Sacrilicious

In what was promised to be a class today our professor left a television with instructions to show a video in

his absence. We watched a 20/20 Special Edition about the Passion of the Christ by some woman whose name I can't remember. I swear she's Martha Stewart in disguise though. They both use the same lighting, soft pinks and yellows. Makes me feel like I'm developing cataracts, which creeps me out. And anyway, I'm not yet able to determine the difference between most newscasters or anchors anymore. They blend together like that shimmering woman on 20/20. All have the same facial expressions, inflection and stress on words. It’s terrible. Is there a course offered where I can learn to fake appreciation and pity as well as these people, or is it innate? I hope it’s class taught.

Regardless, the special edition was about this film, the telling, “according to the Bible”, of the story of

Christ. Now, right off the bat, I have a problem with this. Who has the right to portray Jesus Christ? Anyone? I think I'll start asking people if they could play the Profit Found of a major world religion, and I'm sure I'd get some awkward looks in return. I honestly want to know though. Who has the chops? Apparently, Mel Gibson shown his directorial and theological light on James Caviezel, a man who played Catch, whomever the hell that is, in 2001's Angel Eyes with J-Lo. He could be Jesus! Ohh! (sigh of relief) They should have included her in the film! J-Lo as the woman me loved; for that Latin flavor.

I think the biggest problem I have with this film is that it’s just like other Jesus films despite Gibson’s

saying that it wasn’t. Here we have the portrayal of a historical figure and, more importantly, the founder of the largest religion on the globe (currently) by a guy who's last contribution to film making was playing Fletcher in The Final Cut with Robin Williams which will be released soon (or so the web tells me). What right do we have as human beings, far lesser than prophetic leaders of religion and beyond far lesser than God, to portray anyone/anything but human beings. Research, we can’t even fathom. This argument, of course, can be countered by filmmakers by saying that they are simply trying to provide a vision, an outlet of creativity and story-telling; which is a fair argument to be made. My counter to that is, we have a creative and story-telling based source for this tale and it’s called the Bible. Read it. Don't sit in a theater and think that you've been evoked by God and his messengers because you watched a film, and I know that people will say these things on opening the doors of the theater or on their drive home. Problems will arise due to this film because people will think that it is the truth. Which it is not.

Next to this on the list of problems I have with the film is the simple fact that the portrayal of every part

of this film, as far as I've seen, is based around the agonizing suffering of Jesus – Lover of Humanity, indeed. We see pictures in newspapers, magazines and television of him (intended lower case) drenched in blood. Is that Jesus' story? Agonizing? A death scene? Or was Jesus' story about love, respect and the revealing of the largest and most misunderstood religion on the face of the planet? Perhaps that should have been the aim of the film instead of as a historical study. In the interview, Mel Gibson explained that he was going by the Bible alone, essentially. Then where's the love Jesus had for all things? That’s important. It should be in the trailer. I think we've seen enough about the horrible atrocities and agonizing death scenes of the past brought to you by blockbuster actors, turned directors, turned self-proclaimed theocratic geniuses.

If any of that makes sense to me later…I will be impressed.