Religion as Spectacle – session 6 The Passion of Christ (Mel Gibson 2004)

Discussion Topics: 1. Content vs. Form 2. Truth Value vs. Emotional Value truth value: historical facts, science, logic emotional value: associations with culture, background, religious orientation, sexual orientation

Faith as an Object of Spectacle This issue is best discussed in the context of religious experience What is it? This is an act of belief which refers to tradition understood as an authoritative act How can faith be represented in visual art and in cinema? By means of symbolic language where symbols express specific meanings

The Last Temptation of Christ, 1988, by Martin Scorsese tn0 tn0 Jesus Christ who doubts, who wants to live a life of an ordinary man

The Last Temptation of Christ

Jesus of Montreal (Denys Arcand, 1989) # # Jesus is an unemployed actor who gets into his role so persuasively that he begins to believe in his performance

Jesus of Montreal

Crucifixion as a theme for pictorial art, literature and music Crucifixion is the religious symbol usually expressed in religious depictions Its religious meanings are: Created by the spectator in the process of interpretation Or come from the result these images have on the viewer who see crucifixion as a ritual

Ritual RITUAL - a prescribed form of performing divine service in a particular church or communion - rites of passage – ceremonies that mark a person’s progress from one phase of life or social status to another (birth, puberty, marriage, death) - the code of ceremonies observed by an organization

in ritual, the selection of themes privileges certain peoples’ interpretation of the events over others - the ritual provides the participants with a context in which images related to a particular rite express the focus of a social group on one or another aspect of human existence - rituals presented in films about myths strengthen the myth’s emotional power

they spectacularly frame emotions within the boundaries of SPECTACLE, they direct viewers’ emotions towards the enjoyment of costume, mise-en-scene, sound and close-ups of faces Cinema recreates and refreshes the myth by using a symbolic language The Passion of Christ crosses the line between the Symbolic and the Realistic in its presentation of the body and suffering

The Passion of Christ (Mel Gibson, 2004)

Reactions Emotions as a commodity: the film sells based on the assault of the ritualistic aspects of crucifixion Examples of emotions the film evokes (based on reviews): * reverence, exaltation, admiration, love, respect * hatred, disgust, revulsion (the film is based on sadism and fury)

Historical detail

Hyperrealistic account of the event

Criticism of the film as a religious film No nuanced presentation of emotion The predominance of reason in the film However, early Christians favored very realistic scenes of suffering (the touch, the smell, the filth and the sound of scriptural events) Mel Gibson is believed to cross the line and make a spectacle of suffering in a similar way to his other film: Braveheart (1995) – 5 Oscars

Braveheart wvrU wvrU