Sins of Mel Gibson

The Sins of Mel Gibson
By Daniel G. Jennings
The shoddy treatment of a brilliant man, Mel Gibson, exposes the cheapness, pettiness, bigotry and snobbery of Hollywood and America’s intelligentsia.
Gibson’s cinematic masterpiece “The Passion of the Christ” wasn’t nominated for a major Oscar such as best director or best picture. Gibson’s picture, a profound statement of faith, is denounced as unchristian and unbiblical by the arbiters of taste known as movie critics on a daily basis. Now none of these people attacks “The Passion” as a bad movie, they can’t attacking Gibson’s movie making or storytelling abilities they’re far superior to most big budget Hollywood efforts. Unable to attack the movie on an artistic basis the unbelievers criticize it for being unchristian. Worse it is branded controversial and lumped in with Michael Moore’s childish propaganda piece “Fahrenheit 911.” Even before “The Passion” came out the media falsely branded the film Anti-Semitic. “The Passion,” which makes no political statement, is even accused of being right-wing propaganda.
Gibson’s film is being ignored and attacked because the action star turned director committed a number of what the intellectual elite considers sins in its making. The nature of these sins exposes the arrogance, disdain and contempt the snobs in the media hold for the rest of us and our beliefs.
The first sin Gibson committed was to make an honest Bible picture. Instead of a cartoonish Sunday School lessen showing Sweat Gentle Jesus wandering around a clean and sanitized Judea. Gibson gives us an accurate picture of First Century life and dares to tell the story as the Gospels actually tell us.
Gibson’s First Century Jerusalem is dark, dirty, violent and corrupt as the real Roman city was. Gibson’s Roman soldiers are vicious and sadistic as real Romans must have been, Gibson’s Jewish priests are petty politicians intent on destroying a man they don’t like and the only person in the movie besides Jesus who has a shred of nobility is the Roman governor Pontius Pilot. This isn’t the Gospel story we saw in the Sunday School books and slide shows but it’s an accurate portrayal of the Gospel story.
Gibson takes his faith seriously he doesn’t denigrate it, nor does he try to give people who lived twenty centuries ago modern sensibilities. His movie is dark, bloody and violent but that’s exactly how the Gospels depict the final days of Christ. “The Passion” is a dark and bloody tale of the son of God betrayed by a trusted ally, abandoned by his followers, falsely accused of treason by his own people and turned over to brutal conquerors to be tortured death by his people’s leaders. There is nothing sweet or gentle about the death of Christ and that’s the point.
Gibson is reminding us that Christianity is a violent religion based upon a violent story the torture and execution of an innocent man. That’s a fact that our intellectuals don’t want to think about because they want a gentle religion, they want Sweet Gentle Jesus. They’re mad because Gibson refused to depict Christ as a loopy First Century Hippy or a Marxist revolutionary challenging the corrupt Roman authorities. Instead Gibson depicted Christ as the Son of God dying for the sins of the world.
The second sin Gibson committed was to treat Christians and average Americans as serious adults. He didn’t make a cartoon, a violent action film, a superhero picture or a screwball comedy he made a serious artistic movie and aimed it at average people. “The Passion” is great art and cutting edge cinema, it’s as dark and violent as anything in the art houses and it’s extremely well made. Like most art house pictures, “The Passion” is an independent picture made outside the studio system. Historically, Oscar loves such movies, but not this one because Gibson’s audience was average people who go to church not art house snobs.
Mel succeeded in luring millions of people who normally don’t go to movies or only go to Jim Carrey comedies to a serious artistic picture. One would think he would be honored for that, no he was turned into a pariah because he proved that average people are capable of appreciating art when they agree with its message.
Gibson also broke a lot of Hollywood rules, he refused to play the Hollywood game he refused to censor his movie to make it “family friendly,” refused studio financing, and ignored media attacks. Gibson ignored all the hype about his film being Anti-Semitic and released it the way he wanted. That obviously offended the powers that be in Hollywood, as did Mel’s refusal to advertise and campaign for an Academy Award a deliberate snub of the Hollywood power structure. Mel said to Hollywood: “you don’t matter, the people out in the countryside matter.” That is an unpardonable sin in the eyes of the movie colony elite.
Finally Gibson a conservative Christian dared step out of the male action star ghetto. Conservative values are acceptable in Hollywood when they are espoused in a violent cartoon like action film or an old fashioned historical epic like Gibson’s “Braveheart,” which did win a number of Oscars. Conservative values are not to be promoted by cutting edge art pictures like “The Passion.”
In the eyes of the media elite Mel Gibson is a sinner, in reality Gibson is an honest man who tried to express his faith through his art and take average people seriously. Unfortunately, that is a sin in the warped worldview of modern Hollywood and its apologists in the news media.