The Passion Of The Christ Free Movie

[Ariane Delbrune]

ThePassion of the Christ is a 2004 American epic biblical drama film co-written, co-produced, and directed by Mel Gibson. It stars Jim Caviezel as Jesus of Nazareth, Maia Morgenstern as Mary, mother of Jesus, and Monica Bellucci as Mary Magdalene. It depicts the Passion of Jesus largely according to the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. It also draws on pious accounts such as the Friday of Sorrows, along with other devotional writings, such as the reputed visions attributed to Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich.[3][4][5][6]

As per the title, the film primarily covers the final 12 hours before Jesus Christ's death, known as "the Passion". It begins with the Agony in the Garden of Olives (i.e., Gethsemane), continues with the betrayal of Judas Iscariot, the brutal Scourging at the Pillar, the suffering of Mary as prophesied by Simeon, the crucifixion and death of Jesus, and ends with a brief depiction of his resurrection. The narrative is interspersed with moments in Jesus's life, such as The Last Supper and The Sermon on the Mount, and moments of Jesus' early life. The film was mostly shot in Italy.[7] The dialogue is entirely in reconstructed Aramaic, Hebrew, and Latin. Although Gibson was initially against it, the film is subtitled.

The film was controversial and received polarized reviews from critics; some regarded the film a religious and holy experience, praising the performances of the cast, production values, and John Debney's musical score, while some found it to be antisemitic and the graphic violence to be extreme and emotionally draining. The film grossed over $612 million worldwide,[8] and became the fifth highest-grossing film of 2004 internationally at the end of its theatrical run.[2] It is the highest-grossing (inflation unadjusted) Christian film of all time, as well as the highest-grossing independent film of all time.[9][10] As of 2023, it is the highest-grossing R-rated film in the USA, with $370.8 million.[11] It received three nominations at the 77th Academy Awards in 2005, for Best Makeup, Best Cinematography, and Best Original Score.[12] A sequel centered on the resurrection of Jesus is in development.[13][14]

On the night of Passover in Gethsemane, Jesus prays beside his disciples Peter, James and John. Satan tries to tempt Jesus as his sweat turns into blood and a serpent emerges from Satan's guise; Jesus rebukes him by crushing the serpent's head. Meanwhile, Judas Iscariot, another of Jesus' disciples, is bribed by Caiaphas and the Pharisees with thirty pieces of silver, and leads a group of temple guards to the forest where he betrays Jesus' identity. As the guards arrest Jesus, a fight erupts wherein Peter draws his dagger and slashes the ear of Malchus, the commander of the guards. Jesus heals Malchus' injury and reprimands Peter. As the disciples flee, the guards secure Jesus and beat him on the way to the Sanhedrin.

Awoken from her sleep, Jesus' mother Mary senses something is wrong and speaks with Mary Magdalene. John informs them of the arrest, and they reunite with Peter who has followed Jesus and his captors. Caiaphas holds trial during which false accusations are made against Jesus. Some priests, who object to the trial and secretly support Jesus, are expelled from the court. When Jesus claims he is the Son of God, Caiaphas angrily tears his robes and Jesus is condemned to death for blasphemy. As Jesus is brutally beaten, Peter is confronted by the mob and he denies being a follower of Jesus. After cursing them during the third denial, Peter remembers Jesus' forewarning, then weeps bitterly and flees. Meanwhile, a guilt-ridden Judas attempts to return the money to have Jesus freed, but is refused by the priests. Haunted by demons, Judas uses a rope from a donkey's corpse to hang himself.

Caiaphas and the crowd bring Jesus before Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, to be condemned to death. At the urging of his wife Claudia, who knows Jesus is holy, and after questioning Jesus and finding no fault, Pilate transfers him to the court of Herod Antipas since Jesus is from Antipas' domain of Galilee. Antipas deems him to be a harmless fool and returns him. Pilate then offers the crowd the choice of freeing Jesus or the criminal Barabbas. The crowd demands Barabbas be freed and Jesus crucified. Attempting to appease the crowd, Pilate orders that Jesus simply be flogged. The Roman guards brutally scourge him before taking him to a barn where they place a crown of thorns on his head and insult him. He is presented before Pilate and the crowd, but Caiaphas, supported by the crowd, continues demanding that he be crucified. Unwilling to instigate an uprising, Pilate orders his crucifixion, claiming no responsibility.

Jesus then carries a heavy wooden cross on the road to Golgotha while Satan observes his suffering with sadistic pleasure. Along the way, Jesus is constantly harassed by the guards and rampant mob, encounters his mother who comforts him for a short while before being pulled away by the guards, is helped by the unwilling Simon of Cyrene, and is replenished by a woman who wipes his bloodied face with her veil before also being dragged away by the guards. At the end of their journey, with Mary, Magdalene, John, and many others witnessing, Jesus is crucified. He prays to God to forgive his tormentors, provides salvation to a criminal crucified beside him for his strong faith and repentance, and comforts his mother. Succumbing to his wounds, Jesus surrenders his spirit and dies. A single droplet of rain then falls, triggering an earthquake which damages the Second Temple and rips the veil covering the Holy of Holies in two, while Satan screams in defeat from the depths of Hell. Jesus' body is taken down from the cross and entombed. Three days later, he rises from the dead and exits the tomb.

In The Passion: Photography from the Movie "The Passion of the Christ", director Mel Gibson says, "This is a movie about love, hope, faith and forgiveness. Jesus died for all mankind, suffered for all of us. It's time to get back to that basic message. The world has gone nuts. We could all use a little more love, faith, hope and forgiveness."

According to Mel Gibson, the primary source material for The Passion of the Christ is the four canonical Gospel narratives of Christ's passion. The film includes a trial of Jesus at Herod's court, which is only found in the Gospel of Luke. The film also draws from other parts of the New Testament. One line spoken by Jesus in the film, "I make all things new", is found in the Book of Revelation, Chapter 21, verse 5.[15]

The film also refers to the Old Testament. The film begins with an epigraph from the Fourth Song of the Suffering Servant from Isaiah.[16] In the opening scene set in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus crushes a serpent's head in direct visual allusion to Genesis 3:15.[17] Throughout the film, Jesus quotes from the Psalms, beyond the instances recorded in the New Testament.

Many of the depictions in the film deliberately mirror traditional representations of the Passion in art. For example, the 14 Stations of the Cross are central to the depiction of the Via Dolorosa in The Passion of the Christ. All the stations are portrayed except for the eighth station (Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem, a deleted scene on the DVD) and the fourteenth station (Jesus is laid in the tomb). Gibson was inspired by the representation of Jesus on the Shroud of Turin.[18]

At the suggestion of actress Maia Morgenstern, the Passover Seder is quoted early in the film. Mary asks "Why is this night different from other nights?", and Mary Magdalene replies with the traditional response: "Because once we were slaves, and we are slaves no longer."[19]

The conflation of Mary Magdalene with the adulteress saved from stoning by Jesus has some precedent in Catholic tradition, and according to the director was done for dramatic reasons. The names of some characters in the film are traditional and extra-Scriptural, such as the thieves crucified alongside the Christ, Dismas and Gesmas (also Gestas).

The film was mostly inspired by visions from Catholic visionaries such as Mary of Jesus of greda and Anne Catherine Emmerich. The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ, a book by Clemens Brentano that details the visions of Anne Catherine Emmerich, was particularly inspiring to Gibson because it provided vivid descriptions of the crucifixion, as well as additional roles played by Mary, Jesus' mother.[20]

The depiction of Veronica wiping the face of Jesus is from a Catholic tradition and relates to a relic known as the Veil of Veronica. The film slightly showed the veil bearing the image of the face of Jesus. Its origin lies in the sixth Station of the Cross, in which Saint Veronica wipes Jesus's face with her veil after he encounters her along the Via Dolorosa to Calvary.[21][22]

Mel Gibson originally announced that he would use two old languages without subtitles and rely on "filmic storytelling". Because the story of the Passion is so well known, Gibson felt the need to avoid vernacular languages in order to surprise audiences: "I think it's almost counterproductive to say some of these things in a modern language. It makes you want to stand up and shout out the next line, like when you hear 'To be or not to be' and you instinctively say to yourself, 'That is the question.'"[23] The script was written in English by Gibson and Benedict Fitzgerald, then translated by William Fulco, S.J., a professor at Loyola Marymount University, into Latin and reconstructed Aramaic. Fulco sometimes incorporated deliberate errors in pronunciations and word endings when the characters were speaking a language unfamiliar to them, and some of the crude language used by the Roman soldiers was not translated in the subtitles.[24]

The film was produced independently and shot in Italy at Cinecitt Studios in Rome, and on location in the city of Matera and the ghost town of Craco, both in the Basilicata region. The estimated US$30 million production cost, plus an additional estimated $15 million in marketing costs, were fully borne by Gibson and his company Icon Productions. According to the DVD special feature, Martin Scorsese had recently finished his film Gangs of New York, from which Gibson and his production designers constructed part of their set. This saved Gibson a lot of time and money.

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