My friend Sivakumar sent me this thought-provoking piece which exposes the power of media-hype in the early twentyfirst century. I think Siva has made the point very neatly and has probably hit the nail on the head. Your viewpoint is welcome.... FN
---------- Forwarded message ---------- 'The Passion of the Christ'- an opinion I watched the much-publicised movie 'The Passion of the Christ'! and walked out of the cinema hall numb. There was passion, yes, of those who tortured Christ till there was not an inch left on his body to be bloodied. But they reminded me more of the demons, in 'Ramayan' TV episodes, who invariably had to laugh out aloud before committing massacre! There was blood in plenty, bruises, more blood, dangling flesh, still more blood, flowing blood, red, black and blue blood, all throughout the two hours, in a typical Hollywood style picturisation of violence. But was this what one wanted to see? Did it make you feel sympathetic to Christ's suffering? Did it honestly make you think of his life or his teachings? When the film got over, I didn't know why I took the trouble to sit through expecting something brilliant to be shown to me!! What was the idea of this movie? But then, why do we get taken in by propaganda? I have been watching all kinds of movies made in different languages during the past thirty odd years. I can understand the reaction of those who fear to criticize this movie for fear of committing blasphemy! But not that of the 'politically correct' pseudos who masquerade as critics and have rated it as a great movie! The audience will realize after watching the movie that Mel Gibson, for all his good looks and inability to act would rather be in front of the camera rather than behind it! All he has managed to do is to use two hours of movie time to show us in detail how much and how long can a person be assaulted physically till he dies. There was hardly any development of any character or relationship, be it between mother and son, or between Christ and his disciples where a feeble effort was made and there was certainly no subtlety when it came to violence. The Director does not realize that it is not necessary to show graphic details of violence for viewers to gauge the suffering Christ underwent. And was it just that? Was that all that Christ did in his lifetime? What about Christ's message of love, of non-violence? The flashbacks in the movie, in a way, made the viewers sit through. The movie offers you neither any entertainment nor information or any new insight nor was it gripping by any standards. Why then should you watch this movie? Yes, it did make me think that I should rather have stayed home watching TV where 'Christian' America has been doing the same primitive violent stuff to Iraqi prisoners and all those 'non-prisoners' at Guantanamo Bay! We see more gory violence, mostly religious, on television, whether in Israel and the Arab world, Thailand or tribal Orissa, Bihar, and J & K and still more violence in movies from Bollywood. So what was different here? The movie is in Aramaic, the language Christ spoke! Big deal! Now why on Earth would you want to communicate to an audience through sub-titles when you can choose any other widely spoken language like English? Gibson's movie has to make do without an important cinematic element- spoken word- to communicate. Subtitles divert the attention of the audience from the visuals. Aramaic therefore is just another Hollywood gimmick, more or less like Sanskrit being used for a movie on Mahabharat! Yet, we are supposed to applaud the genius of the film-maker who came up with this brilliant idea! Coming to technical aspects, you expect some technical brilliance in most Hollywood movies. Background music was Bollywood style, and camera was good in patches. But what is the point of saying that the camera work and effects are great if the movie itself does not evoke any passion or interest in the viewer?! For all you know this film may win a few Oscars. But who cares? Didn't 'Crouching Tiger and Hidden Monkey' win a few?!! Afterall America works on the lobby system, and merit does not count always. I would not mind watching a Hollywood classic like 'Ten Commandments' a few more times, but Gibson's movie, I would certainly not recommend to anyone, unless you are a student of ancient torture techniques. This movie, to say the least, has been a wasted opportunity for making a great movie out of the life and teachings of Christ. We only got to see his body, not his spirit. There was certainly no Christ in it! V.Sivakumar ########################################################################## # Send submissions for Goanet to [EMAIL PROTECTED] # # PLEASE remember to stay on-topic (related to Goa), and avoid top-posts # # More details on Goanet at http://joingoanet.shorturl.com/ # # Please keep your discussion/tone polite, to reflect respect to others # ##########################################################################
