The director calls the script for the follow-up production "very ambitious."
The Passion of the Christ is far and away the biggest money-maker at the box office in the Christian genre, having delivered $370 million in North American ticket sales and a worldwide total of $612 million during its theatrical run in 2004. And it did that on a budget of just $30 million, so it has always been a question of "when," not "if" filmmaker Mel Gibson would make a sequel.
Now comes word from the director that he aims to launch production next year on the new film, which will be called The Resurrection of the Christ, and will thus focus on that part of Jesus' life.
In an interview with Deadline magazine, he stated that he wrote the screenplay together with his brother and Randall Wallace (of Braveheart fame) over a seven-year period, adding that he's "never read anything like it" and that it is "a very ambitious" project that will cover not only the resurrection of Christ, but even include the "death of the last apostle."
"And I think in order to really tell the story properly you have to really start with the fall of the angels, which means you're in another place, you're in another realm. You need to go to hell. You need to go to Sheol."
American actor Jim Caviezel, who played the Jesus character in the first movie, will reprise his role in this new one. In light of the fact that two decades have passed in the meantime, Gibson plans to use some de-aging techniques involving CGI on the star, who is now 56 years of age.
There is no firm date for the start of filming, with Gibson saying the complexities of the project will necessitate "a lot of planning" and that he is "not wholly sure (he) can pull it off," though he is determined to "take a crack at it." Christian Film Blog will follow developments with The Resurrection of the Christ and bring you updates as we get them.
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