I’m trying to decide if my muted reaction to this film is due to all I’d read about it beforehand. I don’t think it was. I’m a big spoiler person – that is, I always read about movies before I see them (because time is precious, and I don’t want to waste mine) and in regard to the few television shows I watch, I devour dish about what’s coming up, instead of waiting to be surprised. A fatal flaw, I suppose.

But I don’t think that all of my knowledge really “spoiled” me for this film, because, honestly, nothing I read prepared me for it. Reading about violence is not the same as seeing and hearing it, and further, everything I read was so weighted from either side that in the end, other people’s accounts of the film were just that. I could still see the film on my own terms.

So my final analysis: lots of points for bravery and single-minded creative effort. I always admire that, because it does take courage to create – not to have a good idea, but to see it through to the end. I think the language issue was resolved brilliantly (even if they say Greek should have been spoken at times) – Biblical films have always been weakened by the Accent Issue.

But I really have to say that I wasn’t deeply moved by the film. As I mentioned below, there were certain aspects – Mary and Simon of Cyrene – that were well done and seemed to express something deeper – but aside from that, much of the rest of the film just didn’t work for me. I thought the Sanhedrin was almost cartoonishly villainous, Herod was awfulawfulwaful, the cgi special effects made me wonder if I was in Ghostbusters, and the way the crucifixion scene was done wasn’t my style.

What do I mean by that? It’s all about aesthetic sensibilities and preferences and what works for a viewer. For me, swelling music and overdramatics didn’t serve to bring out the meaning of this event for me. As I was watching it, I actually wished there was no music, and the whole thing had been done as it is in the gospels – starkly, hurriedly, cruelly indifferent but for the mocking soldiers and the grieving mother. Film conventions here just didn’t bring me closer – they distanced me. But that’s just me.

As for Satan – Michael wasn’t crazy about the image, but I thought it was fine. There needed to be some way to express the fact that what was going on here was a battle between good and evil. The androgynous Satan served that purpose, I thought, and I thought it was effective.

So there you go.