Agenzia Fides

Andrea Tornielli - “La PASSIONE, i Vangeli e il film di Mel Gibson”
(The PASSIONE, The Gospels and Mel Gibson’s Film)
Publishers PIEMME Preface by Vittorio Messori, postscript by Gianfranco Ravasi.

Rome (Fides Service) - After making record box-office takings in America Mel Gibons’s fim “The Passion” began to show about a month ago in Italy. The film has been the cause of an unprecedented profound cultural debate in America and then in Europe: on the one hand by Protestants and Catholic, on the other by Jewish organisations accusing the film of ebing anti-Semitic. Starting with the most dramatic scenes, Andrea Tornielli has constructed in his book a gripping confrontation with the gospels of the four evangelists and other historical exegetic documents. The book is an thrilling journey introduced by Vittorio Messori (“The Gospels in this film are not legend: they are factual chronicles ”), enriched with interventions and quotations by scholars and members of the ecclesial world. The book ends with an important contribution by the Biblical expert Gianfranco Ravasi, who writes: “The best way to discover the secret soul of the film is to re-read the only complete and coherent evidence of those hours, the testimony of the Gospels”. Tornielli’s book is an indispensable guide to understanding the film, to enter the most memorable scenes and grasp their rich symbology. (S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 7/5/2004 - Righe 13; Parole 191).