because of His divine power, then gain people might have noticed this, then again maybe lack of modern medical science prevented them from doing so.
The Scourging scene also contains a good depiction of the Banality of Evil with the Roman Officer who oversees it; the only emotion he displays is annoyance when his absurdly sadistic underlings tease him with their implements of torture. Indeed, the Romans are depicted as the evilest people in the movie, with the Sanhedrin’s displaying unease at their brutality and eventually remorse when the Temple is split. One could accuse Gibson of overcompensation.
On the flip side of the ideological spectrum, many found this movie to be a spiritual experience of sorts. As a cradle Catholic, I found this to be a strange reaction; I had always been exposed to images of the Crucifixion, and I simply thought this to be not much more than a relatively well-executed cinematic adaptation of it. Perhaps this is an indictment of many Protestants’ views toward iconography: much of Reformed Christianity touts the experience of being “saved,” and the ban on images could serve to keep Christ’s sacrifice as an abstraction until such an epiphany happens. Ironically to took a Catholic’s exploiting a (silly) loophole in that rule to discredit it.
Mel Gibson, being the skilled filmmaker he is, added some artistic flourishes to his movie, some refreshingly eccentric, not the least of which is when the intentionally androgenous Satan (Rosalinda Celentano) is holding a weird baby-man to mess with Jesus and Mary during the Scourging. At one point Judas (Luca Lionello) and the audience are treated to a disturbing jump scare of a demon. More substantially, he includes many moments that have special Catholic significance, and he deftly combines footage of Jesus' lifting up the Bread during the Last Supper with the lifting of the cross. Commendably, he chose to have the film’s dialogue spoken in Aramaic, Hebrew and Latin, although the Latin is ecclesiastical rather than classical (the “ch” sounds for “c” are a dead giveaway). Fortunately he was made to allow subtitles.
The movie does a good job depicting the humanity of Jesus, especially His relationship with Mary. Jim Caviezel is solid, and the acting overall is good. Pilate’s (Hristo Shopov) struggle is decently handled, and the redeeming faith of his wife (Claudia Gerini) is fleshed out. The movie also stars Monical Bellucci as Mary Magdalene and a score of cast members from the based country of Italy. Cinematographer Caleb Deschanel does a great job with the nighttime scenes in the movie.
