Mel Gibson details the sequel to The Passion of the Christ, and it's lunar

The director was a guest on Joe Rogan's podcast. He described at length the vision of the project, as ambitious as it was confused.

The Passion of Christreleased 20 years ago in the cinema, will it be entitled to a sequel? Mel Gibson has been talking about it for a few years now, but filming, which was initially scheduled to start in 2023, keeps getting pushed back. And it won't be for 2025 either, contrary to what we announced a few months ago.

“I hope next year“, declared the filmmaker, guest of the famous Joe Rogan podcast for the release of his new film, High risk flightan action thriller starring Mark Wahlberg. “It takes a lot because it's an acid trip. I've never read anything like this“.

Mel Gibson has been working on the script for this sequel with his brother Donal and Randall Wallace, the screenwriter of Braveheart, for almost ten years. This is not the first time he has used the term “acid trip” to qualify this project, but with the new details he gave to Joe Rogan we better understand its excess, and why it is taking so long to come to fruition.

The film now has a title, The Resurrection of Christand this is how Gibson presents it:

“My brother and I, along with Randall, joined forces. I think to tell the story the right way, you really have to start with the fall of the angels, which means you go somewhere else, you're in another world. You have to go to hell. We must go to Sheol“.

“You have to find a way to show that without it being laughable or too obvious. I've been thinking about it for a long time, it's not going to be easy and it's going to take a lot of preparation. And to be honest I'm not entirely sure I'll achieve it, it's super ambitious. But I will try to do it…“

During the discussion, we understand that Mel Gibson's vision will require the use of numerous special effects. Also to rejuvenate digitally Jim Caviezelwho will reprise the role of Jesus 20 years after the first film which ended with his crucifixion.

The director gave further details about the film, which will end with the death of the last apostle.

“It's the story of the resurrection. It's non-linear. It's hard to understand so it has to be put in a framework where we also answer other questions. We have to juxtapose the event within it -even with everything else to make it make a little sense, which is hard to do. It took us 6 or 7 years to finish the script.”

“For me the gospels are history. People say he never existed, but he did. And there are other historical accounts, apart from those in the Bible, which corroborate the fact that he really existed. All the apostles preferred to die rather than deny their belief. And no one dies for a lie. Who comes back three days after being killed in public? didn’t do that!”

During the 2h20 that he spent with Joe Rogan, Mel Gibson also reminded us that he remained a controversial personality despite his return to favor in Hollywood. At random, he explained that he did not believe in the theory of evolution, was against abortion, and made conspiratorial remarks about the Vatican, the treatment of cancer and even the fires ravaging California.

Mel Gibson has since revealed that his house burned down while he was recording the podcast.

The Passion of Christ had sparked a huge controversy when it was released in 2004, but was also a huge commercial success with 612 million dollars in revenue worldwide for a budget of 30 million. At this stage, nothing is known about the financing of the sequel.