Is Mel Gibson's The Passion the definitive movie about Jesus Christ?

[Khaza-R]

dramatization, over embellishment to propagandize it, tomayto, tomahto, right?

To be fair aren't all movies dramatically embellished? Look at any reenactment from Hollywood about a modern event (15:17 to Paris comes to mind) and you can see its injected with unrealistic levels of sensation. That's simply just the nature of cinema and storytelling for that matter.

[Daymanmb]

To be fair aren't all movies dramatically embellished? Look at any reenactment from Hollywood about a modern event (15:17 to Paris comes to mind) and you can see its injected with unrealistic levels of sensation. That's simply just the nature of cinema and storytelling for that matter.

Yeh, theres a lot of propaganda in Hollywood, but not all Hollywood movies are propaganda.

[Khaza-R]

I keep seeing you make this point. Do you mean white, as in Caucasian?

To him an Egyptian, yes they are probably very white. I am a Syrian-American for reference. I have redish-brown hair and blue eyes. What is considered fair skinned (white) is a sliding scale in the Arab world.

[Starfals]

I love that movie but i don't dare rewatch it for a 2 time. It was too much for me. I left the cinema feeling all drained and i NEVER feel that way, even after sex lol ;p

[Bae]

i didn't claim his actions are true, i only said that the person who is considered christians messiah and god is real and did exist, did he do miracles no idea, but for sure he at least started a cult that its impact still exist the strongest today (so far as far i know most world is atheists then christians then muslims then hindus then many minorities, yes even jews are too low to be categorized as major religion)

So you claim it by name? So you are only claiming a man called Jesus was born in Palestine. Along with many others by the name of Jesus.

Gotcha, i agree with that, however there is no proof a man called Jesus did anything else but exist.

There were also texts stating King Arthur and Sir Lancelot were alive btw. People rush to say thats a fairy tale and yet believe Jesus existed

[Daymanmb]

To him an Egyptian, yes they are probably very white. I am a Syrian-American for reference. I have redish-brown hair and blue eyes. What is considered fair skinned (white) is a sliding scale in the Arab world.

Present day, sure, but you think that was the case 2000+ years ago, or even further back, before the European conquests?

[Bae]

Why the shit are we talking about this movie in 2020?

Because theres going to be an equally bland and shite sequel coming out soon.

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There is virtually no evidence that the individual in question ever existed.

Thank you. People tend to say "oh theres evidence that a man existed" but they never come up with proof. Because that it what they have accepted.

Every account of his life happens decades after his apparently life. Thats evidence apparently. So if i was to hear a story of spring heeled jack and write a long book about him being real that makes it true.

[Kyphael]

To be fair aren't all movies dramatically embellished? Look at any reenactment from Hollywood about a modern event (15:17 to Paris comes to mind) and you can see its injected with unrealistic levels of sensation. That's simply just the nature of cinema and storytelling for that matter.

To that point, we should really draw a line in the dirt here (no pun) that we are discussing movies... highly embellished, dramatized films. We're not discussing documentaries, whose sole purpose is indeed, at least on principle, to be historically accurate. Like I mentioned, some accuracy or good faith attempt at some historical accuracy is appreciated in any movie about a historical figure, but do I expect Braveheart or The Passion to be as historically accurate as a history channel documentary? I'd be ingenuous to do so.

[jackofwind]

interesting facts, so where did he came with all that? just for making a movie?

Who knows where he came up with all of it. Some of those things are fairly common misconceptions that just get passed on by word of mouth, like carrying the entire cross or nails being driven through hands. Others were definitely just invented and added to the film for dramatic effect.

He did the exact same things with Braveheart (holy shit did he ever butcher that history), Apocalypto, and to some degree The Patriot, so I'm not sure why anyone is particularly surprised.

[deenman]

No, because the movie gets so much wrong about Rome in that period and suffers from the same problems as Braveheart and Apocalypto.

The main problem being that Gibson doesn't give two shits about historical accuracy and blends periods and timelines to paint a false portrait of history.

well to be fair,the bible itself gets everything wrong about rome in that time,but as a movie i would say mel gibsons is the most well produces

[Kyphael]

Cool. I'm sure that religious snuff film part 2 will be equally as bland and boring. In the meantime, religion is a banned subject on this forum. Mods, shut it down.

This is supposed to be a discussion about the movie, and I mentioned it in the original post, this isn't meant to be a discussion about religion. Inevitably, I admitted it'd likely snowball into it due to discussing the source material of which the movie is based on, but it was always intended to look at the movie from an artistic point, and if or doesn't work for you as a film, why, and what film did it better?

[jackofwind]

well to be fair,the bible itself gets everything wrong about rome in that time,but as a movie i would say mel gibsons is the most well produces

Well no one should be using the Bible as a primary historic source, or as a source at all without extensively cross-referencing it with extant secular sources.

[Khaza-R]

Present day, sure, but you think that was the case 2000+ years ago, or even further back, before the European conquests?

I did a DNA test. According it I am roughly 82% Syrian / 9% Lebanese / 3% Egyptian / 1% Gulf Arab / 5% Broadly South European. So no, there's no Western European (Crusaders) in my DNA in a measurable sense. If anything I would argue that places like Lebanon, Syria and Palestine have gotten a darker complexion as an average over time due to immigration from various other Islamic countries

[Daymanmb]

This is supposed to be a discussion about the movie, and I mentioned it in the original post, this isn't mean to be a discussion about religion. Inevitably, I admitted it'd likely snowball into it due to discussing the source material of which the movie is based on, but it was always intended to look at the movie from an artistic point, and if or doesn't work for you as a film, why, and what film did it better?

"To many, that might be an inaccurate or foolish way to even critique a movie that on the surface, is about a man, but underneath, is much more, meaning, only Jesus, and no other mortal man could have accomplished what he did, because within the context of Christianity, Jesus was only a man in guise, but he was chosen, and no other, physically, or spiritually, could have fulfilled that role, so it's not really a film about the strength of the human spirit, the way I prefer to analyze, but the passion of a creator for His creations."

You made it about religion in your first post...

[Kyphael]

Well no one should be using the Bible as a primary historic source, or as a source at all without extensively cross-referencing it with extant secular sources.

You're asking a Christian filmmaker not to use the Bible as a primary historic source in making a movie about a Biblical figure? The bible might be fiction to some, but to Mel Gibson and Christians, it's historical fact. The Passion wasn't intended to be a documentary.

[Daymanmb]

I did a DNA test. According it I am roughly 82% Syrian / 9% Lebanese / 3% Egyptian / 1% Gulf Arab / 5% Broadly South European. So no, there's no Western European (Crusaders) in my DNA in a measurable sense. If anything I would argue that places like Lebanon, Syria and Palestine have gotten a darker complexion as an average over time due to immigration from various other Islamic countries

Well, I mean, Romans are historically considered European and their presence in that area, predates the Crusades by over 1000 years.

[Kyphael]

"To many, that might be an inaccurate or foolish way to even critique a movie that on the surface, is about a man, but underneath, is much more, meaning, only Jesus, and no other mortal man could have accomplished what he did, because within the context of Christianity, Jesus was only a man in guise, but he was chosen, and no other, physically, or spiritually, could have fulfilled that role, so it's not really a film about the strength of the human spirit, the way I prefer to analyze, but the passion of a creator for His creations."

You made it about religion in your first post...

I admit, I threw some gas on the fire, albeit unintentionally. Even as I was trying to keep this strictly as a critique of the film, my personal feelings, and where I somewhat expected things would go crept out in the OP.

[jackofwind]

You're asking a Christian filmmaker not to use the Bible as a primary historic source in making a movie about a Biblical figure? The bible might be fiction to some, but to Mel Gibson and Christians, it's historical fact. The Passion wasn't intended to be a documentary.

There are plenty of Christians who understand that the Bible is not historically accurate in and of itself.

Pretty much every Christian who has even a passing interest in history should understand that the document of the Bible was written well after Jesus lived and that the Gospels have a very specific bias in them because they were written as a criticism of the Jewish laws of the time.

[Daymanmb]

There are plenty of Christians who understand that the Bible is not historically accurate in and of itself.

Pretty much every Christian who has even a passing interest in history should understand that the document of the Bible was written well after Jesus lived and that the Gospels have a very specific bias in them because they were written as a criticism of the Jewish laws of the time.

But some Christians consider The Bible to be historical fact. You cant deny that fact, can you?

[jackofwind]

But some Christians consider The Bible historical fact. You cant deny that fact, can you?

Yes, some undeniably do. I guess he got me.

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The Passion wasn't intended to be a documentary.

Not a documentary per se, but Gibson himself said that he was trying to accurately display the governance, law and execution itself.

Which, as I have covered extensively here, he failed miserably at. Just like he failed miserably at telling Wallace's story in Braveheart.