'Behind the Scenes' Passion film goes straight to DVD

Peter T Chattaway notes that The Big Question, a behind the scenes with a difference film from The Passion of the Christ has gone straight to DVD.

A newswire from Christian News Today reports how feedback from some publicists is that it "may be too Christian for the mainstream, but not Christian enough" to be popular with the Christian market. It was originally scheduled for a wide cinematic release, but now will just go straight to DVD. It looks like the marketing ploy with this one is to position it as a discussion starter. That sounds OK in principle, but I can't help wondering if most of the people in the room for most of these discussions will already share broadly the same opinions.

The film has been doing the rounds for sometime now. It's over two years since The Passion of the Christ was released in cinemas, and as this review dates from March 2005, it's been available to some people at least since then. "The Big Question is a 75-minute documentary movie where the cast and crew from The Passion of the Christ are asked about their faith and beliefs in God". The experience of watching the film is apparently slightly surreal due to the pseudo-1st century costumes and backdrops, but very 21st century dialogue.

The film has seemingly tried to take a round table approach to the film, excluding subtitles explaining who people are to reduce the star power. Whilst this is a noble approach, it seems liable to backfire. Everyone knows who Mel Gibson is, but the guy that speaks after him is going to be even less memorable without a name or a role. If a film like this is going to really make the most of it's idea, it will have to do more than just capture it's interviewees talking in a general sense about theses issues, but somehow relate that to the film. Otherwise, The Passion angle is all about backdrop and marketing; the actual content could simply be achieved by taking a camera onto the streets.

Matt