Hollywood's Passion For Snubbing

January 26, 2005

It's like the old lawyer joke. A client comes in to pay his bill and he leaves a stack of money on the table. Once he's gone the lawyer counts it and discovers the client overpaid by $100. Here's the dilemma: Does he tell his partner? That's the kind of dilemma Hollywood found itself in over the recent Oscar nominations.

 

The Passion of the Christ , Mel Gibson's masterpiece that caused such a stir last year, was the third highest-grossing film of the year. It ranks ninth in the all-time highest-grossing movie category. Yet The Passion was virtually overlooked by the Oscars. Here's the Hollywood dilemma. Do you reward a masterpiece like The Passion or do you ‘dis' one of your top-grossing films of all time just because you don't particularly like Christians? It's apparent that given the option of profit or political correctness, Hollywood has chosen PC.

 

This is a milestone in cinematic history. Given the choice of profit and anything else, Hollywood has historically gone for the money. It took a decidedly controversial film to change the course of history. And not controversial in the conventional sense, mind you. The reason The Passion was so controversial was because it was so popular with mainstream America. The Hollywood elite even embraced a story about the ultimate capitalist pig, Howard Hughes, by bestowing eleven nominations on The Aviator but they couldn't bring themselves to honor The Passion with even one major nomination. Why? Because it was a Christian picture.

 

Sure, they tried to label it anti-Semitic but when your hero and his disciples and mother are all Jewish the charge rings hollow. Not able to kill it in the womb by refusing to distribute it and not able to kill it at the box office, the Hollywood elite did the only thing left they could do. They ignored it. It's rather like ignoring Gone With The Wind , isn't it? The film absolutely dominated American discussion for months. Mel Gibson gambled $30 million of his own money and came out smelling like a rose. But because it's a Christian film, the Hollywood elite has avoided it like a leper.

 

Have you ever wondered why Christians are the only whipping boys deemed intolerable by a clique that prides itself on tolerance? The politically correct are tolerant, you see, except when it comes to tolerance of differing opinions. Christianity requires a stiff look in the mirror and a frank assessment of what we're doing with our lives. Christianity requires forgiveness when these same folks still haven't gotten over the 2000 election, let alone 2004. Christianity dictates unambiguous standards of right and wrong; no gray area, no wiggle room. That tends to make the Hollywood crowd feel uncomfortable.

 

Ultimately, what bothers them the most about The Passion is its immutable admission that there is a higher power over us all. A higher power, even, than the power brokers of Hollywood. To add insult to injury, The Passion came close to single-handedly saving the movie industry from a dismal year. It's bad enough to despise a picture but to be indebted to a despised picture is almost more than they can stand.

 

Motion pictures that idolize smut peddlers like Larry Flynt of Hustler magazine are hailed as works of art. Films that capture the essence of, arguably, the most influential figure in history, are reviled and, ultimately, snubbed by they cinematic snobbery that has besieged the film industry.