Tuesday, March 23, 2004
The Passion of Christ
This may not be the only entry concerning Mel Gibson’s film The Passion of Christ. I haven’t seen it and may not do so for a very long time for reasons detailed below. But I have certainly found the reviews thought provoking. I just read the review written by my cousin Geoff on DVDTalk.com, who, like most critics, accuses Gibson of a “myopic focus on the suffering of Jesus”. Elsewhere, he and other critics note Gibson’s emphasis on the violence of the Jews. Most suggest that the central flaw of the film is its failure to treat the broader context of Jesus’ life and to adequately examine the characters and their motivations. What has not been noticed is that Gibson’s film is not a story about Jesus but about Christ, and, as such, stands in a long tradition of depictions of the Christ-figure on its own. Comparison with historical portrayals of the crucifixion do not show the film in a good light.
The depiction I am most familiar with is the Anglo-Saxon poem The Dream of the Rood, which portrays the Christ-figure as a warrior-hero valiantly embracing his fate by actively climbing the cross. It contrasts strongly with later depictions from the twelfth century which show Christ as a pathetic figure suffering as he hangs on the cross. Gibson’s film could be seen in this tradition, but the reviewers’ comments about Gibson’s emphasis on the violence of the other people involved suggests to me that The Passion is filtered through the lens of contemporary Hollywood film making where extreme and frequent violence is a means of conveying the visual spectacle enabled by the medium of film. The lesson here is that each account of the crucifixion is a reflection of the culture that produced it. However, the turn towards an emphasis on the violence of the Jews is not new nor restricted to film; Christine Chism discusses in Alliterative Revivals how precisely this shift away from pity for the Christ-figure towards accusation of the killers reflected and fuelled a desire for revenge against the Jews in fourteenth-century literature. Those who speculate on whether Gibson’s film will provoke anti-Semitic responses need not speculate in a vacuum; they have only to look at the lessons of history. For this reason, I won’t be contributing to the film’s income, if I can possibly help it.
The depiction I am most familiar with is the Anglo-Saxon poem The Dream of the Rood, which portrays the Christ-figure as a warrior-hero valiantly embracing his fate by actively climbing the cross. It contrasts strongly with later depictions from the twelfth century which show Christ as a pathetic figure suffering as he hangs on the cross. Gibson’s film could be seen in this tradition, but the reviewers’ comments about Gibson’s emphasis on the violence of the other people involved suggests to me that The Passion is filtered through the lens of contemporary Hollywood film making where extreme and frequent violence is a means of conveying the visual spectacle enabled by the medium of film. The lesson here is that each account of the crucifixion is a reflection of the culture that produced it. However, the turn towards an emphasis on the violence of the Jews is not new nor restricted to film; Christine Chism discusses in Alliterative Revivals how precisely this shift away from pity for the Christ-figure towards accusation of the killers reflected and fuelled a desire for revenge against the Jews in fourteenth-century literature. Those who speculate on whether Gibson’s film will provoke anti-Semitic responses need not speculate in a vacuum; they have only to look at the lessons of history. For this reason, I won’t be contributing to the film’s income, if I can possibly help it.
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