Quentin Tarantino says The Passion of the Christ is 15th on his list of best films made this Century.
Explaining why, the Kill Bill director said the 2004 Mel Gibson film retelling the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus had both disturbed and stirred him.
Tarantino made the surprise salute on a recent episode of the Bret Easton Ellis podcast.
Telling Ellis why he loved the film, Tarantino said it was all about the directing.
Gibson “didn’t really choose one tone and carry it through.”
“There are scenes where you feel like you’re watching the most realistic Biblical movie you’ve ever seen,” Tarantino continued.
“Then all of a sudden it turns into a religious painting and gets completely avant-garde, and gets surreal.
“And then there’s actually horror movie imagery that Gibson invests in, big time,” the Academy Award-winning director added.
There’s also the “political stuff,” he said.
“You really see the political situation of a Pontius Pilate in a really terrific way.”
Amazed at the depth and length Gibson went to, Tarantino praised the skill of the Passion’s cast, saying, “they just seem amazing because they’re not speaking English, and it just seems so convincing.”
Talking about first responses to the film’s extreme violence, Tarantino recalled laughing at the violence.
This wasn’t to be perverse. It was because it all just seemed to him to be over the top, he continued.
Clarifying his initial response, Tarantino indicated that laughing was a reflex, “we were just groaning-laughing at how messed up it was,” he said.
For Tarantino, who has a well-known knack for finding humour in the complexly broken and macabre3, the film is profoundly immersive.
Drawn in, Tarantino explained how he went from being sympathetic to Christ to the soldiers beating Christ.
Gibson stretched that scene out, Tarantino observed, adding he admired the reasons for why.
“They just look like the worst cops you’ve ever seen in your life. And they’re testing the whip out, and they’re passing it around.
“You’re like, this is gonna be terrible.
“Then it’s like wham. And you feel it. And then it’s another one, wham. And like, three, four, five times, and you feel every blow.”
Testifying to the scene’s impact, Tarantino said it made him acknowledge a darker side of himself.
“I didn’t know I was going to switch horses [sides]. I just did.”
Giving his own take, Ellis shared that the scene where Jesus is beaten, “was one of the most upsetting he can remember seeing.”
Crediting Mel Gibson for his “tremendous directorial job,” Tarantino recalled telling him about his reaction.
He said Gibson looked at him “like he was a nutcase.”
“Of course,” Tarantino explained, “Gibson doesn’t understand where I’m coming from on this, and I don’t know if anyone else will.”
In 2004, during an interview with LA Weekly, Tarantino said pretty much the same.
“I loved the film,” he asserted.
“I’ll tell you why. I think it actually is one of the most brilliant visual storytelling films ever made.
“So much so that when I was watching The Passion of the Christ, I turned to a friend and said, ‘This is such a Herculean leap of Mel Gibson’s talent. I think divine intervention might be part of it.”
Ellis’ interview with the all-star Hollywood director has become something of a hot topic, and none of it has to do with Tarantino’s remarks about The Passion.
Characteristically blunt, he criticised actors Matthew Lillard (Scooby Doo), Owen Wilson (Cars), and Paul Dano (War & Peace), saying he disliked them.
Dano took the biggest hit, with Tarantino saying There Will Be Blood – which is 5th on his best of list – would have been higher had Dano “been a better actor.”
The controversy spilled out across social media with Lillard calling Tarantino’s criticism of him “humbling, adding that it hurts.
“It sucks. He’d never say that to Tom Cruise.”
Criticism of Tarantino’s bluntness isn’t always consistent.
He has been called out by actresses caught up in the ‘Me Too’ Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse scandals, for not being blunt enough.
Tarantino has admitted he heard things, and has stated that he could have done more – said more.
On that note, the award-winning Hollywood director doesn’t want sex scenes in his films.
They’re a “pain to film” and generally add no real value to the storyline, the Pulp Fiction creator has previously stated.
Pondering his retirement in 2023, Tarantino (who became a new dad at the time) also said, “If it was already a bit problematic to [film those kinds of scenes] before, now it’s even more so.”
Given the current controversy, when it comes to Hollywood’s elite, Tarantino is damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t.
