{"id":53881,"date":"2016-11-11T11:16:36","date_gmt":"2016-11-11T19:16:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/?p=53881"},"modified":"2016-11-11T11:16:36","modified_gmt":"2016-11-11T19:16:36","slug":"paul-verhoeven-still-wants-to-make-that-movie-about-jesus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2016\/11\/paul-verhoeven-still-wants-to-make-that-movie-about-jesus.html","title":{"rendered":"Paul Verhoeven still wants to make that movie about Jesus"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"robocop-paulverhoeven\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Paul Verhoeven \u2014 the man behind such sci-fi hits as RoboCop<\/i> and Starship Troopers<\/i>, plus such sexually charged films as Basic Instinct<\/i> and Showgirls<\/i> \u2014 has been talking about making a movie about Jesus<\/a> for almost thirty years now, ever since he first attended a meeting of the Jesus Seminar in 1988. The subject came up again this week when Verhoeven \u2014 whose subversive critical hit Elle<\/i> gets a limited release in U.S. theatres today \u2014 spoke to ComingSoon.net<\/a> to promote his newest film.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a key bit:<\/p>\n

CS: Leap frogging from the Crusades, we have to talk about your Jesus movie. How close are you to pulling the trigger on it?<\/b><\/p>\n

Verhoeven: I wrote a book<\/a>, of course, and I have been trying to, for years now already, come up with writers to do an outline. I have some that I participated in, then I ultimately looked at the result and thought, \u201cIf it\u2019s this, then they better read the book. Why would I make this?\u201d Because it\u2019s too much the book, and it\u2019s not from me, not interesting enough. Perhaps it\u2019s not possible anymore, but I have not given up, no. The last attempt was six months ago, and I decided to leave it because we couldn\u2019t solve it. We couldn\u2019t solve it to make it a movie that has to be made, you know? You can make it, but then you have to feel that you do something, that the movie that is important to do the movie, although there is a book. I have the feeling that the book is more important than any outline ever about the book.<\/p>\n

CS: Sure. Well, is it possible that you could just one day be walking down the street and it\u2019ll hit you and you\u2019ll have cracked it?<\/b><\/p>\n

Verhoeven: Sure, sure. That\u2019s possible, but there is a very tragic example, the director Carl Dreyer, who did \u201cJoan of Arc\u201d in the \u201920s, and they did a couple of other stories, like \u201cOrdet\u201d and whatever, a very interesting director, he wanted to make a movie about Jesus his whole life. Finally the money came together and the star actor that he wanted was working on another movie, and so he had to wait a year or something, and then he died. So he died in front of the gate. At the beginning of production, basically, when the actor was free and the script was there, he died. So that\u2019s in my mind, sometimes when I think about that project, I say, well, I have to be careful.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For the record, Verhoeven is currently 78. Dreyer was 79 when he passed away.<\/p>\n

In the interview, Verhoeven goes on to say that Monty Python\u2019s Life of Brian<\/a><\/i> is \u201cthe best Jesus movie until now\u201d, and he addresses whether Pier Paolo Pasolini\u2019s The Gospel According to St. Matthew<\/a><\/i> is more \u201chistorical\u201d or \u201cmythological\u201d \u2014 plus, of course, he talks about some of the other films he has made. Check it out.<\/p>\n

\u2014 The photo above is from one of the bonus features on the <\/i>RoboCop DVD.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Verhoeven, who has been talking about making the movie for almost 30 years, says he last tried to develop a script six months ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1116,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[3972,356,345,364,353],"class_list":["post-53881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-carl-theodor-dreyer","tag-gospel-according-to-st-matthew","tag-jesus","tag-monty-pythons-life-of-brian","tag-paul-verhoeven"],"yoast_head":"\nPaul Verhoeven still wants to make that movie about Jesus<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Verhoeven, who has been talking about making the movie for almost 30 years, says he last tried to develop a script six months ago.\" \/>\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\/2016\/11\/paul-verhoeven-still-wants-to-make-that-movie-about-jesus.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Paul Verhoeven still wants to make that movie about Jesus\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Verhoeven, who has been talking about making the movie for almost 30 years, says he last tried to develop a script six months ago.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/2016\/11\/paul-verhoeven-still-wants-to-make-that-movie-about-jesus.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"FilmChat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-11-11T19:16:36+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.production.patheos.com\/blogs\/filmchat\/files\/2016\/11\/robocop-paulverhoeven.png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Peter T. 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