c. 2005 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) “The Passion Recut” is not “The Passion Lite.”

Viewers no longer see the nail going through Christ’s hands as he is attached to the cross. And the excruciating torture scene in which Jesus is flogged nearly to death by Roman soldiers is shortened.

But Mel Gibson’s less bloody director’s cut of his blockbuster film “The Passion of the Christ” loses little of the visceral emotional power of the earlier release. This is still different from the scores of other Jesus films in its unflinching portrayal of Christ’s last sufferings in the context of torture and crucifixion in a first-century Roman province.

On the contrary: Taking out six gory minutes removes the focus from what some considered over-the-top, almost desensitizing displays of violence.

Instead, it moves moviegoers toward a greater appreciation of the subtler treasures of the movie, such as the beautifully expressed relationship between Maia Morgenstern’s Mary and James Caviezel’s Jesus.

Less (blood and torture) is more when one can better appreciate the enormity of Christ’s suffering through the almost unbearable pain of a mother losing her son. No longer numbed by the flogging scene preceding it, the tears will flow even more freely in the scene juxtaposing a younger Mary comforting Jesus as a child after he fell with the older Mary before a bloodied Jesus carrying his cross to the crucifixion.

The scene of Mary kissing her dying son on the cross, and then standing back with blood on her face, is far more affecting than the deleted moments of a nail tearing through flesh and thick wood.

What will be interesting to see is whether moviegoers are ready for a toned-down “Passion.” This is America, after all, and less violence is generally not considered the way to woo ticket buyers from their couches to the big screen.

But that, in addition to the hope this could be an annual theatrical release during the Lenten season, was what the film’s producers were counting on.

“By softening some of its more wrenching aspects, I hope to make my film and its message of love available to a wider audience,” Gibson says in an ad for the movie.

The cuts were not enough for the Motion Picture Association of America to drop the film’s rating from R to PG-13. Newmarket Films decided to release the picture unrated, but several chains are enforcing the R rating, a sensible decision.

Even toned down, the torture and crucifixion scenes are powerful stuff.

This is a movie so dependent on the faith and sensitivities viewers bring to the theater that no critic can put a grade on it.

However, personally, as this “Passion” enters into the canon of religious films that are watched again and again, I would prefer that “The Passion Recut” become the standard version.

Less violence. More love. Nothing wrong with that picture.

(David Briggs is the religion reporter for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland.)

KRE/PH END RNS