Wednesday, March 10, 2004

Another last and final word on The Passion

St. Vladimir's Seminary assistant professor Peter C Bouteneff is so eloquent in his review of Gibson's The Passion that I can't let it pass unnoted.

Money quote:
Yet in a time when the top five grossing films were "The Passion of the Christ," "50 First Dates," "Twisted," "Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen," and "Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights," one has to feel a certain gratitude that we had something of substance to engage with.

Indeed, one has to bring reasonable expectations to the movies.  It would be hard to imagine a cinematic depiction of Christ's perfect fulfillment of the vocations of prophecy, priesthood, and kingship, or of his two unconfused and unchanged natures, wills, and energies.  For all of its flaws, and in some ways because of them, this film has managed at least to bring people to think in some way about Jesus Christ, and at most to convey some fresh insights on His passion.  Until the world becomes Orthodox, we take what we can get from popular culture.

Yeah. What he said.

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