Depending on where you stand, “The Passion” couldn’t have been better–or worse–timed. To many Christians, everything from terrorism and the war in Iraq to gay marriage and an Alabama judge’s failed effort to display the Ten Commandments in the state capitol are the latest moves–if not the endgame–in an ages-old struggle of good against evil; to them, Gibson’s movie offers light in a darkening world. “I left the theater beaming and smiling and so renewed,” says Delaney. Secular Americans, Jews and even some mainstream Christians believe the film will further polarize our society particularly because of Gibson’s emphasis on the role of Jews in the Crucifixion. Peter Richards, a self-declared agnostic from Cambridge, Mass., booed “The Passion” as most of the audience at a Harvard Square movie house applauded. “Christ’s story is being used to make divisions among us when that’s not really his message,” he says. Such Jewish leaders as Adam Mintz, of the New York Board of Rabbis, worry about the effect of “the image of a Jewish mob screaming for the blood of Jesus.” Some Roman Catholics, on the other hand, think such reactions exacerbate anti-Catholicism. William Donohue, president of the Catholic League, has been getting scabrous messages on his answering machine for defending the film. “There’s a lot of hate in this country, and it’s not just toward Jews and Muslims and African-Americans,” he says. “Hello–it’s toward Catholics, too. Some of this is sheer demagoguery on the part of the Jews.”
But if “The Passion” turns out to polarize Americans in general, it’s pulling together Roman Catholics and Protestant evangelicals, who have a long history of mutual suspicion. Gibson is a Catholic traditionalist, but he’s successfully cultivated the support of evangelicals; one Baptist businessman in Plano, Texas, bought $42,000 worth of tickets to distribute free of charge. Catholic and Protestant laypeople seem equally untroubled by the accusations of anti-Semitism against the film. “We all put him to death,” says Mike Murreey, an evangelical from Saugus, Mass. “It just happened to be the Jews then.” Rob DiTonno, a Catholic from nearby Wakefield, adds, “If they call it anti-Semitic, then the Bible’s anti-Semitic.” The Catholic clergy tends to be more skeptical, in light of the Second Vatican Conference–rejected by such traditionalists as Gibson–which held that Jews should not be blamed for the death of Christ. “Speaking as a theologian, well… what Mel Gibson does is give us the Passion according to Mel Gibson,” says Father John West, an adviser to the Archbishop of Detroit and a pastor in suburban Farmington. “I would never tell anybody not to see the movie. But I would caution anyone to watch it carefully and critically.” That’s difficult when watching “The Passion”: teenagers and senior citizens alike find themselves weeping, crying out, hiding their eyes or turning away at particularly harrowing moments. For some, this isn’t a docudrama, but a religious experience.
But they’re watching carefully in Hollywood. “I’m obsessed with this,” says one top talent agent. “No one predicted it, obviously. It’s a shocker.” A Hollywood talent manager says “The Passion” reminds him of “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”: “No studio wanted it. In fact, they desperately did not want it. They all begged not to have it. It did $200 million.” This isn’t to say that major studios now regret taking a pass on “The Passion.” Ticket sales could drop when word of mouth spreads about the film’s graphic violence; besides, who needs the controversy? “It isn’t about whether people like a movie,” says this source. “It’s about protesters outside your building.” And although Hollywood is all about the bottom line, some people out there take the issue of anti-Semitism… just a bit personally. A NEWSWEEK reporter asked one studio head, “Does the success of this movie make you think that–” and the executive shot back, “That I should be developing more Jew-hating material?”
So even though “The Passion” is tapping into what’s obviously a large Christian demographic, don’t expect Hollywood to follow suit. “First, studio heads are too arrogant to ever admit they made a mistake,” says a source. “And second, until this happens again, it’s really an anomaly.” But Jonathan Bock, head of Grace Hill Media, a PR firm that markets to Christians, thinks the “Passion” phenomenon can repeat “again and again” now that Gibson’s opened the door. Bock calls “The Passion” an “Ellen moment”– Ellen DeGeneres, he means–in which a group of outsiders is embraced by Hollywood. “Christian is the new gay,” he says, laughing. “Maybe for the first time since Billy Graham started his Crusades, Christians are involved in something significant in pop culture.”
Bock, of course, is talking about a certain group of Christians–not liberal mainline Protestants and post-Vatican II Catholics, many of whom may have their doubts about whether “The Passion” is an ideal, or even a desirable, expression of their Christian faith. And, as Bock admits, “if you don’t have a relationship with Jesus, I think you just look at it as a gore-fest.” But it’s a done deal now. “For a whole generation of people,” says the talent manager, “this movie will be the story of Christ.” Good news to some Americans, scary news to others; the debate over “The Passion” is a Red State-Blue State thing, with apparently no swing voters and no common ground. Jesus said he came to bring not peace, but a sword; in this if in nothing else, Mel Gibson has proved his disciple.
