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Ecce Pomo: Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ is much more a product of this society than its proponents or critics would like to admit.

Article Excerpt
After months of speculation, Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ was finally released this year. Predictably it divided audiences, whether through its graphic violence, its alleged anti-Semitism or simply its declaration of some kind of religious belief. Yet apart from the debate over the possible anti-Semitic elements in the film, critics and supporters have tended to separate their analysis of the film from any wider context.

The film's supporters see the Passion as an important 'conversion tool'--its historical 'authenticity' allows for an appropriate distance from the present (whether the Pope really said 'it is as it was', this is certainly the reaction Gibson hoped for in making the film). Detractors regard the Passion as something of a freak event--violent, fundamentalist, quixotic in its aspiration towards literalness, in it's use of Aramaic, of subtitles--and so on.

Both positions are limited. While the Passion is likely to go the way of any other Hollywood blockbuster, it is interesting insofar at it connects with contemporary sensibilities rather than transcends them. It's worth exploring how the film resonates with the political and cultural climate of today, how it speaks to a logic of persecutors and victims, and how it depicts suffering in an age of 'global terror'.

While the Passion concerned itself with the persecution of Christ, the theme of persecution came to dominate all aspects of the film's production, not simply its content. Even before the films release, Gibson launched a pre-emptive strike against those likely to accuse him of being anti-Semitic. When the inevitable accusations came, Gibson took on the mantle of the one who was persecuted,...

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