Word: messiahs
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DAUGHTER OF GOD Reality-show producer Mark Burnett has just optioned Lewis Perdue's religious thriller about a female messiah...
...film anti-Jewish? Well, which Jews? Start with the Sanhedrin, the rabbinical senate that found Jesus guilty of violating temple law and handed him to the Roman authority for summary punishment. The rabbis had their reasons; they saw the upstart as dangerous, blasphemous, possibly insane for proclaiming himself the Messiah and telling his followers they would live forever if they ate his flesh and drank his blood. The film sees the rabbis as doctrinally pure but politically corrupt. Indeed, it suggests they are a rogue cell calling a midnight caucus for a frame-up. But Gibson also shows many Jews...
...oppression of Roman occupation. Their clothes are dirt-dry and sweat-drenched. By jolting the viewer to reconsider Hollywood's calcified stereotypes of the New Testament, Gibson wants to restore the immediacy of that time, the stern wonder of that land, the thrilling threat of meeting the Messiah on the mean streets of Jerusalem...
...allow me to baffle or anger my new flock by getting to today's subject: a simple, informative survey of a dozen or so film biographies of Jesus, noting particularly how their depiction of the Messiah's conviction and death compared with Mel Gibson's. The alleged Messiah is once again hot (in the more attractive sense of that word), and readers may be helped by these scattershot notes on other examples of the genre. All of the films, including "Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter," are available on video and/or DVD from amazon.com...
...Like Gibson's Messiah, Parker and Stone's Jesus has Father issues. In the millennium episode (314), young Stan Marsh asks Jesus, "Why does God hate me?" and the Savior mutters, "Huh? He doesn't hate you, he hates me. He's gonna let me be crucified again." Jesus is also not always comfortable with his job. At the end of the episode, when a booing crowd comes to its senses, the elementary school chef says, "Jesus, we're sorry. Can you ever forgive us?" He puts his halo back on and replies, "Aw heck. Do I have a choice...