#56 Postby TexasStooge » Thu Feb 26, 2004 8:50 am
Opening Of 'Passion' Draws Crowds
PLANO, Texas (KXAS NBC5) -- Even before sunrise, believers and nonbelievers alike poured into movie theaters around the nation on Ash Wednesday for the opening of Mel Gibson's "The Passion of The Christ."
An estimated 6,000 people filled all 20 auditoriums at a Cinemark theater in Plano to watch the film. All the tickets had been bought and donated by a local churchgoer.
Arch Bonnema, a financial planner and member of the church where Graham is pastor -- Prestonwood Baptist -- reserved the entire Cinemark Tinseltown 20 theater in town. He spent $42,000 of his own money on tickets.
"When you see the sacrifice that Jesus made, it makes you feel like, I have to do something better with my life," said Bonnema, 50, a lifelong Christian inspired to act after seeing a special screening of the movie.
"Well, it was the most important 12 hours in history and now they have it on film, and I think it is literally going to change America," Bonnema said.
A cadre of ministers, meanwhile, planned to take advantage of the interest.
"Not to preach a sermon," said Graham, "but to sum up the message and meaning of the cross. ... We anticipate that there will be a tremendous outpouring of God's favor on this movie."
Funded and directed by Gibson, the film has received decidedly mixed reviews from critics. Some have praised Gibson's total commitment to his subject: The Oscar-winning filmmaker says the movie is both an attempt to faithfully render the Gospels and a personal vision. Others see it as excessively bloody, obsessed with cruelty and unfair in its portrayal of Jews.
But following months of hype, curiosity about the movie is almost insatiable.
After seeing "The Passion" a few months ago, Bonnema called his wife, Sherry, and told her, "Honey, we've got to get as many people as we can to see this film because it's changed my life."
With her blessing, he approached Cinemark about reserving a single auditorium. Theater officials told him that would be fine, but he would need to do so before regular operating hours.
"If it's before hours, aren't all of them empty?" Bonnema recalled asking. "So I called my wife back and said, 'What do you think about getting 6,000 seats?"'
She agreed, even though she hadn't seen the film herself.
The Bonnemas gave 3,000 tickets to their church and 1,000 to the Dallas Theological Seminary.
That left them with 2,000 -- but not for long.
"I put out an e-mail to friends in the Dallas-Fort Worth area," Arch Bonnema said. "In three days, I had 23,000 requests."
Ordinarily, showing the same movie on 20 screens would be impossible because of a lack of prints, said Terrell Falk, spokeswoman for Plano-based Cinemark USA, which owns about 300 theaters in 33 states.
But in this case, Cinemark made special arrangements to borrow prints from its other area theaters.
"We'll show it early in the morning, then take them to the other theaters," Falk said.
A line started to form at the theater at 5 a.m. Most people walked out in stunned silence, others in tears.
"It shakes you to the core, even if you do believe, and I think that's really what I got out of it," moviegoer Steve Lillis said.
"I thought it was really moving. I've never seen something so graphic in my life," moviegoer Jan Newsome said.
The first public viewing at the Plano Cinemark begins at 1:15 p.m.
"I hope everybody sees it with an open mind," said Rick Pierce, 53, a Baptist who sipped coffee and chewed on a breakfast burrito at the theater before the first showing at 6:30 a.m. CST.
Across the nation, some couldn't wait for morning screenings. More than a 100 people watched the midnight showing of "The Passion" at the ArcLight Cinemas in Los Angeles.
"I'm in shock. I'm physically weak. I'm emotional," said Joseph Camerieri, a 39-year-old paralegal student from Los Angeles, who was trying to hold back tears after seeing the film.
"I think if you're a Christian it will increase your faith ten-fold in what Christ has done for you. If you're not a Christian, you'll probably treat others with more love," Camerieri said.
In the central Pennsylvania community of Bellefonte, about 50 people attended a showing after midnight. Viewers groaned as Jesus was nailed to the cross, and muffled cries could be heard during more than an hour of Jesus' torture, crucifixion and death. In the end, as Jesus rises from the grave, some in the audience quietly celebrated.
"To me, that was the important part," said Aaron Tucker, an English major at Penn State. "I'm like, 'Oh, victory!' There's more to this movie than just the violence. It's about triumph."
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! There was another person claimed to have died during the cruxifiction scene, don't know where, can't find a story to back it up with however.
its totally sold out here until then. But thats great news! This is going to be huge movement and HOLLYWOOD will NEVER FORGET THIS MOVIE 