While the film is unlikely to reintroduce into modern churches the anti-Jewish doctrine once central to many Christian theologies, the movie will likely become a cult-film for modern-day anti-Semites. Especially given Gibson’s questionable record (such as his September 2003 assertion that "secular Judaism wants to blame the Holocaust on the Catholic Church. And it’s a lie… they’ve been working on it for a long time"), it is only a matter of time before it becomes yet another tool in the Arab world to enhance already rampant anti-Semitism and further accusations against Israel and the Jews. While the movie is unlikely to inspire any new (old) anti-Semitism, or waves of anti-Jewish violence as a similar effort might surely have in a different time and place, it is likely to provide modern-day anti-Semites with new (old) ammunition to sling at the Jews.

One would surely expect Jews to play a major role in the Passion story, and one is sure to expect Gibson to portray the temple hierarchy and Sanhedrin in detail. But although the film is presented as a "literal" account of the Christian bible, Gibson takes considerable liberty with the Gospels in order to emphasise his chosen theme of Jesus’ suffering. One example is Gibson’s invention of brutality meted out on Jesus even before his formal flogging by the Romans begins.

Artistic licence is just one way Gibson establishes the theme of "sinister Jews" which continues throughout the film, from the opening scene in which Jewish high priest Caiphas (Mattia Sbragia) bribes Judas (Luca Lionello) to betray Jesus (Jim Caviezel), to the Jewish mob demanding Jesus’ crucifixion from Pontius Pilate, to the remorseless Caiphas angrily observing the brutal flogging and crucifixion. Jewish venom towards Jesus is more than a passing notion; indeed, it seems to be one central focus of the movie.

In contrast, despite the historical record, Roman governor of Jerusalem Pontius Pilate (Hristo Naumov Shopov) is portrayed as a basically good man caught between the proverbial rock-and-a-hard-place. Pilate repeatedly exonerates Jesus of any wrongdoing and tries several times to convince the Jewish mob not to crucify him. The reality that Caiphas was Pilate’s appointee is ignored. In the end, Pilate relents, for fear of a Jewish rebellion (and of his superiors in Rome, who have warned him that such a rebellion would result in his own crucifixion). The villain of Gibson’s movie is clear.

In a film about violence and suffering the viewer is left without any background to the suffering. Gibson expects his viewers to have a high level of literacy in Christian gospel, and provides very little explanation of events and no context for viewers to the events at hand. The movie begins ominously, with a stalking camera shot of Jesus at prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane and forbidding music warning the viewer that the tortured prayer would soon be disturbed. The shot cuts to the agents of Caiphas buying information on Jesus’ whereabouts the night before his death, but the viewer is left to guess exactly what Jesus had done to warrant the Jews’ wrath, how they came to bribe Judas (Luca Lionello) or why his arrest had to be carried out at night.

The result portrays Jesus as a prisoner of those conniving Jews who angrily present their prisoner to bloodthirsty Roman centurions, but the reason is far from clear. For the viewer with no background to the story, Jesus could well have been a wrongly accused criminal, rather than a divinely-inspired messenger sent to atone for the sins of mankind.

Gibson’s approach will appeal to Christian literalists for whom the betrayal-trial-suffering-death sequence is of supreme importance (and for whom the movie was intended). But for Christians who view Jesus’ life and teachings as more important than his death, and for those who watch the movie with non-Christian "glasses" the presentation is less than compelling. Gibson does include isolated references to Jesus’ ethical teachings, such as the demand to "Love those who persecute you, for if you only love those who love you, what value is there in that?" But they are few and far between.

Theology aside, the movie fails on several counts. As promised it is extremely violent, especially the second half which portrays Jesus’ torturous flogging and crucifixion, and the painful scenes are an integral part of the Gibson’s goal in making the movie, but repeated beatings, whippings and floggings became gratuitous. Not because they are hard to watch (they are), but because they slow the plot down. As Jesus’ journey through ancient Jerusalem is marked only by beatings and blood, with no accompanying message and little dialogue, the scene is too long and, after a while, boring, for anyone not looking through the eyes of a Christian believer.

At the end of the day, the tragedy of The Passion is that Gibson’s driving force is the suffering Christ. His overall message is simple — look what Jesus went through for you. Such an approach may be suitable for Gibson and his private church in the hills of Southern California, but it is likely to leave both the modern-day religious thinker and film viewer feeling short-changed.