Why Mel Gibson?

Brave Heart or Mad Max?

Why would one of Hollywood’s most bankable stars take a chance on such a controversial script?

One of Hollywood’s most beloved stars is making headlines in a controversy that he admits may end his career. But he didn’t trash a hotel room, or experience a “wardrobe malfunction”, he’s making a movie about a hometown hero who lays down his life for his friends. Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ -- scheduled to be released on Febraury 25^th, 2004 -- has been in the headlines for several months already. Charges of anti-Semitism and fundamentalism have dogged the film. No studio or distributor would touch it so Gibson sunk more than $25 million of his own money into the project and chose to go ahead film it – largely in Aramaic. The question on many people’s lips is why.

In an interview with zenit.org early last year, Gibson simply explained, “I’m doing what I’ve always done: telling stories I think are important in the language I speak best: film.” That this is a story close to Gibson’s heart is not news. It has been widely reported that he is a devout, and some would say conservative, practicing Catholic. In another interview for The World Over Gibson likened the experience to childbirth, saying, “I just gotta do it, it’s one of those things and the chips fall where they may.”

Gibson himself has called the film a “career-killer”. Actor James Caviezel who plays the role of Jesus in the film tells a story of a conversation he had with Gibson shortly after taking the role. He said that Gibson warned him he might never work again. But Caviezel, like Gibson, is committed to this project. He responded, “I could go down on this ship. If this is the one that takes me out, that’s fine with me.” Whether or not either will work again remains to be seen, but it is risk both seem willing to take. As Gibson told Zenit, “I just hope I can do justice to the story. You can’t please everybody, but then again, that’s not my goal.”

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Why Mel Gibson?

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