Mel Gibson and Abraham Foxman are not becoming the best of pen pals.
With Gibson’s controversial $25 million “The Passion of the Christ” set to premiere Feb. 25, he and one of his movie’s harshest critics have traded letters that, so far, have failed to yield a truce in a kind of latter-day Cold War where the sides alternately snipe and plead for detente.
Their correspondence grew out of harsh criticism by Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. Foxman watched a screening of “The Passion” last month and told reporters that it was a “painful” picture putting ultimate blame for killing Jesus on Jewish mobs and authorities.
Other Jewish officials and rabbis have seen versions of the film and delivered mixed reactions, but it was Foxman who received a Jan. 30 letter from Gibson urging Foxman to join him in “setting an example for all our brethren” by following the path of respect and “love for each other despite our differences.”
The actor-director addressed Foxman as “a man of integrity and a man of faith,” adding, “I do not take your concerns lightly. It is my deepest belief, as I am sure it is yours, that all who ever breathe life on Earth are children of God and my most binding obligation to them, as a brother in this waking world, is to love them.”
In a response Monday, a copy of which JTA obtained, Foxman thanked Gibson for his “kind words,” but said they did not get to the heart of the matter.
“Unfortunately, your letter does not address any of the issues that we have been raising all along since we first reached out to you in March 2003,” Foxman wrote.
“Your words do not mitigate our concerns about the potential consequences of your film to fuel and legitimize anti-Semitism. Can the image of your film be used by those who are disposed toward hatred and harden their hearts?”
For almost a year, Gibson has turned a cold shoulder to Foxman’s entreaties to preview the film and discuss its content. However, the ADL leader and a colleague got into a Jan. 21 screening of the film for a group of Protestant ministers in Orlando, Fla.
On Monday, Foxman said the unfinished version he saw included a scene in which a Jewish mob pleads with Pilate to crucify Jesus and shouts, “His blood be on us, and on our children.”
That single sentence, found in the New Testament only in the Gospel of Matthew, has been used historically to accuse the Jewish people of collective responsibility for the death of Jesus.
A Gibson spokesman, Alan Nierob, said the final version of the film has yet to be seen.
Gibson is “editing every day, 10 hours a day,” Nierob said.
In fact, Gibson apparently will drop the controversial scene from the film. The New York Times reported Wednesday that in response to focus group reactions, Gibson will cut the quote laying collective guilt for the crucifixion on the Jews.
However, even if that scene is deleted, as some have urged, it won’t make much difference, Foxman said.
“The film is a continuum of ‘the Jews did this and the Jews did that,’ while the Romans mainly come off as good guys,” he said.
Foxman said that the only remaining hope of softening anti-Semitic fallout from the film — particularly in Europe, Latin America and the Middle East — is for Gibson to appear on-screen at the end of the movie and say something along the following lines:
“I did this film because I believe I was inspired by the Holy Ghost. I believe that Jesus suffered for all mankind and that He wanted us to love and not to hate. Some people want to put the blame for His death on the Jews. That is wrong.”
“If he were to appear, I think it would detox some of” the movie’s impact, Foxman said.
But Nierob said that wouldn’t work on celluloid.
“Try and kill a commercial film, please,” he said. “It makes no sense from a cinematic point of view.”
Nierob added that he doubted Gibson would reply further to Foxman.
“Everything’s been said — Abe said it,” he said.
Foxman and numerous Catholic scholars contend that Gibson’s portrayal of vengeful Jews runs counter to the Second Vatican Council ruling of 1965 that Jews do not bear collective responsibility for Jesus’ death.
However, Gibson belongs to a traditionalist offshoot of the Catholic Church that rejects many reforms of the past 40 years, as well as the legitimacy of the popes.
Adding to what has become a journalistic cottage industry is a weekend report that Reader’s Digest, which claims some 40 million readers, will publish an extensive interview with Gibson in its March issue. It will hit the newsstands the day before the film opens on Ash Wednesday.
According to Reuters, Gibson claims in the article that he was surprised by the intensity of the controversy “The Passion” has spawned.
“It kind of put me back on my heels a little bit,” he is quoted as saying in an interview conducted by Peggy Noonan, a speech writer for President Ronald Reagan and then-Vice President George Bush.
“My detractors would say that it is going to promote hatred. I disagree,” Gibson said of the film. “I think that’s utter nonsense. The absurdity of that staggers me.”
Nierob, who is Jewish and insists that Gibson is not an anti-Semite, added that the movie already has provoked an important debate about interfaith ties.
JTA Staff Writer Joe Berkofsky in New York contributed to this story.
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