Gibson's 'Christ' Details Crucifixion Scenes, Reveals Conversions

Newsmax.com ^ | 1/25/04 | Carl Limbacher

[truthandlife]

In his first media interview anywhere about his starring role in Mel Gibson's much-anticipated film "The Passion of Christ," James Caviezel - Gibson's Jesus - detailed on Friday the ordeal of filming the Crucifixion scenes, noting that the overall experience prompted many in the crew to convert to Catholicism.

"I was on the cross about five weeks in 30 degree temperatures," Caviezel told nationally syndicated radio host Sean Hannity.

"It was up on the side of a cliff. It's like going up to the Grand Canyon. When the wind gets going, you're in the center of a twister. The Cross is teetering and I'm looking down on all these people shivering in their jackets and mittens. I'm up there for days - nothing on, my arms tied down."

Caviezel said Gibson did his best to make filming the Cross scenes more comfortable by positioning heaters at his feet out of camera range. But the effort merely resulted in giving him "fried toes," he said.

The frigid temperatures and cooked flesh turned out to be the least of Caviezel's problems.

"During the scourging scenes, there was a board on my back and the Romans would wind up and hit it," he told Hannity. "And this guy hit me square on the back and I had a 14 inch scar on my back and it really knocked the wind out of me."

The physical punishment, however, wasn't as traumatic as the lightning that struck him while he was hanging on the Cross.

"I was lit up like a Christmas tree," the actor told Hannity.

"It felt as if I had two hands slapping my head and all of a sudden I had 200 extras scurrying. I had no idea what happened. All I was seeing was pink and a kind of a fuzzy static in front of my eyes."

Caviezel said that when one of the crew came over to check if he was OK, he was struck by lightning, too.

Asked if he thought the lightning strike was "a sign from God," Caviezel told Hannity, "I think the whole thing has been that way."

Noting "the amount of conversions on the movie," he said the experience of filming Christ's story "really changed people's lives."

Caviezel recalled telling Gibson, "I think it's very important that we have mass every day - at least I need that to play this guy."

"I felt if I was going to play him I needed [the sacrament] in me. So [Gibson] provided that."

At the same time, Caviezel said, Gibson went out of his way to be "very respectful to people like Maya Morgenstern, who's Jewish and whose parent was a Holocaust survivor." Morgenstern plays the Virgin Mary in the film.

He defended "Passion" against charges by critics that the film encourages anti-Semitism, stressing that it offers sympathetic portrayals of Mary, the Apostles and other Jewish figures.

"There's no broad brush applied here to any particular group," he told Hannity. "This film does not play the blame game.

"We are all culpable for the death of Christ," added the film's star. "My sins, your sins put him on that cross."

Caviezel credited Gibson with pulling off the immensely difficult project.

"Working with Mel Gibson was a little bit like waltzing with a hurricane," he told Hannity. "It's always exciting and you're never quite sure where it's going to take you. The guy is kinetically a genius."

[truthandlife]

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[truthandlife]

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[Vets_Husband_and_Wife]

Wonderful article! Thanks and Bump!!

[in the Arena]

bttt...

[apackof2]

Bump

[PFKEY]

"I think it's very important that we have mass every day - at least I need that to play this guy."

"I felt if I was going to play him I needed [the sacrament] in me. So [Gibson] provided that."

This guy?

Needed a sacrament?

Sounds like conversion to me.

This guy has not done Mel any favors.

[.45MAN]

been there done that....

[Northern Yankee]

This guy has not done Mel any favors.

Not so!

Jim Caveziel has done an outstanding job with this role as Jesus. You have to listen to his interview with Sean on Friday to hear how committed he was in doing the role of Jesus correctly.

You will not be disappointed.

God Bless!

[Dataman]

More on the Passion.

[BibChr]

Caviezel recalled telling Gibson, "I think it's very important that we have mass every day - at least I need that to play this guy."

Ugh. Br-r-r-r-r.

Dan
Biblical Christianity web site

[bluebunny]

I am so excited about this film. I have done alot of reading on Caviezel. While I'm not Catholic, he has a beautiful spirit about him and deep faith. I can't decide if I like Mel or Jim better. LOL! Ain't he handsome, ladies:



If there was only more beautiful, faiful men like Mel and Jim, the world would be a much better place.

[bluebunny]

I don't think he meant it like that at all.

[LS]

This is the main thing that may keep me from seeing this movie: the torture scene in Braveheart was almost unwatchable. While I love the rest of that movie, to this day I have not purchased it because I cannot watch that scene. I cannot imagine the realism that Gibson brings to the crucifixion scene, and simply don't know that I can stomach it.

[BibChr]

< shrug > I only have his words.

Dan

[BlackElk]

C'mon, Dan, you know you love the Book. Wait until you see the movie!

[BibChr]

I am looking forward to it. Cautiously, but nonetheless.

(c8

Dan

[philosofy123]

The sacrament for you infidel is the actual blood, and flesh of Jesus! Get lost!

[philosofy123]

If you cannot stomach the torture, pleas purchase a couple of tickets and give them away to somebody who care. We should all buy tickets to make this movies the highest earning movie in the history of this planet.

[LS]

Have you seen this?