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Gibson has made it clear that WANTED his film to be one that would shock, stir the pot, and be controversial. He is the one with an agenda, as he himself states. There are critics I like, like David Denby, who is one of the best, who don't like the film, and there are people I like, like David Horowitz and Liz Trotta, who liked the film very much. I won't berate the critics who disliked it, I'll just see it for myself and make my own decision. I do realize that it might have different meaning for me than for someone of the Christian faith.

Having just had a cup of coffee and read the LA Times, I think I finally understand what the critics who hate "The Passion of the Christ" are really complaining about.

The LA Times ran two lenghty reviews of the movie today, one by Kenny Turan on the front page of the paper and the other by Patrick Goldstein, on the front page of the Calendar section. Both of course hated the film, not only for what they regard as its endless gore and evil portrayal of the Jewish high priest Caiphas, but also because of it's obvious power (Turan said it had the "incendiary potential of "The Birth of a Nation" and Goldstein called it a "movie that matters"). But what really left him in "profound dispair," said Turan, was that the Christians watching it saw it through totally different eyes. Whereas he saw "sadistic violence" and "blame," they saw "transcendence" and "truth."

I think this is the key point. Turan wouldn't be bothered by what he regards as a deeply flawed film if he thought everyone would see the same flaws that he does. But it's clear to him that Christians will see the flaws as virtues. And that's what leaves him in profound despair--as this movie demonstrates, when it comes to some pretty fundamental issues, Jews and Christians are clearly not on the same page.

Regarding what he sees as the film's deeply unfortunate portrayal of Jews, Turan says he believes Gibson didn't intend to give "and and comfort" to anti-Semites (though that's what Turan believes the film will do anyway). Goldstein suggests that Gibson perhaps doesn't really understand his own motives for making this film and Goldstein quotes a remark by Pascal: "the heart has reasons which reason cannot comprehend."

Turan also wrote, "This notion, sometimes called blood libel or blood guilt, has led to untold suffering and death over hundreds and hundreds of years, and should have given someone, even a believer, pause."

My understanding is that the term "blood libel" refers to bogus charges starting around the 12th century that Jews drank the blood of children in secret rituals. "Blood libels" against the Jews, thoroughly reprehensible in their own right, are not about the cruxifiction of Jesus.