Review of The Passion of the Christ (2004) by Js — 25 Feb 2004

How on earth this story got to be made into a film I will never know. The central character "Jesus" claims he is the "Son of God" and forms a cult with his followers named ?disciples'.

Except that in this cult, all the members are already poor and the leader is the only one who dies. It's almost as if someone made a parody of modern cultism where the founder is made out as a victim instead.

I would not be surprised if production was funded by The Way or the Cooneyites or Christian Scientists. Seriously, how else could such a preposterous plot make it into production?! There is plenty more in this film that appears to be there merely to insult your intellect rather than form a cohesive story.

The mother of Jesus, Mary, is called ?The Virgin Mary?; that?s right, Jesus? BIRTH MOTHER is called VIRGIN Mary! Anyway, for some incomprehensible reason the powers that be in this ?Roman Empire? ? bizarre looking people with long beards and hats - decide that Jesus has to die for saying he is the son of God (no reason why I might add).

Quite clearly this film portrays a time before any real understanding of mental illness and it is here if anywhere, that the film needed to be explored further. In modern times, such a person would be met not with a barbed cat-o-nine tails, but with compassion, understanding, lithium and electro-convulsive therapy.

He would be assessed as to the likelihood of his being a danger to either himself or others and if need be housed in an appropriate facility for the remainder of his life. That the film-makers decided to subject the protagonist to a series of most horrific tortures before nailing him to a crucifix to die shows just how intolerant of the mentally ill the world of this time was.

Even until the end, the mutilated Jesus maintains his delusions claiming that he will be reborn after his death. What I found most disturbing about this film is that the afore-mention Mary and another character called Mary (oh come on ? couldn?t the script writers have come up with a different name?!? Gertrude for instance ? there; it only took me two seconds to think that up?) along with the Disciples appear to completely believe what Jesus is saying, even when he is half-dead and evidently suffering from extreme blood loss.

Film is the domain of realism ? even fantasy films must remain rooted within some confines of realism, but to expect the film-going audience to accept that these people willingly believe the words of this Jesus character stretches the realms of probability too far.

But then maybe that is point? Perhaps what this film is trying to say is that even the most incredible and far-fetched ideas have a home within the minds of the impressionable? As Hitler said, ?the bigger the lie, the more people will believe it?.

Or maybe what it is trying to say is that we should look back at our own history of hatred and persecution of those that are different from us or we deem not suitable for our society and learn the lessons from our past to resolve to be even more tolerant and understand of people like Jesus rather than treat them with hatred and fear? Or perhaps the person that made this film had his own agenda and a cynic such as myself could never even hope to comprehend the meaning of this film even if he sat me down and explained it to me.

If I don?t understand this film, then perhaps it was not meant for me in the first place? It could be that he made this film purely for himself and people like him and that just because I didn?t understand a single part of it doesn?t mean I should get angry with him.

Well, whatever; I still think it would have been better if Jesus had a pair of nunchucks, some throwing stars and an enchanted samurai sword.