This film tells the story of the last 12 hours in the life of Jesus (Caviezel), on the day of his crucifixion in Jerusalem. This film's script is based upon several sources, including the diaries of St. Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) as collected in the book, "The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ", "The Mystical City of God" by St. Mary of Agreda, and the New Testament books of John, Luke, Mark and Matthew.

The film opens in the Garden of Olives (Gethsemane) where Jesus has gone to pray after the Last Supper. Jesus resists Satan's temptations. Betrayed by Judas Iscariot, Jesus is arrested and taken back to within the city walls of Jerusalem where the leaders of the Pharisees confront him with accusations of blasphemy and his trial results in a condemnation to death. Jesus is brought before Pilate, the Roman Governor of Palestine, who listens to the accusations leveled at him by the Pharisees. Realizing he is confronting a political conflict, Pilate defers to King Herod in the matter. Herod returns Jesus to Pilate who gives the crowd a choice between Jesus and the criminal Barrabas. The crowd chooses to have Barrabas set free and to condemn Jesus. Jesus is handed over to the Roman soldiers and flagellated. Unrecognizable now, he is brought back before Pilate, who presents him to the crowd as if to say "is this not enough?" It is not. Pilate washes his hands of the entire dilemma, ordering his men to do as the crowd wishes. Jesus is presented with the cross and is ordered to carry it through the streets of Jerusalem all the way up to Golgotha. On Golgotha, Jesus is nailed to the cross and undergoes his last temptation - the fear that he has been abandoned by his Father. He overcomes his fear, looks at Mary, his Holy Mother, and makes the pronouncement which only she can fully understand, "it is accomplished." He then dies: "into Thy hands I commend my Spirit."

I am at a lost as to why people claim this movie is so good, I can see why it did so well but not why people thought it was such a great movie. I think the reason why most people claim the movie was so brilliant is because it meant something to them and not because of its actually filming. The movie is overly violent with no purpose other than to shock the audience into apathy and creating a controversy that eventually lead to huge box office numbers. I am not a big religious person but I don't think Christ would want people glorifying his death but rather his life and his teachings. One does not need to see this gross and utterly pointless savagery. The best moments of the film are easily the peaceful scenes in between the savagery and blood letting. The film could have done like that entirely peaceful with the teachings of Christ and been just as powerful and maybe more loved. The movie does nothing more than draw on your own personal beliefs to affirm itself, it has nothing to offer itself except the savage beating and death of a man in an overly gratuitous manner. It simply doesn't stand alone the audience brought the story in with them, if you strip the audience of this knowledge before they saw the movie they would be disgusted by the movie and hate it. They do not even attempt to try telling any back story, rather relying on the audience to know it before hand so they can assault you with images of violence. Sure the movie is brilliantly shot, from a technical standpoint the movie is gorgeous but this movie is a mockery of everything Christ would have stood for as he was for love and not for such brutal savagery. The movie is nothing more than sensationalism garbage and was painful to watch as it easily one of the worst films ever made in the history of Hollywood.
0 stars out of 5