I have to say, The Beaver and Gibson’s performance in it were really good. It felt creepy to be watching him, certainly, but in that movie that creepiness worked.
Oye! May you turn into a kugel, and your King a cat, so that he may eat you and die, and we’ll be rid of both of you!
Maybe he’ll play Yehudah’s dad. It’s my understanding he was a teenager…but I think Mel is too young for that role.
I think the Rugrats did it better. “A Macca-baby’s gotta do, what a Macca-baby’s gotta do!”
I actually might be interested in this. Except you’re right about Joe Eszterhas, which could be the kiss of death.
He would play Antiochus well, but having Mel Gibson play a guy who deep-fried a Jewish family (I may be confusing him with another Antiochus), wold get him in even-deeper shit no matter how well-played.
Mattathias would be better, even as a cameo. The less screen time. the better.
I agree with this. It’s a very underrated movie and performance.
I’ve never seen Braveheart, but Apocalypto was my favorite film of the year it came out. I don’t excuse anything he’s said or done in real life, but in reel life, he’s enormously talented. Edit to add, so I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and wait to judge the final product.
Both posts stellar.
Maybe he’s going to play an anti-semite who’s in therapy and has a Judah Maccabbee puppet while others in his therapy group reenact the story of Chanukkah with their puppets. (Avenue Jew)
I’m picturing Danny Glover running around screaming ‘I’m too old for this shit!’ in Hebrew.
‘They may tak’ oor lives, but they’ll never tak’ oor troosers!’ Yeah, this script practically writes itself.
I LOL’d at the thread title. Brilliant.
Do that many people really pay attention to this stuff, to the extent that they’ll remember it while watching him on-screen?
I am vaguely aware that Mel Gibson has an alcohol problem and has made some anti-Semitic remarks. Never heard about the “pack of niggers thing”, and I really don’t know anything more about the “domestic violence stuff” than that his (ex?) wife accused him of it.
I mean, if you read People magazine every week or something, sure. But do most people really follow celebrity drama that closely, enough that it would make a difference to ticket sales?
It was fairly big news to Jewish people. I wonder how the “pack of niggers” comment, which I vaguely remember went over to African Americans.
He pleaded no contest to the domestic violence charges, and there were photos of his ex-girlfriend (not his wife) black and blue from a beating.
There were also audio tapes released of phone calls in which Gibson admitted to having punched her in the face while she was holding their baby, and made a lot of other rambling, ranting monologues threatening to rape her and kill her and included a comment about her “getting raped by a pack of wild niggers,” among other crazy things. The phone tapes are off the charts and truly indefensible.
Back in 1980 you had an anti-Israel, pro Palestinian terrorist Marxist supporter named Vanessa Redgrave play the part of Auschwitz survivor Fania Fenelon in the tv movie “Playing for Time”. She was cast despite Fenelon’s objections.
I suppose a film about the Maccabees could be done well. But somehow I feel it will be a flop between Wolfgang Peterson’s “Troy” and Oliver Stone’s “Alexander”.
You missed the best bit…
[QUOTE=Mel Gibson]
I’ll burn the goddamn house down, but blow me first
[/QUOTE]
If you compare Gibson’s comments about secular Jews to Judah Maccabee in relation to the Hellenized Jews of that period, it’s not a bad fit.
How about Ike Turner?
The conflict between the Maccabees and the Hellenized Jews isn’t a million miles away from Gibson’s hardcore traditionalist Catholicism, and his rejection of Vatican II either.