The Passion of the Christ on DVD
It's controversial review time kids!

I am sure this review is going to go over well with Christianity groups everywhere. First off I am going to make the bold statement that anybody could have made this movie, Mel Gibson just did it first. In my opinion and I will stick to this opinon, Mel Gibson cashed in on the Bible and the story of Jesus Christ dying for our sins. Besides the Aramaic and Jesus this was just another movie about an innocent man being beaten to death. Now I am a Christian and I believe in what the movie said and portrayed but I don't need to see Jesus brutally beaten to get the point accross. About the 50th time Jesus was hit with a stick, whip, or hit, kicked, or spat on the point was across. We know that he was crucified and that he was put to death. Why did it have to be so graphic?

The movie starts off in the Garden of Gethsemene with Jesus taking upon the sins of the world and being taunted by Satan. Yes I said Satan. Satan played somewhat of an important role but still I don't understand what the point of that freaky baby he was holding while the scourging of Jesus was going on. Anyway back to the sequence of events. We see Judas selling out Jesus to the High Priests for thirty pieces of silver. The guards come and seize Jesus and take him to be judged. They send him to Pontius Pilot and he refuses to condemn him because he see's no fault in him. He sends him to King Harold to see if he will condemn him but he doen't condemn him either. Jesus goes back to Pilot and he is ordered to be scourged only after he is exchanged for a notorious muderer by the name of Barabas.

Now onto the part that I mentioned in my opening paragraph; the violence. What is the first thing somebody told most of you after they saw this movie? That it was moving? Maybe. That it made them want to go back to church? Could be. Nine times out of ten though they commented on how brutally violent this movie was. In my opinion Mel Gibson could not tell a wonderful story about how Jesus touched people lives while he was alive so he opted to show the last horrific twelve hours of his life. Wes Craven or John Carpenter could have made a gorefest like the Passion and that is why I don't understand why people are giving so much credit to Mel Gibson over this. It is a good movie but it takes so much more to be a good movie about Christ or anything Biblical for that matter. The Ten Commandments was a wonderful Biblical movie because it showed Moses going through life from child to adulthood. Sure the movie was ten hours but it told everything that needed to be told. It takes more than two hours to tell the life of Jesus Christ. The only moment that actually moved me in this movie was the one flashback of Jesus just being a regular guy doing his carpentry. That humanized Jesus for me and that was one of the best scenes of the movie. You wouldn't know that though because of all the focus on the gore. The actually crucifiction of Jesus was one of the most barbaric things I have ever seen on film.

One of my main gripes though is that the DVD had absolutely no special features on it at all. I hear they are going to make a two disc edition to coincide with Christmas but why make a single disc verson at all? Money that is why and Mel Gibson is riding this money train for as long as he can. I know a blooper reel, albeit funny, would not be appropriate but some behind the scenes footage would have been nice even if they are releasing another version of it.

Now I am not by any means condemning this movie. If this movie got you to go back to chruch or appreciate Jesus' sacrifice more, than I am all for that. I enjoyed the movie but I felt it focused on the wrong things. I would have rather seen Jesus teaching the people than to see him beaten so severly in almost every scene. Any movie can show a man beaten to death but it takes a real filmmaker to make a moving picture about Jesus and Mel Gibson is not that man. It was a above average picture about the Atonement for our sins but lets face it, the book was better........


Final Score
3.5/5