Medved on Zahn tonight debating the Passion with Tom Shales

Medved was great; Shales pathetic.

Did I even need to ask? Can you telepathically send me the show?

It was pretty good. Michael Medved put Shales in his place but good.

Shales at one point brought up Mel Gibson's father and said he was anti-semitic. Michael told him that how would he like it if someone said something about his father, brother, etc. Shales lost it and told him to shut up. The anchor had to step in. Paula Zahn wasn't there.

Medved was terrific. Shales terrible. Shales was so very nasty too. What's up w/all the venom coming from the "other" side? I left the Passion feeling an even deeper love for Jesus . Love! How are these "other" people come out angry and foaming? Why is that?

I think that CNN posts the transcripts of some of its shows. Check their site tomorrow. Hopefully, Medved will replay a few clips on his show tomorrow. Unfortunately he will be on at the same time as Hannity's interview of Gibson.

It is because you follow Christ. They follow someone else.

Shales lost it and told him to shut up

Excellent! I love it when the leftists get redfaced and go beserk. Medved's so cool and calm--he knows how to push them over the edge. Although, Tom Shales doesn't look/sound like it would take much.

Thanks for the heads up about the interview on Hannity's radio program. We only get the second and third hour of Medved when it's airing live and then they replay the whole three hours in the evening. Maybe I can catch it in the P.M.

I left the theatre with a very hopeful feeling. Hope for me, hope for everyone. I haven't seen any roaming packs of Christians looking to whoop some butt. But the leftists are so very, very angry. Almost in a slobbering, rabid frenzy. George Bush's presidency was almost enough to do them in but not quite--now Mel's film is finishing them off.

Shales is a bloated, self-important, pasty-faced idiot. I'm really disappointed I missed his implosion...maybe I'll have to burn the midnight oil and catch the repeat.

CNN.com transcript:

Joining us now from Seattle is movie critic and nationally syndicated talk show host Michael Medved.

Michael, thanks for being here.

MICHAEL MEDVED, FILM CRITIC: My pleasure, Heidi.

COLLINS: And from Washington, Pulitzer Prize-winning critic Tom Shales of "The Washington Post," who's has had strong words to say against "The Passion."

Tom, thanks also for being here.

Michael, I want to begin with you, if I could. I'm wondering, will the enormous success that this movie has enjoyed so far open the floodgates, if you will, in Hollywood for religious films?

MEDVED: I think it will, because this is not just the discovery of a new formula. It's the discovery of a new audience.

About a third of Americans don't regularly go to movies. Many of those people are precisely the kind of people who do regularly go to church. Any given week, about four times as many people go to church or synagogue as go out to wait in line at a multiplex. And I think that what this shows is that, if you can reach those people and appeal to them, not with some kind of weird, strange project, but with a project that is perceived as part of the religious mainstream in the United States, which is Judeo-Christian, then people will come.

COLLINS: Tom, I've got to ask you about the comment that you wrote in one of your recent columns.

You say -- quote -- "Surely, his" -- and, of course, we're talking about Mel Gibson's -- "parking space in hell has already been reserved."

A bit over the top, isn't it, Tom?

(LAUGHTER)

TOM SHALES, FILM CRITIC, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Well, it's a little extreme, but so is his movie. It's way over the top.

And there's a little facetiousness in what I said. But I don't think he's done a fine, noble thing here. I think he should have -- when he set out to make his movie, I think he should have done everything possible to avoid reopening that old wound between Christians and Jews about who killed Christ. If there's anything we don't need now, it's religious animosity in this country, religious groups at odds with one another. And he was so arrogant about it. He wouldn't let Jewish leaders see the film. He wouldn't do anything to compromise, except a few tiny, tiny changes in the picture itself.

COLLINS: Tom -- Tom...

SHALES: So I don't think...

COLLINS: ... the movie has been out for...

(CROSSTALK)

MEDVED: If I can jump in? Look, the truth of the matter is, that's why he funded it himself, and I think that's exactly what people are going to imitate. Mel Gibson wanted to make his movie his way, an uncompromising vision of the way that he saw the Gospel story. Millions upon millions...

SHALES: But anti-Semitism is not a...

MEDVED: ... of Americans have responded to it. Yes, but there is no evidence at all -- this movie has now been seen by about 20 percent of all Americans, and the evidence that it's generating any kind of significant anti-Semitism -- I actually think that some of the hysterical denunciations of Gibson have generated far more anti- Semitism than anything that exists inside the movie.

SHALES: Some of the support of Gibson has been hysterical too, Michael, so don't oversimplify and make the people opposed to the movie sound ridiculous. They're not ridiculous. They're very sincere and they're very worried. MEDVED: Well, there were people who condemned it before they even saw a single frame of the movie.

SHALES: He wouldn't let them see it!

MEDVED: This movie was -- no, this movie was condemned, Tom Shales, as you very well know, while it was still being shot. People made a case over it because Mel happens to be a traditionalist Catholic who insisted on making the movie his way.

(CROSSTALK)

SHALES: His father is an anti-Semitic bigot.

MEDVED: Isn't that guilt by association? Isn't that sickening, Tom Shales? It's almost as sickening...

SHALES: Oh, yes!

MEDVED: ... as saying that Mel Gibson is going to go to hell.

COLLINS: Gentlemen, let me jump in here for a minute, if I could.

MEDVED: I'm not going to -- I'm not going to attack you by bringing up...

COLLINS: Michael -- Michael...

MEDVED: ... anything about your father or brother or cousin!

COLLINS: Michael, let me jump in...

SHALES: Shut up!

COLLINS: OK, gentlemen, we'd like to keep the discussion, as I say, as gentlemen, if we could, please. And Tom, let me just ask you, if you can take a moment and tell us exactly what it is in the movie -- you talk very much about anti-Semitism. What is it exactly in the movie that you see -- I've seen the movie myself -- that points toward that to you so openly?

SHALES: It's the whole way the Jews are portrayed and the Romans are given a kind of a "get out of jail free" card. And instead of Pontius Pilate being responsible, they make the evil Jewish priests responsible for the death of Christ. Why in the world go to that extreme now? We have enough disharmony in this country. For years, biblical epics were made, and they went out of their way to avoid that kind of ridiculous oversimplification. So now are we going to have a presentation of "Oliver Twist" with Shylock as a Jewish caricature again?

MEDVED: Fagan, you mean. Fagan.

SHALES: Would that be within Mel Gibson's right to do because that's his point of view? That's his personal belief? MEDVED: Well, first -- first of all...

SHALES: We don't need any of that. Yes, Mike?

MEDVED: Well, I'm sorry. First of all, if somebody is doing "The Merchant of Venice," which is what you're referring to, with Shylock, of course, he's going to be a Jewish character because...

SHALES: No. I was referring to "Oliver Twist" by Charles Dickens.

MEDVED: Then you're talking about Fagan, and Fagan...

SHALES: I'm sorry.

MEDVED: ... is a Jewish character, and of course, you would expect that he would be treated as a Jewish character, rather than rewriting it. I think it's absolutely absurd and unfair to attack Mel Gibson for his failure to rewrite the Gospels.

And in terms of your idea that the Romans get a "get out of jail free" card, the most brutal characters in the movie are Romans. They are the Roman guards. And when Jesus happens to be carrying the cross up to Calvary and he is helped by Simon of Syrene, it is shown the Romans express anti-Semitism in a very disreputable way against somebody who's been sympathetic to Jesus and who has been helping him and who is not necessarily one of his followers.

It just seems to me that at one point or other, all of the people who have been predicting pogroms in Pittsburgh because of this movie is have to really be quiet, look at what's happened, see that this movie has inspired people, it's touched people deeply. It has uplifted them in terms of their personal faith, and it has created no significant anti-Semitic backlash to merit all of this hysteria by any means at all.

SHALES: You don't know...

COLLINS: Tom, before you begin...

SHALES: You don't know...

COLLINS: ... let me jump in one more time here because we're really running out of time, and I want to make sure we get one more question in, if you will.

SHALES: Well, no one predicted pogroms in Pittsburgh, Heidi. He's being ridiculous.

COLLINS: OK, let's get a question out here, if we could. "The Passion" is poised to take over some of the biggest-grossing movies of all time. What do you think it is that is driving audiences -- Tom, first you, and then we'll get to Michael -- driving them to go and sit down in their seats in that movie theater and watch this movie?

SHALES: Well, Michael would have us believe they're all making, you know, spiritual pilgrimages, but in fact...

COLLINS: What do you believe?

SHALES: In fact, it's the notoriety of the film, I think, as much as anything, that has drawn people to see it. They've heard it's the most violent, bloody, gory -- and it is -- religious film ever made. And then so, Oh, gee, they're kind of curious about that, the way they would be about any film that was rated R for violence. I think that's a factor.

And then, of course, they've got this fabulous publicity machine of every pulpit in the country, perhaps especially Catholic churches, but Protestant churches, too, preachers saying, Go see this film. You know, It will be an uplifting experience.

I don't think we're going to have a flood now of movies -- religious movies. The thing they worship in Hollywood is the dollar, not any particular religion. So that will determine, you know, what movies are made.

COLLINS: Michael?

MEDVED: Well, nice try, Tom. The fact is, you can't...

SHALES: Stop being...

MEDVED: You can't explain people coming back to the movie three and four times, as many people have. Over one third of the people polled by the Gallup poll who saw the film said they have an intention of seeing it again, more than once. And one of the reasons I think...

SHALES: The same with "Lord of the Rings."

MEDVED: ... it will be imitated is other -- other stars -- right. So fine. "Lord of the Rings" is a very successful movie...

COLLINS: Michael, I need you to finish up.

MEDVED: ... but it's not because people hate the movie that they keep coming back to see it again and again. People are touched by it. And this does encourage any other stars who have deep-seated religious beliefs to try to use their own money and make their own movie and do the same kind of thing Mel Gibson did and connecting with that large public that is eager to see more uplifting spiritual fare.

COLLINS: Gentlemen, we are going to have to...

SHALES: Well, I can't wait to see...

COLLINS: ... call it quits right there...

SHALES: ... Ashton Kutcher's spiritual film.

COLLINS: I'm sorry, Tom. Guys, we are out of time. Obviously, this is a discussion that we'll have to continue on another day, as many people across the country continue to form their opinions on this movie. Michael Medved, Tom Shales, thanks so much, gentlemen, for being with us tonight.

"What's up w/all the venom coming from the 'other' side? I left the Passion feeling an even deeper love for Jesus . Love! How are these 'other' people come out angry and foaming? Why is that?"

The Left is fueled by hate. Hate is to the Left what food and water is to the human body. Without hate, the Left would lose its soul and its reason for being.

Thanks so much for posting the transcript! Tom Shales--what a little pig. Michael is giving his "closing argument" and he is still running his mouth. How rude. I notice that Michael didn't interupt him when he was summing up.

If the media had to report on Medved and Shales' debate--they would be talking about how "nasty" Medved turned it.

Thanks so much for posting the transcript also...the lines are being drawn indeed in this country.

The transcripts don't describe how Shales told Medved to "Shut-up". He sounded like a six year old child.

Medved took Shales to the woodshed and gave him a spankin'.

Poor Michael Medved. He will never be a Sean Hannity. Unless of course, he is some how brain damaged.

He sounded like a six year old child

Maybe Medved will play it on his show today. I'm not surprised he had to resort to telling Michael to shut up. You are right--that's what a child uses when they can't defend their point of view. When they know you are telling the truth and can't think of anything else to say. I'm surprised he didn't throw in a few "Whatevers!". Can you imagine Medved ever telling someone to shut up during a debate? We need more debaters on our side like Medved--we've got a lot, but we need more. The left definitely needs people with more smarts like Medved. Of course, if they had that kind of smarts then they wouldn't be on the left.