I altogether thought that this was an alright film. The main theme of
the film seems to be passion, and it's a fairly nice illustration of
that.
I thought that the supposed realism was somewhat spoilt by the silly
ending. Instead of giving us baby steps of believability, we are jolted
straight into a sequence of miracles, with villains making faces better
suited to Scooby-Doo.
I also liked the colloquial Latin -- I hate how people think Latin is
utterly phonetic(-ally spelt) and profound. There is a big difference
between Classic English literature and modern colloquey -- We just have
the benefit of sound recording so that people in the future might think
English is shiter[sic] than Latin. Many people complained that the
Latin was too modern, but the characters would not have spoken
Classical Latin; Instead they would have spoken the vulgar Latin that
was later to erode classical Latin into what we consider a more
medieval(more modern) style. However, I suspect the translator may have
assumed too much and kicked the ball of translation into the long grass
by using gobbeldegook whenever difficulty arose. I'd nonetheless love
to see something similar done with Middle English.
I noticed the same technique Gibson used here as in Braveheart, of
Satan appearing amid the crowd, but becoming invisible between some
pairs of people, as did William Wallace's birdfriend.
~Iain
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