Indeed but they would not have that brutal because, like I said earlier, there was enough flogging to kill a person ten times over. The film was unrealistic on that score you have to admit. And after you have admitted that you have to then ask what purpose all that extra violence served. A lot of people believe that it served to cater to people’s violent fantasies and in a film about Jesus that is awfully goddamed hypocritical.
I couldn’t say if it was or not, I have never witnessed a flogging. Or, in this case, a scourging.
[quote=“bob”]
A lot of people believe that it served to cater to people’s violent fantasies and in a film about Jesus that is awfully goddamed hypocritical.[/quote]
Indeed, they may be right; but that was not the intent of the producers. Neither are they responsible for what fantasies people conjur in their own minds.
Again, it goes back to the fact that if we didn’t want to see someone being put to death in that fashion (and we all knew what the movie was about before we saw it) we should have stayed away. Complaints about Roman scourging and crucifixion being too violent is like going to a porno theatre and complaining there was too much sex.
Nah. The film was not shot in real time and yet covered the last day of Jesus life. It is left up to us to imagine how the other hours were spent on the basis of what information the film provided. It is hard to belive that anybody would imagine anything but more of the same scourging in those intervening hours. Jesus would have bled to death.
Neither of us knows with any certainty what the intent of the producers was but we can guess that part of it’s motivation was to make money selling violent images. That seems a fair conclusion based on what they presented to the world.
And it is not simply a case of, if you don’t want to see it don’t watch it. I am interested in film. I see it as something that simultaneously reflects and creates the global community in which I live. It is my right, perhaps even my reponsibility, to see and criticize a film like this regardless of whether or not I want to be exposed to those sorts of images.
No, it would be more like going to a porno theater, thinking you were going to see some sex, maybe with a little DP thrown in, and getting full out bestiality and enough “man-seed” to cover the man, women, horse, dog and sheep from head to toe.
:snivel:
Since no one has addressed the anti-semitism remark I made, here are the complaints:
[quote]ADL’s concerns include:
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The film portrays Jewish authorities and the Jewish “mob” as forcing the decision to torture and execute Jesus, thus assuming responsibility for the crucifixion.
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The film relies on sinister medieval stereotypes, portraying Jews as blood-thirsty, sadistic and money-hungry enemies of God who lack compassion and humanity.
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The film relies on historical errors, chief among them its depiction of the Jewish high priest controlling Pontius Pilate.
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The film uses an anti-Jewish account of a 19th century mystical anti-Semitic nun, distorts New Testament interpretation by selectively citing passages to weave a narrative that oversimplifies history, and is hostile to Jews and Judaism.
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The film portrays Jews who adhere to their Jewish faith as enemies of God and the locus of evil.[/quote]
And if you believe that Gibson’s intentions were pure and true:
[quote]Gibson is a passionate member of the Catholic Traditionalist movement, a minority (but growing) Catholic sect that rejects the reforms of the Second Vatican Council in 1964-65 - in particular the abolition of the Latin Mass. The Passion is nothing short of a party political broadcast for this movement, if only in the crude way Gibson’s earlier Braveheart was propaganda for the SNP.
How influential is this Traditionalist movement, and what might it do with a multi-million-dollar war chest from Gibson? The publicity surrounding The Passion has fed all sorts rumours - particularly of an anti-semitic nature. Much of this has been provoked by the increasingly bizarre public comments of Gibson’s 85-year-old father, Hutton. Gibson senior is a self-confessed anti-semite and Holocaust denier. In one recent radio interview, he claimed there were no Nazi extermination camps: “They [the Jews] simply got up and left! They were all over the Bronx and Brooklyn and Sydney, Australia, and Los Angeles.”
He went on to claim: “They’re after one world religion and one world government. That’s why they’ve attacked the Catholic Church so strongly, to ultimately take control over it by their doctrine.”
Gibson senior belongs to the extreme fringe of the Catholic Traditionalist movement which has gone so far as claiming that the Church in Rome has been taken over by a weird coalition of Jews and Freemasons acting for Satan.[/quote]
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree? :shh:
P.S. Dr_Zoidberg, I LOVE YOU!! 
Well I guess Bob we could take a nasty criminal and scourge, flog and crucify him real time and redo the film.
I course it’s your right to hold a view different to others. Mel gibson held the same view as no studio would produce the film so he put US$25million of his own maoney into making it.
He’s a devout Catholic and even had the Vatican and the Pope approve of the movie. I mean the Pope gave his blessing to the film, so what do us mere mortals do… we pray we never get crucified.
I thought the film was good not because of it’s violance but because the acting and the story was good.
Another thing, if Christians believe that their souls will go to Heaven, why do they hang onto the physical life so much? Whereas any good Islamic hothead will pray for death so that he can be a Martyr and go to Heaven.
Perhaps people are really afraid that death is final. No recourse to the law and no afterlife. Sooner or later I guess we all find out.
Indeed but they would not have that brutal because, like I said earlier, there was enough flogging to kill a person ten times over. The film was unrealistic on that score you have to admit. And after you have admitted that you have to then ask what purpose all that extra violence served. A lot of people believe that it served to cater to people’s violent fantasies and in a film about Jesus that is awfully goddamed hypocritical.[/quote]
I’m sure those in power saw Jesus as a real threat and hated him very much. I’m sure that hate drove them to make it a damned good crucifiction. How could it not have been that brutal???
All religions are violant in nature imho. People interpret the owrds to their own oend so we end up with the Crusades, Inquisitions, intefadahs, Fatwas, and all kinds of nice edicts in God’s name. Funny how they all go around killing each other beleiving in the same God but different prophets… exceptin Jesus cause he’s the Son of God prophet.
It was a gore fest shot like a horror movie and promoted as an expression of religious conviction. Even “if” the violence was inteneded to be a realistic portrayal of Jesus suffering and hence the magnitude of his wisdom and forgiveness, then why not give him some good lines to that, or any other, effect? It’s not like there was a shortage of source material.
Here’s how A.O. Scott put it…
More from Jeffrey Westhoff, Northwest Herald…
[quote]The brutality begins right away. As soon as they arrest Jesus in Gethsemane, the temple guards repeatedly belt him in the face, then drop him off a bridge and dangle him from the chains that bind him. These preliminary beatings do not occur in any of the four Gospels.
Jesus is a walking bruise by the time he appears before Pontius Pilate (Hristo Naumov Shopov). Pilate is none too happy with this, either.
[quote=“Satellite TV”]
Well it’s only about the last 12 hours of Jesus’ life so I guess next time Mel can make a movie about the other 33 missing years… yeah great title for his next movie The Missing Years 
[/quote]
Hey that title’s already taken. It’s a title of a great John Prine album. In fact, the title song starts out with “Jesus, the missing years…”
Anyway, slightly off topic but oh well 
I thought it was a noble experiment. Something that doesn’t get done in Hollywood. Supposedly as close to the Bible as possible and in the language actually spoken. I quit watching when the whipping started, but it was interesting.
Well, the Aramaic is an interesting twist, but who wants to watch an orgy of violence and suffering? :loco: No thanks.
People who are into that kind of thing. S&M I think they call it. It’s a big thing in shame based societies
Well, I think if you watch the Passion and only watch the violence that was done to Jesus, then you’ve missed the point. The Gospel story is not about how terrible the Jewish leaders and the Romans were, it’s about how Jesus reacted to them.
As for whether it’s justified to show it in film, consider 1) The story is extremely violent in itself – there may be some question about whether every specific event happened exactly as the Bible and other sources indicate, as some have noted, but the movie follows the story pretty closely for the most part. 2) In the Bible the extreme violence is integral in highlighting the depth of Jesus’s forgiveness (“forgive them, for they know not what they do”).
As for accusations of stirring up violent anti-semitism, well, any Christian who interprets the story as a promotion of violence betrays their own beliefs. Someone willing to do that isn’t really a Christian, they’re just a bigot and they’d find some way to fuel that with or without this movie.
I think most of us got that point. But as has been stated in this thread umpteen million times already, we could have gotten it with about a third the violence. More of the film could have been devoted to other aspects of the story. Given the sadomasochists a little less to jerk off over and a little more to think about like. Whatever. I give up.
[quote] “I give up”
Does that mean I win?
Just kidding Bob. But still, are people still more likely to be influenced by Passion than all the other violence out there that’s actually on movies where the time period is today and the place is LA or NY?
I’ve been thinking back to when I saw the movie (shortly after it came out at an theatre in the States). The reaction I saw wasn’t that of an audience enjoying the “orgy” of violence. It was a very sober reaction – some crying, others thinking intently, a few discussions – definitely nobody laughing it up about how cool it was to see someone get beat like that. Granted, there’s different interpretations in different places, but a U.S. theatre with lots of Christians was probably pretty close to the target audience that were by and large seeing the movie.
Yea, as I recall that there were two , at least, one reported case of someone having a heart attack and dying while watching the film.
OK so nobody got off on the gore and the purpose of all the violence was to make people think about the magnitude of Jesus sacrifice; but the only people who would get that part are the people who have at least a passing familiarity with scripture, and the only people who would be
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Are you an expert in how much it takes to kill someone? I mean really, can you tell me whether a beating would kill someone on the spot, or just get close enough that they wouldn’t last much longer? We know he was severely beaten, spat on, etc. As Jesus was not a Roman citizen he probably recieved more than 39 lashes with the whip, and as somewhat of a revolutionary may have gotten a particularly harsh beating, the skin would have literally been nearly completely ripped off his back. He was incapable of carrying the cross up the hill, and the soldiers were surprised at how quickly he died once on the cross. So I’d say beaten to very near death is a fairly accurate portrayal – if they overshot, it wasn’t by a whole lot.
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I bring up the audience because you offer the idea that somewhere perverts are getting off on violence, but you don’t really give anything to support that, so the only retort I can give is that I didn’t see it when I went and saw it. As for preaching to the choir, yes that’s exactly the case, it was no secret that Christians and those interested in Christianity would be the primary market, since people tend to go see movies about topics they are interested in.
Ultimately, yes it was an extremely violent movie, yes it was somewhat disturbing - as it was meant to be. However, it was given an R rating, and was billed as being extremely violent - so the audiences had fair warning. Frankly, I don’t see how the risk that a few perverts somewhere, somehow may get off on the violence outweighs the benefit of having a considerably accurate portrayal of a story that is so important to so many people.
There were several patrons who had heart attacks watching the first Jaws movie 
You give up too easily Bob. We appreciate you thoughts on the film.
There are people who saw the Twin Towers collapsing in NY scores of times over. You didn’t actuallly see any violence in that although 3000 people died.
There were no blood and guts to been seen. People differ on their views.
