First, just got a note from Italy, it sounds like they won't be able to come afterall. Daniela's father isn't doing very well, and is scheduled to have an operation early June. Here's hoping that a) he gets better and b) they're able to come next year.
Secondly, I just got back from The Passion of the Christ. Dewey & I went after hanging out at Beth, Leslie & Heather's place for dinner and such. My first impression is that I didn't really like it. Too many flashbacks, and if I didn't have a good understanding of the story I would have been very confused. Granted, these are my first impressions and those after hearing a lot about the film from others who had seen it. Also, it wasn't as gruesome as I was expecting - not that it wasn't gruesome, I was simply expecting worse. Perhaps I'll have a different / more insight after it sinks in some.
I agree with the flashback thing, that was overdone, as was the whole devil stuff. That whole joke with the table seemed a bit odd in the one flashback. Also, sitting in the front row for subtitled movies is not fun. Overall, though, I thought it was decently good, and I think that it's just hillarious that after all those studios passed on the movie, it managed to become the top grossing movie of the year in just five days (admittedly, it's fairly early in the year, but still; and the fact that about half of all ticket sales were for that one movie, that's really impressive).
I can understand why the studios would pass on the movie. While it definitly had a likelyhood of producing a very good return, it had an even greater risk than other movies. Good old risk vs. return.
In terms of soaking in, I still don't think I really liked it as a movie goes. Not because what they did was bad, but because I still feel it was missing some things. Granted, I wouldn't expect nor would it be possible to explain the whole story, that's what the book is for afterall. But, I feel as thou more explaination, not necessarily a lot more, but some more along the way would have been good - would have made people thirst to know even more.
Well, if you look at some other movies that Hollywood has made, ones that it hasn't come anywhere near making the money back off of (such as Gigli, which just swept the Razzies, or anything Kevin Costner touches over the last ten years or so) -- Hollywood really does not have a good track record. At all. Or if by risk, you meant the risk that came from being associated with a Christian movie, well, that type of risk hasn't stopped them from producing other sorts of movies (and, frankly, most people don't pay attention to what studio releases what, they don't care; though I know there are people out there boycotting assorted studios for one reason or another). Yeah, the movie was lacking in several areas. I thought most of what it did cover was quite good though (except the flashbacks and devil stuff). Oh, and in case you haven't heard, ABC is going to be running a piece that was titled "Judas" though I think they changed the name ... it's going to be exploring how Judas was "misunderstood" et cetera et cetera ...