'Passion' Is Already Generating a Faithful
Following
By Caryle Murphy and William Booth
Washington Post Staff
Writers
Tuesday, February 17, 2004; Page A01
A week before its release, before a single member of the general public has
seen it, Mel Gibson's graphically violent film about the last 12 hours in the
life of Jesus Christ has become the most talked-about movie event in America, in
large part because of a marketing strategy that is targeting Christian audiences
while trying to manage the controversy about anti-Semitism that swirls around
the picture.
Paul Dergarabedian, the president of Exhibitor Relations, a company that
tracks box office sales, told Variety that the pre-release buzz of "The Passion
of the Christ" rivals that of the first "Star Wars" prequel, one of the
top-grossing movies of all time. The film will be released next week on Ash
Wednesday, on 2,000 screens. Hundreds of theaters, including a number in the
Washington area, have already sold out showings for the opening week.
Gibson has said he wanted to make the "most realistic" Jesus movie ever made.
The R-rated subtitled film, which contains scenes of blood-drenched violence and
physical suffering, has generated intense interest among religious audiences,
especially evangelical Christians, who have been identified by Gibson as his
core audience -- and by some Jewish leaders who fear that the portrayal of
Jesus's scourging and crucifixion in such excruciatingly realistic detail will
spark anti-Jewish feelings. The film is being marketed by specialty firms
directing their messages to evangelical churches and to religious leaders, who
see the film as an opportunity to affirm the beliefs of the faithful and to
bring the message of Christ to nonbelievers. Dozens of Internet sites directed
at Christians have been touting the film; the marketing companies are offering a
look at the movie's trailer, ways to purchase tickets online and supplemental
study guides. An ad plugging the movie appeared on the hood of a race car at
NASCAR's Daytona 500 on Sunday.
Outreach Inc., a purveyor of Christian products, is working with Gibson's
company to market the film and has distributed thousands of sets of promotional
materials, including DVDs of film highlights, to churches nationwide,
encouraging them to attend the film as a congregation.
"People who see the film will become more curious about who Jesus is and what
he accomplished. We have a lot of books and videos that focus on the person and
work of Christ," said Rob Phillips of LifeWay Christian Resources, one of the
companies with tie-ins to the film.
Denny Harris, director of ministry operations at McLean Bible Church, one of
the largest Christian evangelical congregations in the Washington area, said he
thinks that viewers "will be deeply moved and left with questions about"
Christ's crucifixion. "What we desire to do is to help people understand what
the implications of the death of Christ are . . . and to understand what they
can do in response to that."
Harris's church purchased 10,250 tickets in advance -- and more than half
have already been resold to the congregation.
Joseph P. Vitale, a young District lawyer who is Catholic, bought out the
largest screen at the AMC movie complex at Mazza Gallerie in Northwest
Washington for the first night's screening because he and his friends thought
seeing the movie "would be a great way to start off Lent." Vitale then sent
invitations to friends, acquaintances and Catholic youth groups at local
universities, offering them the opportunity to buy tickets in advance at his
cost. Within hours of sending the e-mailed invitations, Vitale said he received
more than 350 affirmative responses, and within days his e-mail in-basket held
requests for a total of 800 tickets.
"For many people," Vitale said, "it can be more than just a moviegoing
experience. It will also be a personal experience."
According to people who have seen the movie, Gibson (who funded and directed
it and co-wrote its screenplay) has chosen to focus on the role of the high
priests at the Jewish temple in Jerusalem in indicting Christ and calling for
his execution. The Jewish leader Caiaphas is insistent that Jesus die, while the
Roman governor Pontius Pilate is portrayed as a sympathetic character who only
reluctantly gives in to the mob's bloodlust.
"I'm not sure there has been a film that has ignited such an exchange of
inflammatory condemnations before people even see it," said the Rev. Christopher
Leighton, a Presbyterian minister and executive director of the Baltimore-based
Institute for Christian Jewish Studies.
Leighton criticized the media for pitting Christian evangelicals' fervor for
the film against Jewish fears. "In that situation," said Leighton, "there is a
lot of heat and not much illumination."
There are many Christians, he added, who also are "enormously anxious about
the Gospel story being presented in a way that foments or incites anti-Jewish
attitudes."
In an interview with ABC News's "Primetime" that aired last night, Gibson
said of the film's violence: "I wanted it to be shocking. And I also wanted it
to be extreme. I wanted it to push the viewer over the edge. And it does that. I
think it pushes one over the edge . . . so that they see the enormity, the
enormity of that sacrifice; to see that someone could endure that and still come
back with love and forgiveness, even through extreme pain and suffering and
ridicule."
In comments before clergy and test audiences, Gibson has said that his movie
is based closely upon the four New Testament Gospel accounts of the Crucifixion,
as well as the visions and mystical testimonies of two nuns, Mary Agreda of
Spain (1602-1665) and Anne Catherine Emmerich of France (1774-1824).
But Hollywood executives and religious leaders with knowledge of the project
also say that Mel Gibson himself cannot be separated from the film. He is an
Oscar-winning director whose characters often endure bloody trials of faith,
such as his own portrayal of the Scottish rebel in "Braveheart" who is publicly
disemboweled while lying upon a crosslike rack.
Gibson, 48, is a traditionalist Catholic, an ultraconservative in terms of
his faith. Traditionalists reject the reforms of the Roman Catholic Vatican II
council of the 1960s, which lifted prohibitions on eating meat on Fridays and,
in an effort to make Mass more accessible, ordered that it be said in the lay
languages of congregations rather than in Latin.
Gibson has defended "Passion" as an accurate portrayal of Christ's final
hours and has rejected accusations of anti-Semitism, telling the Global Catholic
Network, a radio and television broadcasting service, that his film
"collectively blames humanity for the death of Jesus. . . . Now, there are no
exemptions here. All right? I'm the first on the line for culpability. I did it.
Christ died for all men for all times."
But he has also conceded that the controversy surrounding the film has
generated the kind of free publicity that can make a blockbuster. He has called
it "inadvertent," but one Hollywood executive at a major studio, who asked for
anonymity, described it as "a brilliant marketing campaign."
"The publicity, the controversy and the interest -- it's a movie phenomenon
that hasn't been seen before," said Robert Fyvolent of Newmarket Films, which is
handling the distribution.
Surveys by the market research firm Nielsen NRG suggest that the film could
open in the $15 million to $30 million range -- which, as Gibson and others have
said, is remarkable for a picture with no-name actors speaking two dead
languages (Aramaic and Latin) with minimal subtitles.
Gibson has mostly shown the film to restricted, often handpicked audiences,
who must sign releases pledging not to divulge details of the movie -- an astute
marketing move, perhaps, but one that has aroused considerable suspicion and
anxiety among some Jewish groups.
David Friedman, Washington regional director of the Anti-Defamation League,
said, "The producers are not showing it to people who they think are not going
to give laudatory comments."
An official at the New York-based Office for Film and Broadcasting, which
reviews and classifies movies for U.S. Catholic bishops, said that it had not
yet been allowed to see the film but was told it would be invited to a screening
during the film's opening week.
Gibson, though, has shown the film to some Jewish leaders, to a gathering of
Jesuit priests and to an unsuspecting audience of 250 self-professed film geeks
attending movie-review maven Harry Knowles's film festival in Austin several
months ago. Knowles, who runs a popular cinephile Web site called Ain't It Cool
News, said his audience was anything but evangelical.
"It was a mainly agnostic, film-loving prime movie demographic. We had a
phone repairman, an FBI agent and a paper shuffler from the IRS," Knowles
said.
Gibson's film, Knowles said, "blew the audience away."
It is possible, Knowles said, "that if you are looking for anti-Semitism in
the film, you might find it." But he also said he felt the film's message was
"about a guy who takes more punishment than you've ever seen in your life, and
how he doesn't cry out for revenge but prays for their forgiveness. We're not a
Bible-thumping community. I'm as liberal as can be. And I think I understand the
message better than they do -- the conservatives."
Sophie Hoffman, president of the Jewish Community Council of Greater
Washington, who like Friedman has not seen the movie, said she is most worried
about the film's influence in Europe, the Middle East and Asia, "where
anti-Semitism has been rising at frightening and dramatic rates."
One of the most sensational moments in the version of the film that has been
screened in previews is a line from the Gospel of Matthew, in which the mob
calling for Jesus to be put upon the cross shouts out, "His blood be on us and
on our children!" Often called the "blood libel" quote, it has been interpreted
in the past to call down rage and blame upon the Jews in the centuries-long
tradition of Passion plays.
One of the movie's other publicists, Larry Ross, who has often represented
the Rev. Billy Graham, said that Gibson was still fiddling with the final edit
of the film. "You will have to wait until Mel releases his film to know what
decisions he has made as a director," Ross said.
William Booth reported from Los Angeles.