{"id":2930,"date":"2005-03-23T10:08:00","date_gmt":"2005-03-23T10:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2005\/03\/flashback-steyn-on-the-passion\/"},"modified":"2005-03-23T10:08:00","modified_gmt":"2005-03-23T10:08:00","slug":"flashback-steyn-on-the-passion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2005\/03\/flashback-steyn-on-the-passion.html","title":{"rendered":"Flashback: Steyn on The Passion"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Mark Steyn is both a political pundit and an arts critic, so <\/span>his review of The Passion of the Christ<\/i><\/a> \u2014 re-posted on his website to coincide with the release of <\/span>The Passion Recut<\/a><\/i> \u2014 starts with a typical conservative denunciation of the forces that rallied against Mel Gibson\u2019s movie. But, unlike most other conservative commentators, Steyn does not quite go on from there to sing the movie\u2019s praises \u2014 instead, he actually puts on his film-critic hat and makes a few astute comments about Gibson\u2019s limitations as a filmmaker. My two favorite observations of his:<\/span><\/p>\n

The idea of embracing Christ\u2019s life within His death is smart moviemaking, and a suppler director would have done more with it. But Gibson is something of a stolid storyteller and his picture settles into an almost mechanical rhythm: flaying \u2013 flashback \u2013 beating \u2013 flashback \u2013 nailing \u2013 flashback.
. . .
That\u2019s another limitation of Mel\u2019s movie. Although they\u2019re speaking Aramaic and Latin, its real language is Hollywooden. So, for example, one of the flashbacks shows Jesus the carpenter making what seems to Mary like a \u201ctall\u201d table. Jesus explains that it\u2019s for a rich man who likes to eat sitting down on \u201cchairs\u201d and mimes the position. \u201cThis will never catch on,\u201d says Mary.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

FWIW, there <\/span>are<\/i> things I like about this particular flashback \u2014 the way it paints the relationship between Jesus and Mary in almost romantic terms, a la<\/i> the Renaissance artists; the way it emphasizes the physicality of Jesus, also a la<\/i> the Renaissance artists; etc. \u2014 but the conversation about the table has always bugged me. It reminds me too much of the scene in <\/span>Monty Python\u2019s Life of Brian<\/i> where a soapbox prophet in the background predicts the invention of jumbo jets<\/a>. So, nowadays, I generally refer to this flashback as \u201cthe jumbo jet scene\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mark Steyn is both a political pundit and an arts critic, so his review of The Passion of the Christ \u2014 re-posted on his website to coincide with the release of The Passion Recut \u2014 starts with a typical conservative denunciation of the forces that rallied against Mel Gibson\u2019s movie. But, unlike most other conservative […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1116,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nFlashback: Steyn on The Passion<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Mark Steyn is both a political pundit and an arts critic, so his review of The Passion of the Christ -- re-posted on his website to coincide with the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2005\/03\/flashback-steyn-on-the-passion.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Flashback: Steyn on The Passion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mark Steyn is both a political pundit and an arts critic, so his review of The Passion of the Christ -- re-posted on his website to coincide with the\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2005\/03\/flashback-steyn-on-the-passion.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"FilmChat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2005-03-23T10:08:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Peter T. 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