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>I mean >you haven't even commented on the anti-semetic undertones in >the movie, but you're worried about the gore factor? wow.
>I mean >you haven't even commented on the anti-semetic undertones in >the movie, but you're worried about the gore factor? wow.
I hope you'll go into more depth about this. I'll admit to having a frequent blindspot about this kind of thing, but I had a hard time finding what all the fuss was about. Though this probably has something to do with most of the reviews I read, which were more interested in using the anti-semitism accusation as a stick to beat him with as opposed to a jumpoff point for actual analysis. That's, of course, not to say that it can't be the latter, just that I didn't encounter many pieces with concrete examples. But I also wasn't looking.
I think the whole thing was a lot more faithful to the Gospel accounts than people give it credit for, but in sort of a mishmash form which opens him up to closer examination on what pieces from which accounts he decided to include and which ones he didn't. It's been waaaay too long since I've taken a NT course, but the sympathetic Pilate is a Lukan construction, right? Gibson borrowed pretty gleefully from that, which was probably not a great choice, and also not a very likely one given what we know about Pilate's administration (that he seemed to find not executing prisoners pretty dull).
Pointing out that he chose some of the Gospel accounts most antagonistic towards Jews obviously doesn't exonerate Gibson, but it does kind of give the argument a bit larger scope.
I talked to a friend of mine after the movie came out, and he kind of reframed at least part of the problem for me: the whole Jesus story is a story about Jews. If you've got a story set in first century Palestine, the good guys and the bad guys are all going to be Jewish. But when you proceed with an artistic sensibility as medieval as his was, you've got to be a little bit more careful about what you do with this fact. Deciding NOT to go with the account that bends over backwards to include the Romans in with the good guys is the first step most sensible people would have taken. I'm willing (by somebody whose opinion I actually trust, like you) to be convinced Gibson's story was anti-semetic, but at the moment the farthest I go is that he obviously had a tin ear with respect for two millenia of Christian ugliness towards Jews.
Of course, when he and all his silly sedevacantist buddies reject "Nostra Aetate" as non-authoritative modernist novelty, my sympathy is in short supply. ______________________________
"Walleye, a lot of things are going to go wrong in your life that technically aren't your fault. Always remember that this doesn't make you any less of an idiot"
--Walleye's Dad
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