Precisely. I saw the movie. Nobody exited the theater mumbling under their breath, "Those filthy Christ-killers!" Anti-semitism is one of Europe's stains from dark periods of its history. Jews are understandably concerned about anything which might raise the spector of anti-semitism. But this is the 21st Century, for crying out loud, not the 14th! The only ones raising the issue of "anti-semitism" are Jewish leaders. They would do well to give it a rest.
BTW, thanks for posting this article. I LOVE Orson Scott Card!
Sunday, February 29, 2004
And here's the blogspot address:
http://markshea.blogspot.com/2004_02_01_markshea_archive.html#107810244134717345
Justice in the Universe!
posted by Mark Shea at 10:54 PM
The quick assessment: Hands down the finest film ever made about Jesus Christ. Period.
The longer assessment: Let's get a few things out of the way immediately.
First: Thanks, Mel, for having the great courage to make this film. It was a profoundly *manly* thing to do and has given us a portrayal of Jesus that is, in the very best sense of the word, the most masculine Jesus ever committed to celluloid. Interestingly, several men I have talked to have spoken of the film in that way as well. The sense of sheer *warfare* that permeates the film is overwhelming. And it is deeply and profoundly warfare with powers and principalities, not with flesh and blood. Jesus has no enmity to his human adversaries. He prays for them repeatedly. But his hostility to the devil is implacable, utter, and steely. Indeed, if I were the devil, I would quail in terror at what is, for Lucifer, the single most frightening moment in the film: the look of Resolve on the face of the Risen Christ in the final moments of the film. Satan has done his worst. Now it's Time to wrest the entire cosmos away from him.
Second: I cannot speak for Jews because I am not Jewish. So I'm not going to go around telling Jews what they can and cannot feel about the film. If it makes some Jewish people feel upset then they are entitled to their reactions. That's what works of art do: provoke reactions. However, I *can* tell Jewish people and anybody else who will listen what this work of art did to me and to the 30 teens and adults (and the packed theatre) who, well, not "saw" but experienced it on Friday.
It made us pray. It made us feel ashamed of our sins. It made us embrace each other. It made us weep. It took our breath away at times--both because of the depth of human cruelty and the awe of divine love. It made me admire Gibson's theological depth and his artistic vision. We left the theatre in silence and did not at all feel very inclined to find baseball bats with which to smash synagogue windows. Personally, I felt a strong need to go sit before Jesus in the Tabernacle. I thought of the sins I'd confessed and been forgiven of a couple of days before--and what it cost to have those awesome words of absolution given me. I thought how easily I hold grudges and how much I've fallen into the habit of contemptuously dismissing people who hurt me. I thought of how troubling it was to me that the violence did not trouble me more. I came away from it asking God for a compassionate heart. My son and his friends, God bless their beautiful young souls, immediately went away for a retreat and he came back the wonderful laughing boy I've known all these years, yet there was a seriousness in the joy--like a young boy becoming a man. I came away from the film not only with gratitude for the Sacrifice, but with joy over the gift of all those kids.
I did not, and I daresay no Christian did, come away from the film saying, "I want to hit a Jew." The very idea that anybody could come away thinking that is so repulsive, so *alien* to this film that I cannot believe anybody could come away desiring that.
The reason for that is simple: The film is so deeply immersed in the message of the gospel that only a wilful misreading by a Christian could derive a message of hate from it. Indeed, apart from Jesus and Mary, the strongest character--a character so strong he actually threatens to overshadow Jesus as Mercutio threatens to overshadow Romeo--is Simon of Cyrene. In his relatively short time on the screen, he establishes himself as a true hero. And Gibson is careful to identify that hero as Jewish. He is not a believer in Jesus, but he is a deeply humane man (though fearful at first) and he stand up with immense courage to the Roman brute squad (who are the true villains of the film). By the time he has walked the Via Dolorosa with Christ, he is a changed man, but so should be any Catholic anti-semites lingering out in Hooterville. In one of the most moving images in the film (I still well up when I think of it), he and Jesus make the final ascent to Golgotha with their arms linked over the cross.
Are there Jewish villains in the film? Of course. The film is true to the gospels in that it makes clear that the Temple elite and some of the citizenry (though not all) wanted Jesus dead. To get rid of that fact you must get rid of the gospels themselves. But to this Catholic, I was moved far more to think of some of my own bishops and their selfish clinging to power than I was to generalities about The International Jew or some sort of theorizing about racial guilt. Caiaphas acts, not as all Jews act, but as all corrupt men act--particularly when they are clinging to power. As the reviewer for TIME pointed out, calling criticism of the Sanhedrin "anti-semitic" is as dumb as saying "Either you are with the Republican Party or you are with the terrorists." It is possible to fault the ruling class without despising the entire people. Then, as now, there were lots of Jews who defended Jesus--and not all of them were his disciples as both the cinematic Simon of Cyrene and Rabbi Gamaliel in the book of Acts shows.
As is commonly known, Gibson draws on a variety of sources: the NT, the stations of the cross, Emmerich's visions, and his own imagination. Of course, secular viewers have complained about the violence and, particularly, the blood of the film. One particularly desperate writer not only assumes the film is anti-semitic but also tries to cash in on old American Know-Nothing chips and ignite some good old Protestant hatred of the film.
But it's a total non-starter. Evangelicals are wild about the thing, and well they should be. A tiny minority of Fundies complain that it takes liberties with Scripture, but these are indeed a tiny minority. The rest recognize that liberties with Scripture are an old artistic practice. And the liberties are not so much contradictions as they are theological illustrations of obvious Scriptural teachings. So, for instance, Evangelicals know that there is "Power in the Blood". So do Catholics. After all, the blood, the selfsame blood that is splattered all over the scourgers at the Pillar, is the blood that we drink on the altar. We say in earnest, what the mob said in unconscious irony: "May his blood be on us and on our children." I pray that prayer will be granted me and my children all the days of our lives. So do Evangelicals. The main difference is that, as a Catholic, I regard the blood of Christ as being just as physical now (albeit sacramentally) as it was then, while my Evangelical friends have a piety that tends to be wary of encounters with the Incarnation in the here and now. (Though encounters with things like this film may serve to alter that.) And since Gibson is a Catholic, he has no trouble with that identification between the blood on the floor of the guardroom and the blood in the chalice. So we are shown the scene (straight from Emmerich) in which Mary blots up the blood of Christ with towels just as a Catholic would blot the spilled Precious Blood with a purificator. It's all one for Gibson because it's all one for any Catholic who knows his faith.
This link between Catholic teaching and the imagery of the film is brilliantly shown in the way Gibson has edited the film. So for instance, as Jesus gazes up to Mount Calvary, the scene suddenly cuts to the Sermon on the Mount and his admonition to love your enemies. As he is beaten, he falls on his back and can see only the foot of the soldier who is scourging him. The scene then cuts to Jesus washing the feet of his disciples. And as he falls to the ground at Calvary at the very feet of the Jewish rulers who condemn him (and who, by this time, an ignorant Christian may be tempted to blame) Gibson chooses that moment to flashback to Jesus saying, "No one takes my life from me. I have power to lay it down and I have power to take it up again."
The awesome power of this film comes from the connections it makes (at least for me). I literally caught my breath when Gibson cuts to a scene from the Last Supper where the Passover bread is brought to the table, wrapped in cloth. The bread is set at the table and the cloth is taken off, then Gibson cuts back to Jesus being stripped of his garments. The bread is elevated for the consecration at the Last Supper, and Gibson cuts to the elevation of the cross ("If I be lifted up, I shall draw all men to me.") These kinds of juxtapositions occur throughout the film. Probably the most moving one is the scene where Mary is simply paralyzed by fear and cannot follow Jesus any further on the road. He stumbles under his cross. She has a flashback of him falling as a child and her running to comfort him. It somehow gives her the will to run to him again with the same words "I'm here." She is a comfort for him, yet he is somehow the greater comfort for her. His grace has made it possible for her to wrench free of her paralyzing fear. He looks at her and says, "Behold, I make all things new" (words from Revelation that remind us of the cosmic backdrop to this harrowing torment.
I could go on and on, but I won't. Suffice it to say that this film is one of the most theologically informed films I've ever seen. Not a frame of it is left to chance. As to the complaints about blood and gore, I'm afraid that from a Catholic perspective, this only illustrates to me that most people don't, at the end of the day, *really* believe what we say when we talk about the blood of Christ and the agonies of the cross and so forth. In the end, I suspect there is something of the spirit that whispered to Simon Peter on Caesarea Philippi at work: "No, Master! This must never be!" We say that because (we assure ourselves) we don't want this "pornographic violence" (as the suddenly puritanical Andrew Sullivan and similiar critics have clucked). But, in reality, we are upset because we don't want to face that fact that the man who endured this said, "Take up *your* cross and follow me." It's not him we're concerned with. It's saving our own skins--as Peter himself discovered. In our heart of hearts, our response to the message of the cross is, if we are normal, "No. No thanks. Not if it involved that. He can't be serious."
Don't feel too smug about the Sullivans of the world recoiling in horror from that. If you don't recoil, you haven't thought about the implications of the gospel. I *hope* that, should it be necessary, I can someday be willing to endure what the gospel has cost some of our brothers and sisters--and supremely, our Lord. But I don't know if I could. I fervently pray I shall never have to find out.
In the meantime, I remember the counsel of a Father of the Church (Ephraim the Syrian, I think) who said, "Be kind to everyone you meet, for every person is fighting a great battle."
Not just judges, anyone in any position of power can act this way...police officers, pastors, school teachers, professors...
...but his point is well made.
Gibsons effort here in this movie is crystal.
Any ultra famous hollywood directors (and I mean any) must move over. A movie made with sub-titles YET has challenged anything they ever made or thought about making..
Gibsons eye for this craft and intuition for story telling MUST be recognized.. and hopefully this movie is merely openers in this game..
GO MEL.!. BE BOLD and take no prisoners..