Springtime for Jesus (Passion of the Christ)

Springtime for Jesus

Peter A Hempel

“Oh, the Protestants hate the Catholics,

And the Catholics hate the Protestants

And the Hindus hate the Moslems,

And everybody hates the Jews”

Tom Lehrer, “National Brotherhood Week”

What to do? You’re bankrolling your own niche religious movie on a bare-bones budget – for Hollywood – of $25 mil or so. No money for a big marketing campaign.

Hey. Great idea. And it’s free. Sell it as “The movie the Jews don’t want you to see.”

Step 1. Preview screening to selected (sympathetic) audiences. This starts getting the word out about the film, in particular about its depiction of the Jews.

Neat trap. Jews leaders begin to protest. After all, they have to protest. The film is antisemitic, and comes at a time of rising antisemitism on the global scene. However, this protest assures huge media coverage of the controversy.

Presto: a low-budget, sub-titled, anti-blockbuster (Frank Rich had earlier suggested in the New York Times that “it’s hard to imagine the movie being anything other than a flop in America, given that it has no major Hollywood stars and that its dialogue is in Aramaic and Latin”) becomes the talk of the media.

Evangelicals rise up and purchase enormous blocks of seats in hopes of converting the “unchurched”. (It’s not clear whether these evangelical aspirations include the conversion of the Jews.) And lots of other people want to see for themselves what's going on here.

"It's an event movie…the controversy has obviously helped in creating awareness."

Bruce Davey, Mel Gibson's partner in his film company Icon Productions

Washing his hands

Much has been made of Pontius Pilate’s washing his hands of his guilt in this movie. Mel Gibson’s been doing a lot of hand-washing as well.

When the controversy first erupts, Mel claims he is not anti-Semitic, he’s just telling what happened. Lots of his friends are Jews.

In the tradition of “fair and balanced coverage” of the issue, this should pretty much put an end to it, right?

But why should we take his word for anything of this sort, when there is such obvious evidence of his movie blaming the Jews (exclusively) for the crucifixion? (The passion and the crucifixion were also God’s plan, but no one seems to be blaming Him for any of this.)

Moreover, Mel and his father are traditionalist Catholics – a rigid fundamentalist group who regard the Pope as a hopeless liberal and specifically reject the 1962-65 Vatican II reforms, including the dropping of the doctrine that Jews are collectively responsible for Christ's murder.

To take it one step further, Mel’s father, Hutton, is an outspoken holocaust denier; Mel wants to wash his hands of the potential implications of this by telling interviewers his feelings about his father’s views are a private matter between him and his father and “let’s not go there.” Really? This movie is anything but private. And its implications are anything but a private matter. The French have hesitated about allowing the film to be shown in theatres out of concern about a rising climate of antisemitism and antisemitic violence.

Here in the US, the right to freedom of speech allows Mel Gibson to produce any kind of movie he wants; the issue for us is his moral responsibility, and his personal views on the holocaust matter are part of this. If, as his father believes, the holocaust never happened (or was vastly exaggerated), then antisemitism is strictly free speech and doesn’t matter because it’s never really done anyone any harm. If, on the other hand, the holocaust did happen, antisemitism has been and continues to be a matter of life and death. And anyone who creates a monstrously antisemitic movie is culpable. So which is it, Mel? Is the holocaust a fairy tale?

If this movie had had so much as a hint of anti-Muslim elements (not historically possible, of course), President Bush, the Wall Street Journal (which has written admiringly about the movie) and other heavy hitters would have been weighing in against stereotyping and intolerance. But hey, it’s only the Jews.

And the “boo-hoo” award goes to…

Finally, Mel got a chance to make even more news as a no-show at the Academy Awards. The explanation - he didn’t want to get booed. Didn’t want to get booed? After making a movie about his savior getting beaten and tortured and crucified on behalf of his beliefs? And he doesn’t want to get booed? Ouch. But hey, it’s the you-know-who’s who would be booing him. This isn’t Mel’s fault; it’s “their” fault.

The bottom line

Well, as P.T. Barnum might have said, nobody is likely to go broke underestimating the box-office power of antisemitism in our culture. The opening weekend packed in the faithful, the curious, and the gore-lovers alike for a showing that any Superstar would envy...

"The Passion," which debuted on Ash Wednesday, rocketed to the No. 1 box-office slot for the weekend with $76.2 million from Friday to Sunday. It was the seventh-best three-day opening ever, behind "Spider-Man" at $114.8 million and such Hollywood franchises as "The Matrix Reloaded" and the first two "Harry Potter" movies.

"The Passion" put up the second-best five-day figures for a movie opening on Wednesday, behind last year's "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" at $124.1 million and ahead of "Star Wars: Episode I — The Phantom Menace" at $105.6 million.

(MSN Entertainment news)          

Peter A. Hempel

03-02-04