49 Fun Facts About The Passion of the Christ

In The Passion of the Christ, what do the guards force onto Jesus's head after the scourging?

A crown of thorns, a jibe at the charge that he called himself a king: in Matthew's Gospel his tormentors kneel in front of him and hail him as 'king of the Jews'.

Who plays Jesus in The Passion of the Christ?

Jim Caviezel. He says Mel Gibson phoned after offering him the part to warn that he might never work in Hollywood again if he took it.

Which Italian actress plays Mary Magdalene in The Passion of the Christ?

Monica Bellucci. Her Magdalene is shown as the woman Jesus saved from stoning, though the Gospels never say the two were the same person.

In The Passion of the Christ, Mary quotes which Jewish ritual?

Passover Seder. Maia Morgenstern, who plays Mary, suggested the line: sensing that her son is in danger, Mary asks why this night is different from every other night.

What span of time does The Passion of the Christ mainly cover?

Jesus's final twelve hours. Earlier moments, such as his boyhood with Mary, arrive only as brief flashbacks, some of them cut into the crucifixion itself.

Where does The Passion of the Christ open?

In the Garden of Gethsemane. Temple guards arrest Jesus there and, in a scene the Gospels don't have, hang him off a bridge by his chains on the way to his trial.

In the opening scene of The Passion of the Christ, what does Jesus crush under his heel?

A serpent, which slithers toward him as he prays. Stamping on its head echoes Genesis 3:15, where God tells the serpent that the woman's offspring will crush its head.

What are the three languages of the dialogue in The Passion of the Christ?

Aramaic, Hebrew and Latin. Gibson first planned no subtitles at all, saying 'the image will overcome the language barrier', and gave way before the film was released.

In The Passion of the Christ, whose crude jokes were deliberately left without subtitles?

The Roman soldiers'. Translator William Fulco, a Jesuit professor, took their curses from obscene graffiti found in Roman army camps and said fluent Latinists' 'ears will fall off'.

Why did Mel Gibson avoid modern languages in The Passion of the Christ?

Viewers would anticipate the lines, he said: a familiar verse in modern speech 'makes you want to stand up and shout out the next line', as when you hear 'To be or not to be'.

In the title The Passion of the Christ, what did the word 'Passion' first mean?

Suffering. It comes from the Late Latin passio, 'suffering', and named Christ's ordeal on the cross before English used it for strong feeling.

In The Passion of the Christ, whom does the crowd choose to free instead of Jesus?

Barabbas, a convicted murderer. Pilate then has Jesus scourged instead, hoping that will satisfy the crowd without an execution; it only feeds the demand for a crucifixion.

In The Passion of the Christ, who urges Pilate to spare Jesus and later provides cloths to clean up his blood?

His wife, Claudia. Matthew's Gospel gives Pilate's wife a single unnamed line, a warning after a troubling dream; the name Claudia was attached to her by later tradition.

What traditional names does The Passion of the Christ give the two thieves crucified beside Jesus?

Dismas and Gesmas. Neither name is in the Gospels: tradition made Dismas the thief who repents, and in the film a crow swoops on Gesmas after he mocks Jesus.

In The Passion of the Christ, who is pressed into helping Jesus carry the cross?

Simon of Cyrene. He starts out unwilling, a bystander sneered at as a Jew, and the film makes him a full character who ends the climb moved by the man beside him.

In The Passion of the Christ, what does a woman on the road to Golgotha do for Jesus?

Wipes his bloodied face with her veil, which comes away bearing his image. She is Veronica, a figure from Catholic tradition and the sixth Station of the Cross, not the Gospels.

In The Passion of the Christ, what sets off the earthquake that splits the Temple when Jesus dies?

A single drop of rain. The camera follows it down from high above the cross like a tear from heaven, and the ground shakes the moment it lands.

Which figure in The Passion of the Christ did Mel Gibson cast a woman, Rosalinda Celentano, to play?

Satan. Celentano plays the devil as a bald, pale, androgynous figure who drifts through the crowds and, during the scourging, cradles a grotesque baby in a parody of the Madonna.

In The Passion of the Christ, what form do the demons take that hound Judas out of Jerusalem?

Children. A pack of taunting children with demonic faces hounds Judas until he hangs himself outside the city, a torment the Gospels never mention.

Which Gospel is the only one to include the trial before Herod shown in The Passion of the Christ?

Luke. In his account Herod has long hoped to watch Jesus perform a miracle; met with silence, he mocks him and sends him back, and he and Pilate end the day as friends.

Which Old Testament book provides the opening epigraph of The Passion of the Christ?

Isaiah. The film opens on the verse from chapter 53 that ends 'by his wounds we are healed', written centuries before the crucifixion and read by Christians as foretelling it.

Which scene in The Passion of the Christ comes from the visions of nun Anne Catherine Emmerich?

Mary wiping up the blood. In Emmerich's visions, written down by the poet Clemens Brentano, the two Marys kneel at the pillar to mop the scourging ground with linen, a scene found in none of the four Gospels.

Mel Gibson told his cinematographer to make The Passion of the Christ look like the paintings of which artist?

Caravaggio. Caleb Deschanel gave the film the painter's chiaroscuro, and Gibson, asked how audiences would cope with no subtitles, replied that Caravaggio's paintings have none and 'people get the message'.

Which southern Italian city of ancient cave dwellings stood in for Jerusalem in The Passion of the Christ?

Matera. Pasolini had shown the way forty years earlier, filming his own life of Christ among its Sassi cave districts; Gibson shot the crucifixion there and Judas's suicide in the ghost town of Craco nearby.

Sets left over from which Martin Scorsese film were re-dressed for The Passion of the Christ?

Gangs of New York. Scorsese had just finished shooting at the same Rome studio, and Gibson's designers turned part of what he left behind into their Jerusalem, saving time and money.

Who paid for The Passion of the Christ, a film no studio backed?

Its director. Mel Gibson and his company Icon were the film's sole backers, and the tens of millions they spent on the shoot and the marketing were earned back within five days of its opening.

At which Rome studio was the soundstage work for The Passion of the Christ shot?

Cinecittà, founded by Mussolini in 1937. Allied bombs damaged it and refugees were living in its studios when MGM arrived to film Quo Vadis, the epic that made it 'Hollywood on the Tiber'.

By his own account, during which scene was the star of The Passion of the Christ struck by lightning?

The Sermon on the Mount. He says it was the last shot of the film, on the fifth take, and that the strike left him needing two heart operations before the damage was finally put right in 2014.

Which injury did the star of The Passion of the Christ suffer when the cross fell on him?

A dislocated shoulder. The take stayed in the film: he says he was straining to get his arm back over the beam, which on screen looks as if Jesus is embracing his cross.

The Passion of the Christ earned Oscar nominations for its score, its cinematography and which other craft?

Makeup. Turning the star into the scourged Jesus took eight-hour sessions that began at two in the morning, yet the Oscar went to Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events.

What stopped Mel Gibson from calling his film simply The Passion in the United States?

Miramax had registered that title for a film of Jeanette Winterson's novel The Passion, a romance of the Napoleonic wars, so Gibson's became The Passion of Christ and later gained its second 'the'.

Which studio passed on The Passion of the Christ amid protests, then released it on home video anyway?

20th Century Fox. It held first option on the film and passed as Jewish leaders called it anti-Semitic, then sold 4.1 million DVDs of it in a single day.

On which day of the church calendar did The Passion of the Christ open in the United States?

Ash Wednesday, 25 February 2004. The day begins Lent, the season of penance that leads to Good Friday, so a film about the crucifixion opened just as churchgoers turned to its subject.

Which 2024 film ended The Passion of the Christ's 20 years as North America's top-grossing R-rated film?

Deadpool & Wolverine, which needed only ten days. The film that overtook a Gospel epic stars an antihero who spends it calling himself 'Marvel Jesus'.

Which critic praised The Passion of the Christ while calling it the most violent film he had ever seen?

Roger Ebert. A former altar boy, he wrote that anyone but Jesus on that cross would have earned the film an NC-17, yet audiences polled by CinemaScore graded it A+.

Which verdict on The Passion of the Christ was attributed to Pope John Paul II?

"It is as it was", as Peggy Noonan reported it in The Wall Street Journal after a private screening. Weeks later the pope's secretary insisted that the Holy Father had 'told no one his opinion of this film'.

Which animated series answered The Passion of the Christ with an episode called 'The Passion of the Jew'?

South Park, five weeks after the film opened. Kyle is appalled by the violence, Cartman prays to a poster of Mel Gibson, and Stan and Kenny take a bus to Malibu to demand their $18 back.

What was The Passion Recut, released in March 2005?

A cut with less violence. Gibson trimmed the most graphic footage hoping for a PG-13, the ratings board still called it an R, and it went out unrated to takings of just $567,692.

In 2006 Entertainment Weekly ranked The Passion of the Christ the most controversial film ever, ahead of which Kubrick film?

A Clockwork Orange came second. Kubrick's 1971 film was blamed for copycat attacks in Britain, and the director had it pulled from cinemas there himself.

What title did Mel Gibson announce in 2025 for his sequel to The Passion of the Christ?

The Resurrection of the Christ, unveiled on Joe Rogan's podcast in January 2025. That autumn the whole cast was replaced, because de-ageing the original actors with digital effects would have cost too much.

In The Passion of the Christ, what does Pilate do before the crowd as he orders the crucifixion?

He washes his hands in front of the crowd and declares himself innocent of this man's blood. The gesture, from Matthew's Gospel, gave English the phrase 'to wash your hands of' something.

In The Passion of the Christ, what does Judas do with his silver after the arrest?

Tries to give it back. Stricken with guilt, he begs the priests to take their thirty pieces of silver and free Jesus; they refuse, and he flings the money at them.

What did Benedict Fitzgerald, co-writer of The Passion of the Christ, accuse Mel Gibson of in a 2008 lawsuit?

Underpayment. His suit said he had accepted a small salary because Gibson told him the film had a budget of only a few million dollars.

In The Passion of the Christ, what does Jesus do after Peter slices off a temple guard's ear?

Heals the wound, then orders Peter to put away his sword, warning that all who take the sword will perish by it.

In 2004 The Passion of the Christ had the second-biggest R-rated opening weekend ever, behind which sequel?

The Matrix Reloaded, which had opened to $91.8 million the year before. A subtitled film in dead languages came within $8 million of it.

In a flashback in The Passion of the Christ, what is Jesus the carpenter shown building?

A tall table. He is making it, with chairs to follow, for a rich customer, and the film plays the modern-height furniture as a joke: nothing like it stood in a first-century Judean home.

In which country was The Passion of the Christ cleared by censors for Christian audiences only?

Malaysia. After talks between the government and church leaders, the film was allowed in specially designated cinemas for Christians only.

Before The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson had won the Best Director Oscar for which film?

Braveheart, his 1995 epic about William Wallace. Christianity Today's reviewer pointed out that there he kept the hero's fatal wounds just out of frame, a restraint he dropped entirely for the crucifixion.

A scene cut from The Passion of the Christ has Jesus tell which group to weep for themselves rather than him?

The women of Jerusalem. The meeting is the eighth Station of the Cross; Gibson filmed it, with Jesus stopping on the road to address the mourners, then cut it and kept it back for the DVD.