Posted on 02/18/2004 6:37:16 AM PST by presidio9
Mel Gibson's controversial new movie "The Passion of the Christ" was igniting plenty of passion yesterday - even though opening night was still a week away. First Lady Laura Bush said she was looking forward to watching the R-rated film about the Crucifixion of Christ.
"I think it sounds very interesting, and I'd like to see it," the First Lady told reporters while visiting a high school in Bentonville, Ark.
But lots of others weren't so sure.
Gibson's story of the torture of Christ isn't just brutal, it's an exercise in cinematic sadism that opens on Ash Wednesday (Feb. 25) at 18 theaters across the city and 2,000 more throughout the country.
And that left many New Yorkers interviewed by the Daily News wondering whether the one-time "Lethal Weapon" star took the violence too far in his portrayal of "The Passion of the Christ."
They joined a chorus of other critics who fear the movie unfairly scapegoats Jews and who accuse Gibson of straying from the Gospels.
For many parents - even churchgoing parents who don't quibble with Gibson's interpretation of the Gospels - the violence might be too much for their kids.
"I don't think my children would get it," said Debbie Sparber, 45, of Manhattan, a Christian whose kids are 12 and 9. "They'd misunderstand what they're seeing."
Richard D'Alessandro, 45, a Manhattan-based actor who has appeared on violent shows like "The Sopranos," said there's no way he'll take his 9-year-old, Giancarlo, to the film.
"Violence is violence, no matter what the subject matter," said D'Alessandro, who is a Catholic. "For whatever religious value this film may have, the violence makes it out of the question."
Despite the blood and gore, many religious groups such as the New York-based Catholic League have already prepurchased thousands of tickets - virtually assuring Gibson will recoup the $25 million he sank into making the movie.
That Gibson's "Passion" is expected to do boffo at the box office is all the more remarkable because six months ago he was struggling to find a distributor.
True believers like Jurema Farr, 41, of Sparta, N.J., said Gibson's recounting of Christ's last 12 hours alive is something her three kids need to see - even if it sickens them.
"They need to know and learn about what happened to Jesus Christ," said Farr, her 8-year-old, Ulysees, and 6-year-old, Orion, in tow. "You have to show your kids the truth, even if it's violent."
Dr. Alan Hilfer, a child psychologist at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, disagreed. He said kids that age aren't ready for that kind of graphic violence.
"I have seen some of the clips, and it was pretty gruesome," he said. "This is not cartoon violence."
But Manhattan psychiatrist Wayne Myers said "kids from religious families are already programmed to believe in this, and their parents will explain this as this is our Lord suffering."
In an interview with ABC's Diane Sawyer, Gibson admitted he pumped up the violence because he wanted to push the viewer "over the edge." He said he wanted viewers to feel "the enormity of Christ's sacrifice."
Gibson also denied the movie is anti-Semitic, but has resisted requests by Jewish groups to add a postscript to the movie reminding viewers that it was the Romans, not the Jews, who ultimately crucified Christ.
Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League asked Pope John Paul yesterday to tell his flock that Gibson's controversial movie is not the gospel truth.
"It's Mel Gibson's version of the Gospel, it's Mel's gospel," he said.
Joseph Starrs of American Life League's Crusade for the Defense of our Catholic Church, said Gibson is true to the New Testament.
"This film is many things, but it is not anti-Semitic," he said. "If this film were, then the Gospel itself must be, because it is on this indisputable truth of the Gospels that the movie is based."
I guess the right to hijack threads is one of them there rights "emanating from the Penumbra."
The Roman Empire is unfairly maligned these days. Certainly, the Romans could be harsh masters. However, the life of the average person living in the Roman Empire was head and shoulders better than his contemporaries in the rest of the world.
The best you can say about the Roman Empire is that they did not kill all those who believed in the G-d of Israel.
The best you can say about the Roman Empire is that it brought law, order, peace, prosperity, education, sanitation, medicine, science and civilization to the people under its rule. Roman rule was fairly non-obtrusive- you were free to keep your religion and customs, so long as those customs and religion did not threaten the rule of the Caesars. The dream of a unified, peaceful Europe is something that has been unobtainable since the fall of the Empire.
No one ever claimed that the Romans were nice, democracy-loving people. They were quite different from us- much more cynical, harsh and cruel. That being said, to compare them to Nazis flies in the face of history. There are worse systems to live under than a benevolent empire. In the relevant time period, I challenge you to name a better place for a person to live.
For a slave or a citizen ?
I think you make the case they are to be compared to the Nazis.
That was just the beginning of one man's career, or one man's slaughter, however you want to look at it.
I suppose Gibson's scenes of flogging and crucifixion are nothing compared to what God has in store for me.
True, one of the ways Roman influence spread was by the sword. But Caesar's bloody conquest of Gaul brought it into the Imperial sphere of influence. Consequently, when Rome became officially Christian in the early 4th Century AD, those who actively spread the Gospels were buttressed and shielded by the power and institutions of the Imperial State. Not too many centuries later, the avowedly Christian empire of Charlegmange ruled much of Europe and its heartlands included the by then thoroughly Christianized provinces of Roman Gaul. Look how much trouble the Church of Rome had Christianizing the wilderness areas beyond the Rhine and the Danube where the Roman writ did not run. Although the core Roman provinces were brought into the Empire by the sword, these provinces were Christianized earlier and more fully than the rest of Europe and, in their later incarnations, were responsible for Christianizing much of the world.
To take the Romans to task for prosecuting the early Church is to ignore the reality that the Church ultimately co-opted and replaced the Roman State with its own supra-national instutions. Without an aggressive, expansionist, and occasionally brutal Rome, Christianity might never have escaped out into greater Europe from its ghetto in the Levant. Christianity owes a debt of gratitude to the Romans for wrestling prime territory away from savages in much the same way that the US owes Great Britain for taming North America. To ignore this debt and focus on ancient tensions is to ignore the greater sweep of history in favor of focusing on a parochial grudge.
According to the Bible, G-d specifically commanded the Israelites to make war and destroy certain nations. Surely you don't argue with that in support of Mel's movie.
and Christians of the Crusades, waded deep in the blood of their adversaries.
I see no Biblical mandate for the Crusaders to slaughter Jews and other Christians on their way to surround Jerusalem with armies.
What you seem to be missing is that Roman brutality was a necessary pre-condition for the growth of Christianity throughout Europe.
Yes, I'm missing that. What chapter and verse was that ?
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