"people read or hear bits & pieces & accept it as "gospel truth" -- & it's just made up...it plants bad seed & confuses the gullible. Then - true horrors - Hollywood will make a movie from it!!!!!"
Remembering Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" being reviewed by Mark Kermode on BBC Radio 5, they also had on the programme the head of the British Board of Film Classification, and they were discussing film adaptations of the Bible.
Said BBFC head explained that if there were to be a film of the Bible made, which didn't gloss over things, re. "The Greatest Story Ever Told", and all that jazz - using the actual Bible story as the screenplay, including the Old Testament - he said that the BBFC wouldn't be able to rate, and therefore allow such a film's release.
Because the sex & violence (including ultra-gory scenes that'd make "Hostel" seem like "Mary Poppins"; Hosea 13:16 etc) would result in such - if it were shown in even private film clubs, as per an 'R-18'* rating - being seized by the police under the Obscene Publications Act.
*- 'R-18', re. hardcore porn, is available only in licenced sex shops.
@Caustic Gnostic
"Mel Brooks, on the other hand...."
I'd KILL for Mr. Brooks - via his company Brooksfilms - to do a parody of "The Greatest Story Ever Told", especially considering how he was directly influenced by Monty Python, re that 'Inquisition' song & dance skit in his past film "History of the World (Part I)"; "Life of Brian" and all that jazz...!
A thought: It's hard to believe that Mel - via Brooksfilms - was responsible for the delightful literary romance "84 Charing Cross Road" (I remember reading the serialisation by Helene Hanff in the "Reader's Digest" years & years ago...!); then at the other extreme, the visceral & superb David Cronenberg film "The Fly".
A tip o' the hat to ya, Mr. Brooks.
