From Renewing His Faith
Life keeps flinging surprises at Mel Gibson. Twelve years ago he woke up and realized he had achieved everything he ever hoped for -- except a sense of purpose. He looked at the Oscars, the money, all that fame and fortune bestow, and decided there had to be more. The path he found was a bit of a shocker as well: It led the one-time Sexiest Man Alive back to the faith of his boyhood, to a spiritual revitalization that, he says, changed him profoundly.He may have been transformed, but he is still Mel Gibson, so it was probably only a matter of time until he directed a movie about the man at the center of his transformation, Jesus. The Passion of the Christ, which opened late last month, has turned into another of those cosmic surprises for Gibson. Seldom has a film generated so much publicity and controversy before its premiere. Some critics found it overly violent. Others insisted that the film gives a harsh, even anti-Semitic depiction of the role that the Jews played in Christ's death. The criticism stung Gibson, who at first tried to defend himself, and then mostly went silent. Now, in an exclusive interview, he talks with author Peggy Noonan more frankly and broadly than ever before about his faith, his family, his future and The Passion.
RD: Why did you want to make this movie, and how long has the idea been with you?
Gibson: It's been incubating for 12 years. I think the germ of it came at a time in my life when I was really searching. I was asking all those Shakespearean Hamlet questions: What's on the other side? Why am I here? Part of my investigation was the reawakening of the faith that I was raised in. So I began to explore in books, sermons and theologies. I began talking to experts. It's interesting that many of the criticisms that have been leveled at me -- they think that I just came out of a vacuum with this. I have talked to literally thousands of learned and biblical scholars over the last 12 years. I just didn't make it up, you know.
RD: What was going on with you 12 years ago that made you ask all your Hamlet questions and then renew your faith?
Gibson: We usually come to these things in times of trial and pain. I might look like I'm living the high life, making movies and jetting around the world. But true happiness resides within. I was spiritually bankrupt, and when that happens, it's like a spiritual cancer afflicts you. It starts to eat its way through, and if you don't do something, it's going to take you. So I simply had to draw a line in the sand. But it wasn't so much about me making a decision as being backed into a wall.
RD: Did it take a while to get where you ought to be?
Gibson: Oh, yeah, sure. This kind of stuff doesn't happen overnight. This is a very gradual metamorphosis. And it is nowhere near complete yet. I'm still so full of flaws.
RD: Can you explain to the readers what the reference The Passion means, in terms of the life of Christ and the crucifixion journey?
Gibson: Passion. It's about obsessive love. It was the whole point of Christ's incarnation -- God becoming man. The purpose of the sacrifice was to expiate the transgressions of all mankind. I believe that, and billions of others do too. These are the testimonies from the Gospels, and they speak of love. They speak of ransom, and a complete forgetting of self, for the sake of all others, which is really the height of heroism. He became the whipping boy so that we have a chance -- because, you know, we can't make it on our own.
RD: As far as the Christian story goes, The Passion begins after the Last Supper, with Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. It ends with the last words of Christ on the cross.
Gibson: Yes. And in the film there's an epilogue -- kind of a rising.
RD: What does your faith mean to you today? What role does it play in your life?
Gibson: Well, you're not going to get along too far without it. I think the next decade is going to be really interesting, and I think we're in for a pretty wild ride, all of us, right around the globe. I believe that faith, for me, if you're going on a wild ride, it's kind of like slapping a seat belt on. Not that it's going to save you here [laughs], but that you'll be able to transcend the madness by appealing to a higher power.
RD: If it's true and you believe in the truth, you're safe?
Gibson: Yeah. And I have put it to the test, I'm telling you. Because in my life, I've been a monster. It has not ever, ever let me down. Ever. I should be dead. Suffice it to say, hey, I was a wild boy.
Clarity and Controversy
RD: Your father. I have read in some articles that your father has some very conservative religious beliefs, and, according to at least one story, that he has questioned some of the accepted versions of the Holocaust. Is there anything you want to share about that?Gibson: My dad taught me my faith, and I believe what he taught me. The man never lied to me in his life. He was born in 1918. He lost his mother at 2 years of age. He lost his father at 15. He went through the Depression. He signed up for World War II, went off to Guadalcanal, got malaria and shot at and didn't like it too much. Served his country fighting the forces of fascism. Came back, worked very hard physically, raised a family, put a roof over my head, clothed me, fed me, taught me my faith, loved me. I love him back. So I'll slug it out until my heart is black-and-blue if anyone ever tries to hurt him.
RD: You're going to have to go on record. The Holocaust happened, right?
Gibson: I have friends and parents of friends who have numbers on their arms. The guy who taught me Spanish was a Holocaust survivor. He worked in a concentration camp in France. Yes, of course. Atrocities happened. War is horrible. The Second World War killed tens of millions of people. Some of them were Jews in concentration camps. Many people lost their lives. In the Ukraine, several million starved to death between 1932 and 1933. During the last century, 20 million people died in the Soviet Union.
RD: So the point is that life is tragic and it is full of fighting and violence, mischief and malice.
Gibson: Absolutely.
RD: Many who have seen the film have said it is powerful, shattering. But some have also said the film is too graphic and violent. What do you say to that?
Gibson: It's pretty raw, and I think it's graphic, yes. But I believe that that's the reality of it. From many accounts I've read, I think it was actually more violent than what you're going to see in this film. According to the psalmists, you couldn't even recognize him as being a human. That's how bad it was.
RD: I must tell you, my Christian imagination never went so far as to imagine him whipped that many times. I wouldn't think a human being could survive that and carry a heavy cross up a hill.
Gibson: Yes, but we're not talking any human being [laughs].
RD: Were you trying to communicate something through the very graphic nature of the film?
Gibson: I wanted to impress on the viewers the enormousness of this sacrifice, the willingness -- and the horror of it. I wanted to overwhelm people with it. But it has escape hatches. There are little places of respite within the film where you can escape from the violence and find lyricism and beauty.
No Other Stories Quite Like It
RD: Such as when you cut away to a memory of Mary's, when Christ as a little boy falls and she runs to him. You took us out of the narrative to go back in time to a moment of love.Gibson: That's what the film is about. It's about the greatest expression of love. No greater love has a man that he would lay down his life for his friends.
RD: You did the film in the original languages of the time. Christ's and Mary's dialogue is in Aramaic. Will there be subtitles?
Gibson: I thought that it would probably be more effective in its original languages. It gave me an extra impetus to have the visual aspect of the film be very strong, so that it wasn't as dependent on the spoken word. And I find that the film has a tremendous amount of clarity because of that. But I think the subtitles enhance it. Preaching to the choir is one thing, but there are many people that don't know the story. And even people who do know the story might get a little confused.
RD: What are you trying to do with this movie? Are you trying to make an artistic statement? Are you trying to proselytize?
Gibson: Well, what I see in this story -- and there are no other stories quite like it -- is faith, hope, love and forgiveness. And I think we're desperately in need of those things in the world. I think we're out of control. There's genocide happening in places that we rarely even focus on. There are wars. The guys here are dying over there. The guys over there are dying because of the guys here. I mean, it's crazy.
RD: And how does the film fit into that?
Gibson: I think it displays the remedy for it.
RD: And what is that remedy?
Gibson: Faith, hope, love and forgiveness. I think anybody that sees this will have a strong reaction to it, positive or negative. I hope that it's received in the right spirit. My detractors would say that it's going to promote hatred. I disagree. I think that's utter nonsense. The absurdity of that staggers me.
RD: Is this film the great work of your life? Is it the culmination of your career?
Gibson: It's taken a lot of my time and all my talents and energies. I think it's definitely a benchmark moment for me in an artistic sense.
RD: Are you going to take a little time off after this?
Gibson: I love working. I might take a couple weeks and reload, then go off and do something else, and hopefully it'll be light and funny and nobody'll be angry at me.
RD: Give me the headline you want to see on the biggest paper in America the day after The Passion opens.
Gibson: War ends.