the Passion of the Christ. Exactly two hours of Jim Caviezel groaning and pretending to bleed a lot. Surprisingly little story. Even most of the symbolism won't make a lick of sense if you haven't read the Bible or heard the stories. Satan is in the movie, for example, but his presence makes zero sense, changes nothing and means nothing if seen only inside the context of what the movie presents us with. As such, the movie is 100% preaching to the choir. You're not supposed to watch it if you don't already know the New Testament in and out. I'm not religious, but I still find theology interesting. This movie has nothing on Cecil B. Demille's Ben Hur and The Ten Commandments - two movies that I enjoyed very, very much. Those movies work outside the confines of an already devout Christian mind, Passion of the Christ does not.

That's why it's so successful and "is the most inspiring thing ever made *touches self*."

Torture Porn disguised as something significant.

And not in a good way either.

And then he followed up with Apocalypto, which easily could have done without 75% of the ultra graphic violence.

Mel's a disturbed man deep down.

I never even watched it, it seemed too much like an imperialist's wet dream. I have no problem with graphic violence so long as it serves the plot.

Apocalypto was very disappointing to me. There was so much opportunity to show something no movie (that I know of) has ever done before. I wanted to see this Incan society and how it works. Religious blooshed and societal structure, culture, etc. We get a few minutes of tease with a pretty fascinating pyramid set, then it becomes a generic chase movie set in the jungle that could easily have been transplanted to the streets of New York. Waste of an interesting setting.

Like in "I Saw the Devil". The graphic violence was necessary for that movie to have 100% full sensory impact.

At least I'm using something the system recognises. Which smiley I use is my choice and doesn't change anything for anyone. It had to take Batty longer to write, asterisk and then bold the two "spoilers" than it would have for him to simply click the spoiler tag and write a note. I really don't give a ****, I'm just arguing to be a ****, but I do wonder what his thought processes were when it took longer to do it the way he did? :laughing: I thought he was a lazy ****er.
Watch The Last Temptation of Christ; far superior movie.
Indeed. One reason why I won't watch it. Also, I don't speak ancient Aramaic. :rolleyes:

:d

:p:

Mind you, you have to admire the stance the Church took on the movie. When asked what he thought of it, Pope JP II said "It is what it is". Huh? Nice and clear condemnation/endorsement there, JP! Typical ****ing Church!

Willem Dafoe and Harvey Keitel? I'll get right on that!

And it's even by Scorsese. Incredible that I've never heard of it.

It's totally brilliant. Keitel is a bit useless, Dafoe is good but not great, but the idea in the movie is just stunning.

(#^.^#)

Why should they be expected to do either of those things?

I'm not even sure why I like both of those actors so much. Dafoe probably for Platoon. Keitel, maybe mostly for Bad Lieutenant.

welllllll ... considering a lot of Christians were probably conflicted as to whether to watch it or not - would it be a sin, watching Christ get tortured, or was it their Christian duty to understand what He suffered for them? - I think the Church really dodged coming out either in favour of or against the movie, and I think Christians were expecting a decision from el Papa. I wasn't, but I was mildly interested in how they would react, and to just shrug was, to me, a total cop-out. Not that I'm surprised, as I say.

*Catholics

Anyway, true Christians would never watch the film because movies were not around during Jesus' time and are inherently evil. Those who are conflicted about whether or not the content matters should just keep on sinning.

One of the worst cases of miscasting ever.

.

I liked Apocalypto a lot, but I really wish it had ended differently.

I agree with that too. It could have gone down a few different small roads, but it chose to just go back to the main road. Trying to write this in a spoiler free manner :p:

Let me know what you think of it when you get around to it. And what you thought of the ending. No spoilers here.

I'll try and do that :)
First step is to see if they have it downtown in my favorite used movies/music/books store.
I'm trying to make a list of other movies to look for too. I can never remember what I actually want to see when I'm standing down there.

Two sources if you just want to buy it cheap

http://video.megaboon.com/movie/4769...tion_of_christ
https://www.movieberry.com/the_last_...ion_of_christ/

Thanks for the help, but I got lucky and found it all new for cheap in the store I mentioned! I just finished watching it fifteen minutes ago.

I'll try to say something coherent about it, but a lot of thoughts and feelings were running through me as I watched it.

After it was over, I thought about how there was a constant feeling of uncertainty underpinning the entire movie. Is he really the Messiah? Does he believe it himself? Does his followers? What about Judas? Is that Satan or not? Did he really give up God, as he kept questioning his mission or how to carry it out, throughout most of the movie. It wasn't until the very last couple minutes I felt sure about what would really happen.



Out of spoiler territory again: When the credits revealed that Peter Gabriel did the soundtrack, I had just been thinking how massively inappropriate for the tone of the movie the music had felt at times - as it also did at the very end.

I was also surprised to see David Bowie as a Roman official!

Long story short, I really liked the movie a lot. I did get a little impatient somewhere in the middle of the movie when the uncertainties were really piling up on me, but that faded away eventually and I found the movie to be pretty fascinating. I think this one will get better with repeat viewings over the years.

This movie against Mel Gibson's take on Jesus: Not even a contest.

EDIT: I almost forgot. That loud noise and the weird colors seconds before the credits roll... I have no idea what that was about. Easily the weirdest thing about the movie.

Yes, Bowie as Pilate was weird. The cultured London accent seemed totally out of place in Jerusalem, didn't it? I don't know what that was at the end either, unless it was meant to represent his death and then the ascension of his soul? Oddly, I looked at it completely differently:

Personally, I love the soundtrack and I have it. I think it really suited the mood and tone of the movie, but you're entitled to your opinion of course. Definitely my favourite movie about Jesus, and I've seen a few.

Interesting take on the movie. There's bound to be a few ways of interpreting it when it is as non-explicit about it's meanings as it is. The struggle of Jesus to be what he has to be is definitely a central theme.

I kept thinking about his accent through the whole scene, so that would be a 'yes' :laughing:

It was only a handful scenes where it struck me as an odd fit. Most of the movie, it did work.

Any other you would recommend?

The Host

Terrible movie that is so overated based on the fact that it's "foreign cinema".

It kind of depends on what you're looking for. For your traditional Hollywood God-is-great sort of thing, you can't go wrong with either King of Kings or The Greatest Story Ever Told, both excellent movies. Naturally, if you're particularly interested and haven't yet seen it, the Franco Zeffireli mini-series Jesus of Nazareth is a must-see, though it's very long (5 or 6 hours, split into four episodes) and of course the musical Jesus Christ Superstar is great too, with an interesting take on Judas. If you want a laugh, and have not yet seen it, Monty Python's Life of Brian is a hilariously irreverent take on the whole story. There was also a miniseries called I think just The Bible a while back, which was very good too.

I think we need an explanation Chula, that's a bold statement.

He didn't catch the subtext. Common mistake.

Subtext, smugtext. It's simply just a bad movie. Horrible acting, terrible special FX, and really stupid storyline.

Agent yellow? Really?

You just don't get it mate.

What is foreign cinema when there's people in every different country

I just don't like it mate.

On account of you missing everything that it's about. It's like a 70s arena rock experience.

I thought it was a great movie personally. Funny, this is the second time recently that I've found myself on MB defending a Bong Joon Ho movie from someone who seems to just not get his aesthetic or his tone.

A Tale of Two Sisters got me floored

I've seen Life of Brian. I even had it on VHS as a kid.
I haven't seen any of the rest or even heard about most of them, so here's some IMDB work for me to do. Anything that seems interesting will go on my watch list. The only thing here I have my reservations about right off the bat is Jesus Christ Superstar. I like a good musical but oh boy do most of them suck.