JUDGMENT DAY AMID THE BRUTALITY, SCENES OF STARTLING BEAUTY.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Critic

AS YOU MAY have heard, Mel Gibson's ``The Passion of the Christ'' is intense. So much so that it does not allow room for vast portions of the Greatest Story Ever Told to be conveyed.

A full and objectively true rendering? Gibson, who co-wrote ``Passion's'' script with Benedict Fitzgerald, was fooling himself more than anybody if he actually felt that's what he was doing here. What he has created is indelible moving imagery of a Christ that suffered for all of the sins of mankind.

The relentless scourgings, beatings, piercings, pummelings and so much more that actor Jim Caviezel as Jesus is subjected to bestow a pattern of unendurable pain. (Credit should be given to the film's greatest miracle workers - makeup effects and designers Keith VanderLaan and Greg Cannom.)

These horrifying, often over-the-top scenes leave precious little space for the love and forgiveness in Jesus' teachings, which are only shown in flashbacks. I can't think of any movie that has rendered the pain of all flesh more vividly than this one does.

That's quite an accomplishment - though arguably not enough of one for a movie that is so highly anticipated by so many people. I can only guess here, but it's likely many Christians will be strongly moved by this depiction of their Lord's sacrifice. (Director Gibson, who apparently has never met a significant slow-motion shot he didn't like, has a blunt but effective way of formally underlining points he feels must be made.)

I can say, however, that ``Passion'' doesn't make the locals look very good. Since the film provides very little historical context of the time - the threat Jesus posed to the Jewish power structure and the Roman oppression - the uninformed viewer may be left wondering why there were so many of the snaring Pharisees and screaming rock-throwers. Yes, the film does have Jewish characters who love Jesus, who lobby for his fair trial, and who despise what they see being done to him - whether they believe that he is who he claims to be or not. But overall the film portrays them as token exceptions to the mob rule.

However, the average Roman is shown in an even worse light. The sadists who flay Jesus into hamburger, crowned him with thorns and harass his every step along the stations of the cross are a cretinous, drunken lot. But the big difference here lies with the ruling classes. Pontius Pilate (Bulgarian actor Hristo Naumov Shopov) is drawn as a politically conflicted functionary who frets about how crucifying Jesus will affect his standing in Rome. This pragmatic approach of his may be seen as representing the banality of evil. But as the most rational and conflicted character in the movie, Pilate also appears to enjoy much more human dimension than Caiphus, the singularly hate-driven Jewish high priest (played by Italian actor Mattia Sbragia).

And even after the hour-plus of graphic brutality and stereotyping that so punishingly lead up to it, the Crucifixion scene itself is as powerfully and beautifully staged as any on film. (That's the director's hand, by the way, driving in the first nail.) The Resurrection is shown, nicely if abruptly, as something of a quick coda, but the agony and absolution of the Crucifixion scene has already gotten across a sense of transcendence.

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

Three stars

In a nutshell: Mel Gibson's greatest accomplishment is his visceral rendering of the last 12 hours of Jesus' life.

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) Jim Caviezel, left, and Jarreth Merz in ``The Passion of the Christ''

(2) While much of the film consists of a violence depiction of Jesus' final hours, ``The Passion of the Christ'' does reference some other New Testament events, including the Last Supper, with Jim Caviezel, second from right, as Jesus.