HEAVEN & MEL; Mel Gibson's film The PassionOf Christ opens this week amid controversy over its allegedanti-semitism, but, as NeilMackay finds out, there's no such thing as bad publicity

From: The Sunday Herald | Date: February 22, 2004 | Copyright information

MEL Gibson must be a fan of Father Ted. There's an episode of the cult comedy show in which Ted and idiot sidekick Father Dougal are press-ganged into staging a protest outside a cinema on Craggy Island against a movie called The Passion Of St Tibulus. They handcuff themselves to railings and half-heartedly chant "Down with this sort of thing!" Nobody had the slightest intention of seeing the movie, but Ted and Dougal's inept protest attracts such attention that they manage to turn the film into the island's biggest ever grossing movie.

That's pretty much the story of Gibson's latest film ...

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