SACRIFICE [Professors say Gibson's Apocalypto is biased against Mayan bloodletting]

Newsweek ^ | December 5, 2006 | Newsweek

[Dante3]

I agree about the Patriot - the film would have been better if that one scene with his son had been deleted.

"Apocalypto" however showed much of what I learned about the Mayas in my anthropology class. I closed my eyes during some scenes. Overall, it was an engrossing and exciting film and kept me literally on the edge of the seat.

Very well done, but yes a lot of violence, but not a racist film.

[Dante3]

Exactly.

[CharacterCounts]

Violence was evident in the Passion. However, given the definition of gratuitous (being without apparent reason, cause, or justification), I don't think it was gratuitous at all. It brought about none of the baser emotion. There was no adrenaline flowing - only a profound understanding of the sacrifice Christ made for us.

[Polybius]

The original Aztecs were landless mercenaries brought in to help when a war. After the victory the Aztecs took the daughter of the the king that had employed then and skinned her alive. They then danced in her skin in front of her father. ........... This isn't a real popular topic in most of the classes pushing Hispanic studies.

It's funny how, in the U.S., the name of the ancient Roman province of Hispania has become a euphemism for "Aztec" or "Meso-American Indian" while, in Mexico itself, "Hispano" means those evil Spanish Conquistadors who put an end to the Aztec Empire.

[eleni121]

I went to see it with a world class anthropologist and he thought that while it compressed history by about 700 years...it is a movie after all---it portrayed the people and times very accurately and realistically.

He actually dug in those pyramids down there..so he should know.

I was enthralled by it. Action, adventure, human drama, social and cultural narrative---splendid film!