Or: Here are Sean’s uninformed opinions on a movie he hasn’t even seen yet, which I guess hasn’t stopped anyone else, so here we go
What to make of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ? Well, for starters, I’m not buying that it’s anti-Semitic. I’m just not. In their collective rave for the film, both Roger Ebert & Richard Roeper, not exactly bagmen for the right wing, said it wasn’t anti-Semitic at all; ditto for the God Squad, Father Tom Hartman and Rabbi Marc Gelman. That pretty much settles the argument for me, because it would appear that at this point the only people taking offense are professional offense-takers. Hell, on Keith Olberman’s show the other day, Roeper said it actually could be considered more anti-Italian than anti-Semitic. As you might have noticed, I gun for anti-Semitism with as much gusto as anyone around, but if it’s not obvious to two film critics and two religious pundits, I don’t think it’s there.
I think films about Jesus, paradoxically, bring out the worst in people. During the pre-release furor, when people like Frank Rich were lambasting the film without even having seen it (though, to be fair, he wasn’t invited to do so), I couldn’t help be reminded about the similar uproar over Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ. How many of the quote Christians unquote who boycotted that movie had any clue what they were actually boycotting? I think that film is one of the most deeply felt and devout Christian statements ever committed to celluloid, and when I hear people say otherwise, I’ve got to wonder what film they saw, or what kind of closed-minded zealotry they saw it with. It seems to me profoundly unfair to prejudge Gibson’s film as being too orthodox, in the same way that it was profoundly unfair to prejudge Scorsese’s for being too unorthodox.
I am not a Christian, but I greatly admire the life and teachings of Jesus, and I think it is important to tell his story. His death, quite simply, is an important part of that story, one that I think most comfy-cozy condemnatory Christians ignore. (For whatever reason, the answer to the religious right’s question “What Would Jesus Do?” rarely seems to be “throw all your money away, dedicate your life to helping every hated lowlife in your area, be rejected and hated by your hometown, undermine the religious and governmental authorities, get arrested, convicted in a kangaroo court, and tortured to death.” Go figure.) This also ties into my appreciation for over-the-top violence in film, and the way the spectacle of seriously hard-core bodily trauma cuts through various layers of distanciation to reveal horrifying truths about the world and the human condition. I can’t think of a more appropriate venue for such spectacle than Jesus’ crucifixion, which essentially served the same purpose.
Okay, those were the pros.
On the con side, Gibson himself strikes me as a fundamentalist whack-job, a person to whom our current Catholic Church is irredeemably liberal (!) and our current Pope is a namby-pamby pinko (God help us!). His refusal to repudiate his scumbag Holocaust-denying father’s grotesque anti-Semitism is offensive. (Listen, I love my Dad too and always will, but if he started saying Auschwitz was a hoax while I was trying to make a movie about a man who died out of love for his fellow man, you bet your ass I’d call bullshit on him.) Of course, Gibson also has made a string of troubling statements about homosexuals, and I’m no fan of that either. Actually, I’m surprised that no one’s pointed out how Gibson chose to make Satan an androgyne, which seems in keeping with his feelings about gays. I also think it’s no coincidence that our commander in chief chose the week this film was released to expand the War on Terror to American gays–I’m sure he figures his whole religious base will have a hard-on for infidels the second they leave the theatre.
Which leads me to some deeper problems not just with the movie, but with the Christian story. I’ve long been disturbed by the emphasis Christianity has placed on the crucifixion. It strikes me as borderline death-worship, simultaneously a celestial stamp of approval for human suffering and a divine invitation to seek revenge for this act. Like Christopher Hitchens and Patti Smith, I’m also horrified at the notion that a man I’ve never met (how could I? he lived 2,000 years ago) was the victim of a human sacrifice on my behalf. I did not ask for this to happen, nor would I if it were an option to me. I’d say “Jesus died for somebody’s sins, but not mine,” but the thing is I don’t believe in sin, either. I believe in doing right and doing wrong, and God knows I’ve done a lot of the latter, but that’s up to me to make right. I would have preferred that this wonderful, loving, caring, fun-loving (yeah, that’s right!), passionate, peaceful, moral, beautiful man of Nazareth lived a full, long life then to die in torment and ignominy for what I’m constantly told are my own wrongdoings. Their my wrongdoings. Please, God, let me atone for them.
Basically, I think a much better symbol than the cross would have been the empty tomb, the stone rolled away. Isn’t the point of Christianity not just that Christ died, but that Christ conquered death? Why is the joy of this essentially ignored in favor of the human sacrifice? I know you can’t have one without the other, but doesn’t it make more sense to focus on the end, rather than the means?
Anyway, those are my thoughts about the film. I would like to see it sometime, but I know the violence will probably keep the Missus away–the violence and the fact that her Christianity is a deeply personal affair, and she’s uncomfortable with communal expressions thereof. We’ll see.
Oh, hell. This seems appropriate too:
Well, a redneck nerd in a bowling shirt was a-guzzlin’ Lone Star beer
Talkin’ religion and politics for all the world to hear.
“They oughta send you back to Roossia, boy, or New York City one,
You just want to doodle a Christian girl and you killed God’s only Son.”
I said, “Has it occurred to you, you nerd, that that’s not very nice,
We Jews believe it was Santa Claus that killed Jesus Christ!”
“You know, you don’t look Jewish,” he said, “near as I could figger
I had you lamped for a slightly anemic, well-dressed country nigger.
No, they ain’t makin’ Jews like Jesus anymore,
They don’t turn the other cheek the way they done before.”
He started in to shoutin’ and spittin’ on the floor,
“Lord, they ain’t makin’ Jews like Jesus anymore.”
He says, “I ain’t a racist but Aristitle Onaysis is one Greek we don’t need,
And them niggers, Jews and Sigma Nus, all they ever do is breed.
And wops and micks and slopes and spics and spooks are on my list
And there’s one little hebe from the heart of Texas–is there anyone I missed?”
Well, I hits him with everything I had right square between the eyes.
I says, “I’m gonna gitcha, you son of a bitch ya, for spoutin’ that pack of lies.
If there’s one thing I can’t abide, it’s an ethnocentric racist;
Now you take back that thing you said ’bout Aristitle Onaysis.
No, they ain’t makin’ Jews like Jesus anymore,
We don’t turn the other cheek the way we done before.”
You could hear that honky holler as he hit that hardwood floor,
“Lord, they ain’t makin’ Jews like Jesus anymore.”
“No, they ain’t makin’ Jews like Jesus anymore,
They ain’t making carpenters who know what nails are for.”
Well, the whole damn place was singin’ as I strolled right out the door
“Lord … they ain’t makin’ Jews like Jesus anymore.”
–Kinky Friedman, “They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Anymore”