70 The Last Temptation of Christ

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Zot!
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Re: 70 The Last Temptation of Christ

#51 Post by Zot! » Tue Apr 10, 2012 2:54 pm

Out of curiosity, doesn't Scorsese have a say in this kind of thing?

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Re: 70 The Last Temptation of Christ

#52 Post by perkizitore » Wed Apr 25, 2012 6:55 pm

The blu-ray has really the lamest booklet I have ever encountered on a Criterion BD release...

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Re: 70 The Last Temptation of Christ

#53 Post by PfR73 » Mon Apr 01, 2013 12:23 am

Watching the film again tonight, I noticed for the first time that during the opening scene where the man is being crucified, Jesus whispers/thinks to himself "Lazarus." Now, it seems it can't be that this man is Lazarus of Bethany; too much time takes place between this crucifixion and Jesus' raising him from the dead, not to mention that, at least in the Biblical text, Lazarus dies from illness, not crucifixion. And the man on the cross doesn't resemble Tomas Arana to me.

Does anyone have any insight into why Jesus says/thinks this here in the film? I searched on Google and it didn't appear to me that this was from the novel. Is it supposed to be that the man's name is also Lazarus and it is just a coincidence (there are at least 2 men named Lazarus in the New Testament, although neither was crucified)? Jesus in the film doesn't seem to have much prescience of future events, so I'm not sure he's making a connection to his future miracle.

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Roger Ryan
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Re: 70 The Last Temptation of Christ

#54 Post by Roger Ryan » Tue Apr 02, 2013 8:33 am

I'm not convinced that the name "Lazarus" is being spoken/thought by Christ during the early crucifixion scene. Note that Dafoe keeps silent throughout most of this sequence. The name is spoken over a shot of the Zealot praying as the Roman who has just nailed the Zealot's right hand to the cross passes the hammer to the Roman who will nail the left hand, but it is not attributed to anyone in particular. More than likely, the name mention is part of the looping done to build up the background chatter, so it probably wasn't even recorded during shooting but was added during post-production.

I checked the novel and this reference to "Lazarus" is not mentioned in the book's corresponding scene. Since Tomas Arana is credited as playing both "Lazarus" and "Crowd Member" (according to IMDb), it's possible that the character of Lazarus is part of the gathered crowd and is being called by name as part of the general chatter recorded during the looping session. Of course, Scorsese didn't need an excuse to drop the name into the sound mix; perhaps he just wanted to create a little subliminal foreshadowing?

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The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#55 Post by Mr Sausage » Mon Mar 16, 2015 6:32 am

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#56 Post by Mr Sausage » Tue Mar 31, 2015 11:40 am

Thinking about it, this movie seems especially catholic in that its concept of humanness, the one it notoriously applies to Jesus to make him more human, is doubt. The temptation at the end is the final outrageous example of this, but throughout the whole thing Jesus is in the perpetual agony of doubt. This kind of persistent, almost a priori doubt laced into one's system from the outset is a very catholic conception of existence, where the command and the world to which the command is supposed to apply seem at such a variance that it's more likely that one is false than that both are true and meant to fulfill each other. But of course one can't simply ignore the command; it always persists, a gnawing doubt one would like to refuse, until one comes around to affirming it on one's death bed, finally. Hence catholics are usually described as lapsed rather than simply atheists.

At the least, Jesus in this movie is made most human to those who've had to wrestle with their own faith. Also: the god in this movie must be an asshole. Sends Jesus down for the purpose of tormenting him with endless temptations, dooming him to a kind of failure (the failure we humans were doomed to), all for him to get a horrible death as reward for his final renunciation of happiness. Of course he goes to heaven afterwards, but that just feels like the ending of The Game (or of the stories of Job and Abraham and Isaac come to think of it).

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#57 Post by zedz » Tue Mar 31, 2015 3:31 pm

When I saw this film on release, the theological aspect of it that I found most refreshing (and which the protesters were way too indoctrinated to clock) was that humanizing doubt. The whole religious point of Jesus and his sacrifice is supposedly that he was the Son of God and the Son of Man, and yet most authorized depictions and church-promulgated understandings of Christ totally ignore the implications of this, and downplay the human side, presenting him as a flawless, uncomplicated God in drag, just biding his time dispensing life lessons until he got his fifteen minutes on the cross. The depiction of Christ in this film, a guy who's terrified and bewildered by what he realizes he's expected to do (i.e., the sensible, human reaction) is a much more understandable and sympathetic figure, and it makes his ultimate sacrifice actually mean something in terms we can relate to. And surely that's an essential theological point: Jesus sacrifices himself for us. He's not really sacrificing himself unless he has the option to do otherwise (as this film illustrates, while idiots in the audience were bellowing "THIS NEVER HAPPENED!!!" at something they were too dim to understand was a dream sequence), and it's not much of a sacrifice if he's 100% convinced of his own divine nature and destiny, and knows that everything will be awesome as soon as he carks it. I mean, the Bible actually explicitly gives him a moment of doubt on the cross, and this narrative merely elaborates on that.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#58 Post by Mr Sausage » Tue Mar 31, 2015 6:15 pm

Well said. The difference between this film and The Passion of the Christ is the difference between a man making a sacrifice and a man being sacrificed.

Interesting you saw those moments at the end as a dream sequence. For some reason I took them to be somewhat more metaphysical, an illusion conjured by satan, say, or at least something more than the products of Jesus' dying brain. Not sure why.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#59 Post by swo17 » Tue Mar 31, 2015 10:10 pm

Well zedz said just about everything that I had to say. I would just add that it is precisely this humanizing element that makes the film so faith-affirming to me. Perhaps this is a surprising result given that the same element of the story might notionally be considered blasphemous, but I think if people focused on the film's intent, as opposed to its content, (or, you know, watched it all the way through and then thought on it before making up their minds) all of the controversy would go away.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#60 Post by Roger Ryan » Wed Apr 01, 2015 8:46 am

zedz wrote:...The whole religious point of Jesus and his sacrifice is supposedly that he was the Son of God and the Son of Man...
This is what is clearly noted in author Nikos Kazantzakis' introduction to his novel as well - he felt the story of Jesus was useless unless the reader could relate to him as a human. Kazantzakis' interpretation of Christ's message, which is reflected in Scorsese's film, is that we all have the potential to become the "Son of God" and that should be our spiritual goal. Therefore, as presented in the novel, Jesus is a man who strives for divinity. The "fully human / fully divine" tenet becomes someone who is fully human transitioning into the fully divine with all of the self-doubts and missteps that process would incur. The film's controversial final twenty minutes or so is sort of the opposite of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE (!) in which Christ sees how his life would continue if he abandoned his goal. The temptation is to remain fully human.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#61 Post by lubitsch » Wed Apr 01, 2015 10:44 am

I don't think there's any point in humanizing too much a being which is part human part and part god. We get in fact lots of Jesus' human side in the bible but also in all previous films: after all he has the shape of a man, lives and talks like one, gets angry at merchants, is kind to children and so on. Taking this into account it seems to me that dragging out the doubt aspect to the nth degree and adding another tedious human aspect is rather pointless. And I'm sure nobody watches a Christ film for character development.
The film obviously offends all those who believe in the words of the bible because he strays quite a bit away in the depiction. But it also bores those who don't believe because theologically it hasn't anything really daring or original to offer and is far less radical than it seems.
Oh and watching Keitel and his slang is alone enough to sink this film immediately ...

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#62 Post by Mr Sausage » Wed Apr 01, 2015 2:13 pm

A Jewish character speaking in a New York accent frankly seems more appropriate to me than a Roman character speaking in a South London accent.

The rest of your points are just bizarre to me.

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zedz
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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#63 Post by zedz » Wed Apr 01, 2015 6:16 pm

Mr Sausage wrote:A Jewish character speaking in a New York accent frankly seems more appropriate to me than a Roman character speaking in a South London accent.
That particular niggle with the film always seemed incredibly petty to me, unless the niggler also takes issue with every single filmed instance of characters in Biblical films speaking in any modern accent, even RP (i.e. every single instance of any of those characters speaking), or indeed, with speaking any modern language. All of it is equally wrong, and just as wrong as Hamlet not speaking medieval Danish. It's what art does all the fucking time. And this is a film in which that perpetual issue is actually addressed in a considered way.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#64 Post by lubitsch » Wed Apr 01, 2015 6:41 pm

zedz wrote:
Mr Sausage wrote:A Jewish character speaking in a New York accent frankly seems more appropriate to me than a Roman character speaking in a South London accent.
That particular niggle with the film always seemed incredibly petty to me, unless the niggler also takes issue with every single filmed instance of characters in Biblical films speaking in any modern accent, even RP (i.e. every single instance of any of those characters speaking), or indeed, with speaking any modern language. All of it is equally wrong, and just as wrong as Hamlet not speaking medieval Danish. It's what art does all the fucking time. And this is a film in which that perpetual issue is actually addressed in a considered way.
Technically you're absiolutely correct, but Scorsese deliberately chose this approach to reduce the distance and make the characters more accessible for modern viewers by speaking in a modern way, acting that way and behaving more psychologically accurate.
Which leads back to my initial point. The story of Jesus Christ if you tell it from a believer's point of view (which every film does) is not modern, not realistic and not easily understood. It starts with a women becoming pregnant as a virgin and doesn't get easier to digest for a rational mind. Therefore a rather cerebral approach with the actors speaking King's English and the visuals being stylized seems quite appropriate for me.
I totally don't get what is gained by psychologizing Jesus and turning him into some kind of second-class Hamlet. There isn't much gained by this approach if in the end the outcome is the same as ever. And it seems to betray a complete lack of the sense of wonder essential to the whole story.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#65 Post by djproject » Wed Apr 01, 2015 9:27 pm

I find it amusing (and yes, slightly irritating =] ) that the discussion will end on Bright Monday, the day after Pascha (Orthodox).

I made a review of it as part of my vlog review series called "The djproject Criterion Collection" and it ended up being the longest review I ever did: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNMehZKRBi4" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If it's in the "tl;dw" territory for some - and admittedly, I do sound paranoid at times looking back on it - the bullet points are thus:

* I have serious issues with it theologically. Fundamentally, it shows a God who is confused, indifferent and even nasty toward the universe. It shows a humanity who is just as confused, indifferent and even nasty but obviously at a smaller scale. The goal is not redemption or transfiguration or reconciliation; it's an uneasy truce. Jesus is a selfish neurotic who wanted to leave the cross for selfish reasons and would later embrace the cross for selfish reasons. In the end, I can perhaps *barely* relate to him but I sure as hell won't follow him.

* If it was a mere thought experiment, it could be entertained (and, I would think in the end, ignored). But this was taken very seriously by both Kazantzakis and subsequently Scorsese. And what's worse is if I try this kind of switcher-roo on any other religion, a bounty would be called on me. (Oh yeah, Salman Rashide had a fatwa issued on him for writing The Satanic Verses. Yeah Kazantzakis was excommunicated and the book was added to the Index but he shrugged it off and people loved it.)

* The only salvageable part of the film is the score. It's one of my favourite film scores in general and I love the album Peter Gabriel eventually released. To me, I'm able to separate it completely from its cinematic context and hear it as the "soundtrack to the spiritual struggle of man".

I'll be glad to expand if needed but I think this should suffice.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#66 Post by zedz » Wed Apr 01, 2015 9:49 pm

djproject wrote:* If it was a mere thought experiment, it could be entertained (and, I would think in the end, ignored). But this was taken very seriously by both Kazantzakis and subsequently Scorsese. And what's worse is if I try this kind of switcher-roo on any other religion, a bounty would be called on me. (Oh yeah, Salman Rashide had a fatwa issued on him for writing The Satanic Verses. Yeah Kazantzakis was excommunicated and the book was added to the Index but he shrugged it off and people loved it.)
So you're suggesting that we'd all be better off if Scorsese were threatened with death for making this film.

Well, that's certainly a novel critical approach!

EDIT: Actually, Scorsese probably was threatened with death for making the film by somebody. So much for turning the other cheek.

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The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#67 Post by Red Screamer » Wed Apr 01, 2015 10:49 pm

I don't think the God of this film is nasty or confused, I think this God is distant and mysterious, which seems to be consistent with the theology I know of. Also, Jesus' doubt isn't all fabricated, though it is certainly expounded upon, since he shows hesitance and uncertainty in the Garden of Gethsemane, during those last few moments on the cross, and perhaps other places in the Bible as well. I think that the film does succeed in making Jesus a much more interesting character and, as Sr. Sausage and Zedz mentioned earlier, Scorsese makes sure the audience truly feels his sacrifice. Honestly, I've never been more moved by the Jesus story than when watching this film.

Also, and I'm not sure how believers would feel about this but, if Jesus truly existed, taught, performed miracles, and so on, wouldn't the accounts that appear in the Bible be just as chopped up, sensationalized, and nonliteral as people claim this film to be, since humans would have written about the events many years after they occurred, and each writer wound up with a different version and interpretation of the story, likely making it fit their own needs at the time? What I mean to say is that if these events did occur, every depiction of them will be only a representation and warped as such. This film makes no claims to be factual or true to what exactly transpired at the time and I find that to be part of the directness and transparency that makes it so affecting.

EDITED: for clarity and further expansion
Last edited by Red Screamer on Thu Apr 02, 2015 11:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#68 Post by theflirtydozen » Thu Apr 02, 2015 10:04 am

Frankly, I enjoyed revisiting this, since I think it's good to have a challenge to the account with an alternate take. I see a lot of comparison with Noah from last year and its backlash. My newsfeed was filled with rants from people who didn't know it was adapted from a graphic novel and were offended by its content. To my knowledge, neither Noah nor LToC at any point claim to be a literal version of the story, so why should that be held up to those standards?
I don't think there's any point in humanizing too much a being which is part human part and part god.
I think the film adheres to the doctrine of hypostatic union where Jesus is 100% deity and 100% human. I think focusing on the human attributes actually makes the film more real, much like the low production value relative to something like The Greatest Story Ever Told.
Also, and I'm not sure how believers would feel about this but, if Jesus truly existed, taught, performed miracles, and so on, wouldn't the accounts that appear in the Bible be just as chopped up, sensationalized, and nonliteral as people claim this film to be, since humans would have written about the events many years after they occurred, and each writer wound up with a different version and interpretation of the story, likely making it fit their own needs at the time? What I mean to say is that if these events did occur, every depiction of them will be only a representation and warped as such. This film makes no claims to be factual or true to what exactly transpired at the time and I find that to be part of its directness and transparency that makes it so affecting.
The classic defense is that the original manuscripts are divinely inspired but imbued with the characteristics of each author. It would be boring if the four gospels were carbon copies. It adds flavor; each can focus on a different aspect of Jesus.
Actually, Scorsese probably was threatened with death for making the film by somebody. So much for turning the other cheek.
He does mention in the commentary that he had bodyguards and people checking his mail for a year. I think it's Schrader who mentions that a French theater received bomb threats.
Fundamentally, it shows a God who is confused, indifferent and even nasty toward the universe. It shows a humanity who is just as confused, indifferent and even nasty but obviously at a smaller scale.
I don't think God is depicted much worse than other films in the subgenre, he's just deified a bit more. I mean, if you're referring to something like when Jesus' "guardian angel" tells him that God killed Mary Magdalene, we have to retrospectively realize that that's a demon/the devil. (Not trying to put words in your mouth, it's just one example I can think of at the moment) Of course humanity is confused, isn't that the point of Jesus? To bridge the gap between God and man and reconcile them through making the sacrifice of crucifixion?
On the topic of that little girl as the "angel," when she's revealed to be the devil, Scorsese originally wanted to have a sort of figure of death replace her. The special effects turned out too hokey for this key scene, so they just switched to cutting to the pillar of fire. However, you can still see the grim reaper-esque prop in one of the production stills on the disc.
Sorry if this comment is sloppily composed in places. I'm doing this on my phone and in between working.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#69 Post by jindianajonz » Thu Apr 02, 2015 12:37 pm

Here's a intersting theological examination of the film by Steven D Graydanus, which was quoted by Roger Ebert as convincing him the film is "indeed technically blasphemous".

I'm guessing most (myself included) will strongly disagree with his final assessment that the film doesn't contain much in the way of artistic value, but from a theological standpoint he makes some very good arguments as to why the Jesus in the film cannot be reconciled with the Jesus of the Bible.
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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#70 Post by swo17 » Thu Apr 02, 2015 2:12 pm

I think he makes some really interesting points until that last section where his subjectivity probably gets the better of him. Mostly though, it's just refreshing to see someone of faith approach the film with an open mind so as to have more than just general, uninformed objections to it.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#71 Post by lubitsch » Thu Apr 02, 2015 4:36 pm

swo17 wrote:I think he makes some really interesting points until that last section where his subjectivity probably gets the better of him. Mostly though, it's just refreshing to see someone of faith approach the film with an open mind so as to have more than just general, uninformed objections to it.
Ahem, the whole article is a rather obvious step by step description how the film isn't true to the gospels and why it's therefore wrong. The test more or less starts with "I will try to show in this essay which side went wrong" and more or less ends with "my conclusion is that the religious critics who think Last Temptation a bad film are correct". An open mind is the last thing the author has to offer as the last section indeed proves. Would he have an open mind, he would at least acknowledge that despite differences in details, the main thrust of the film at least roughly corresponds to the gospels.
And that's exactly my point from above: for Christians the film is at best strange and an aberration and at worst blasphemy while atheists get a religious second class Hamlet.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#72 Post by swo17 » Thu Apr 02, 2015 4:55 pm

He had an open enough mind to watch the film, consider everything that it's doing, and make specific criticisms that are hard to argue with regardless of how much value you find in the film. After reading his essay, I might go back a little on what I said earlier--I still find the film faith-affirming, but in a more fantastical way that probably is antithetical to the spirit of the gospels, as Graydanus suggests. Or maybe the faith that the film is primarily affirming is faith in mankind.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#73 Post by lubitsch » Thu Apr 02, 2015 6:02 pm

swo17 wrote:He had an open enough mind to watch the film, consider everything that it's doing, and make specific criticisms that are hard to argue with regardless of how much value you find in the film.
All true, but don't forget the last section which basically says that blasphemy is worse than communism or racism. The text is a pretty classical example of writing by people who think they are fair and impartial and well-balanced but in the end come down massively on one side of the argument. Now consider that this is actually a Christian reaction that you consider more open minded, but which still comes down harshly on the film. How the narrow minded ones look like we can imagine. So who is the target audience for this film? It certainly doesn't look as if it's Christians.
swo17 wrote:I still find the film faith-affirming, but in a more fantastical way that probably is antithetical to the spirit of the gospels
I'd change spirit to letter, otherwise we agree. Structurally the film is exactly what its title says, an extended version of the temptation of Christ in the desert though the temptation is shifted on the cross. The temptation is just a lot more fleshed out than usual and Jesus has to struggle far more than you'd expect, but in the end Jesus wins and overcomes his doubts. So there's nothing wrong with the basic structure for Christians, but the characterization is indeed very troubling because Jesus behaves too much like a human and Scorsese/Kazantzakis try to milk as much human behaviour, psychology and anti-heroism out of Jesus as possible.

I hate to sound like a broken record but the Jesus of the gospels is basically alien to us and our understanding. He can not and should not be made somehow more realistic, palatable and psychologically plausible because it cheapens the alienness and obviously the divine aspect. It's like explaining what happened at the end of 2001 or the misguided final explanation of Norman Bates in Psycho, it tries to replace the mystery, the divine and the alien with something much more realistic and mundane. Therefore the approach of George Stevens is in fact more fitting than Scorsese's. There are limits to which degree you can use Jesus as a character and the gospels as a story. Neither does Jesus fit sufficiently the requirements of a modern multi-dimensional character nor are the gospels structured sufficiently for a good story arc. It's more promising not to try and focus on other aspects, e.g. the visual and devotional as Stevens did. Or you can focus on the socio-political situation around Jesus as Duvivier and Ray did.
Now if somebody would make a film about the presumably historical Jesus that would be a completely different affair, but Kazantzakis and Scorsese don't take this approach either. So the film uneasily sits on the fence and doesn't fit anywhere.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#74 Post by Mr Sausage » Thu Apr 02, 2015 6:31 pm

EDIT: didn't see Lubitsch's most recent post before posting this one, tho' it does seem to contradict certain things he said earlier.

It's interesting that lubitsch says that the Christ of the Bible and most (all?) other adaptations is human enough that further humanizing is unnecessary when, even as a half-human, he's still far less recognizably human than the full blown deities of most of the pagan traditions--Greek, Roman, and Norse particularly. Those gods are full of passion, emotion, and flaws. But, crucially, they are not eternally, placidly sure of what's right. Nor is doing right a simple thing to them. It's bound to create (sometimes vast) negative consequences, or even reveal the difficulties inherent in the very idea of principle. My favourite example is in The Iliad, where Zeus wants desperately to save his son, Sarpedon, from an impeding death blow, but knows that this precedent is dangerous and will implicitly allow the other gods the same license. So he has to watch, grieving and helpless, as his son is killed.

Moments like the above are powerful because they are recognizably human dilemmas with recognizably human emotions. I can't say I recognize much in Jesus in either the Bible or the adaptations. When not preternatural, he's like a savant or genius on a plane too far above ordinary humans. Scorsese's movie changes that by creating a figure who must live a real human life: navigate tricky local and interpersonal politics, the needs and desires both of himself and others, and the duties imposed on him from all sides--Jewish, Roman, and heavenly--while trying to decide who he wants to be. Not only to I recognize these struggles as more intense versions of ones I see all around me, but it distances me from dogma and didacticism. I am free to contemplate Jesus as something other than the model of, and mouthpiece for, a way of life, one I don't subscribe to. He becomes a full-fledged character in a dramatic story whose emotions can be shared and whose situation can be sympathized with in a way that isn't really possible in other sources. And he's allowed a range of emotions and passions that a strictly faithful account wouldn't allow him. He shares what all those Greek, Roman, and Norse gods share: passions, flaws, uncertainties, capriciousness, and the capacity for evil. The wellspring of human drama.

As for blasphemy: blasphemy is opinion backed by authority and force. It's someone's interpretation ratefied by power. The only reason, say, disputing the concept of the trinity is blasphemous is because the proponents of arianism were politically weaker than the Council of Nicaea. And as for the nature of Jesus, all it would've taken is a different set of people deciding what books to include in the bible to get a considerably different, Gnostic account of the man. Who cares if Scorsese's movie is technically blasphemous? The people who decided those technicalities were men hundreds of years ago whose ideas were buttressed by authority. And, technically, The Divine Comedy and Paradise Lost teeter so far on the brink of blasphemy that they cross the line here and there.

And I think lubitsch ought to stop speaking for christians and atheists alike.

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Re: The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, 1988).

#75 Post by swo17 » Thu Apr 02, 2015 6:36 pm

lubitsch wrote:
swo17 wrote:He had an open enough mind to watch the film, consider everything that it's doing, and make specific criticisms that are hard to argue with regardless of how much value you find in the film.
All true, but don't forget the last section which basically says that blasphemy is worse than communism or racism. The text is a pretty classical example of writing by people who think they are fair and impartial and well-balanced but in the end come down massively on one side of the argument.
Well no, I think he is simply saying that his objections to the film are so constantly present ("Jesus has hardly a scene — hardly two lines of dialogue put together — in which the falseness of the character is not the dominant fact about him") that they taint any appreciation that he might otherwise have for the film. In fact, the main thing that props this film up in film history is its unconventional telling of the Christ story (the very thing that Graydanus takes issue with) whereas BOAN and Potemkin are widely celebrated for their contributions to the cinematic form in spite of any abhorrent racism or Marxist propaganda present. In any case, at this point in the essay the author has abandoned objectivity so it's difficult to argue either with or against him. But I would say that going into something with an open mind doesn't preclude you from coming out of it with your mind firmly made up.

Also, I suppose "blasphemy" can mean more than one thing. When I use the word with regard to this film, I simply mean upending or denying Christ's divinity.

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