In Praise of Mel Gibson

In Praise of Mel Gibson

Mel Gibson is a hero. I do not mean he is my hero, or a hero to any particular group, but symbolically, he is an American hero. There is another symbolic American hero named Howard Roark, who, though a fictional character, is the same kind of hero as Mel Gibson.

The author of the book in which Howard Roark appears is another of those same kind of heroes. Her name was Ayn Rand, and the name of the book is The Fountainhead.

Ayn Rand would not have liked Mel Gibson's movie. Ayn Rand was an atheist. Mel Gibson may never have read Ayn Rand's book, and certainly would not have agreed with her atheism; Mel Gibson is a staunch Roman Catholic.

Moral Courage

Nevertheless, these three, A Roman Catholic, An Atheist, and a fictional architect are all heroes of the same kind. They all chose to do what they believed was right to do, in the face of all opposition and criticism, risking their effort, their time, their reputation, and their resources to pursue what they believed, refusing to be dissuaded from their pursuit or discouraged by the opinions or scorn of the experts, the authorities, or even their peers.

From the beginning, the experts, the, "movie moguls," and the critics opposed Mr. Gibson. Every possible criticism and prediction of failure was publicly launched against his project. Unable to obtain financing from any other source, he invested his own money, and who knows how much time and effort in the pursuit of his vision.

And he succeeded. Marvelously, wonderfully, and victoriously, he succeeded; like Rand, like Roark, he succeeded by doing what he believed in.

Of all the things for which the product of Mel Gibson's efforts, The Passion of the Christ, has been praised, the most important one, the one that makes him a true hero, his moral courage, has all but been ignored.

The Reward

Oh, he will be rewarded for that success, but not by those who discouraged him, not by those who refused to support him, and not by those who criticized him. He will be rewarded by those who enjoy the product of his efforts, as he ought to be.

According to Penelope Patsuris' article, (Forbes 03.03.04) What Mel's Passion Will Earn Him: "At the close of its fifth day in theaters, the movie officially grossed $125.2 million, and industry experts anticipate that the international box office sales could hit $650 million by the end of its run."

"Gibson and his Icon Productions outfit provided the film's sole backing," spending a combined total of $45 million on production and advertising. Combined world returns of $650 million are predicted, meaning, a conservative 40% minus his investment should net Mr. Gibson about $215 million. Since he will also receive a percentage of "Passion" merchandise, the ultimate share of the Christian retail market of $4.2 billion dollars should be considerable.

When I said at the end of an article criticizing the movie, "There is one fact about the movie I like very much. I am delighted that Mr. Gibson is going to make a bundle ... There are few things a free-market lover enjoys more than to see someone's investment and efforts make a profit. I am delighted Mel's efforts and money have produced something that so many people find of value," I was criticized by the same individuals who otherwise praised the film, because I only found value in the movie's profitability.

The idea that something is of real value unless it makes money is the opposite of all American values. Nothing proves the value of anything like the profit that represents the voluntary payment of all the individuals who freely choose to buy it.

While I personally would not pay a dime to see The Passion of the Christ and have not been reticent about my reasons (A Passion for Pain | Brutal, bloody and thin-skinned | Passion Prattle | A Catholic Passion | Not A Bible Story) I know how to objectively evaluate Mr Gibson's work.

Is The Passion of the Christ really worth the millions of dollars Mel Gibson will make? According to all those who are willing to shell out hard cash to watch this movie, it is worth every penny. Who else should decide? What other measure would truly reflect what this film is worth to those who actually pay for it?

An American Success

Whatever else The Passion of the Christ is, it is one of the most controversial movies ever. Everyone is saying something about this movie, and everything is being said, from calling it "Sublime" to saying, "I Detest This Film With a Passion".

America is one of the few counties in the world where a film with this level of controversy can still me made without coming under the review of some government agency or another. More importantly, America is probably the only country left where the kind of controversy found in our press and media is possible, where virtually anything can still be said, and has been. More importantly than that, it is a country where none of these opinions matter except to those who choose to consider them. No matter what anybody says about this film, anyone who chooses to can and will see it, and nobody who chooses not to will be required to see it.

While the pundits argue about the surprising (to them) success of this movie [it gets free advertising by the Christian leaders, it appeals to those who love violence, it appeals to the religious] if any, all, or none of these are true does not matter. The success of The Passion of the Christ is attributable to one thing, the efforts of one man, investing his utmost ability to produce what he envisioned, investing his resources to produce it with the best technical quality possible, and advertising that product faithfully. That success (or failure) is manifested by how many Americans freely decide it is a product they want and will find of value to them. (Ultimately, that probably determines its success on the world market as well, because, had it flopped here, it is unlikely it would have succeeded greatly elsewhere.)

Is the The Passion of the Christ a great movie? That is a question to be answered elsewhere, and in time, it will be. What is without question is that the The Passion of the Christ a great human achievement by a great American hero, who cannot possibly be rewarded too much.

Biographical Note:

Mel Gibson was born in Peekskill, New York, on January 3, 1956. His father, Hutton Gibson, moved the family from New York to Sydney, New South Wales, Australia in 1968. He married Robin Moore on June 7, 1980. They have seven children: Hannah, twins Edward and Christian, William, Louis, Milo and Tommy.

Earnings history:
Mad Max (1979) $15,000 (Australia)
Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981) $120,000 (Australia)
Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985) $1,200,000, (Australia)
Lethal Weapon 3 (1992) $10,000,000
Ransom (1996) $20,000,000
Conspiracy Theory (1997) $20,000,000
The Patriot (2000) $25,000,000 (USA)

—Reginald Firehammer (3/5/04)

Linda Lovelace

Linda Lovelace

2/16/87 People magazine:

TROUBLE: AWAITING A LIVER TRANSPLANT, LINDA LOVELACE MARCHIANO STRUGGLES TO CLOSE THE BOOK ON HER PAST

By Toby Kahn

Any day now the little black medical alarm Linda Lovelace Marchiano carries around in her purse will start beeping. If it doesn't, she will die. It's as simple as that.

Last November the 38-year-old star of Deep Throat, the most successful porn film ever made, was told she needed a liver transplant. She has been anxiously waiting for a liver to become available ever since. Once the beeper does go off, Linda and her husband, Larry, will have just four hours to get from their home in suburban Long Island to the Presbyterian-University Hospital in Pittsburgh where the 15-hour procedure will take place.

Marchiano's liver problem was discovered last September when she entered a New York hospital to have a double radical mastectomy. That operation, which has been postponed until after the transplant, was necessary because of silicone injections that her first husband, Chuck Traynor, insisted she have during the early '70s. ''There are all kinds of lumps on my breasts, but the doctors don't know for sure if they're cysts, silicone or cancer,'' says Linda. ''I spent quite a few months preparing myself for that operation. Then I got hit with this.'' Doctors have traced her liver malfunction to a blood transfusion she received after a 1970 automobile accident. Though it was undetected at the time, the donor apparently had a hepatitis virus.

Larry, a construction worker, and Linda live in a simple two-bedroom home in a lower-middle-class neighborhood. They have little money and try not to think much about the monumental medical bills they are facing. Linda's projected eight-week hospital stay will cost roughly $200,000. Afterward she'll be on an antirejection drug for the rest of her life -- which could cost as much as $2,500 a month. Medical insurance probably will cover about half of the total outlay.

Lovelace and Marchiano were married in 1976, yet Linda continued to be plagued by accountants, lawyers, creditors and prosecutors. The couple lived in a cold-water flat on Long Island and were often on welfare. Few were interested in her real story. Ordeal wasn't published until she passed a battery of lie detector tests.

In recent years Linda has traveled around the country, telling her story to college students, religious groups and community gatherings (her lecture fee averages $1,500). She has also testified before several commissions on the effects of pornography on women and children.

***

Entertainment Weekly, 02-26-1993, pp 68. Last Page SOURCE: Benjamin Svetkey: ENCORE ORAL ARGUMENT WHILE LINDA LOVELACE'S FILM X-CAPADE DREW THRONGS, IT WAS TOO DEEP FOR ONE JUDGE

Over the past 20 years the film has generated $600 million, making it one of the most profitable movies of all time.

Of course, not everyone was a fan. Prosecutors in several states tried to ban the film on the grounds of obscenity. They failed in Massachusetts and Tennessee, but on March 1, 1973, New York criminal-court judge Joel Tyler called the movie "a nadir of decadence one throat that deserves to be cut," and fined the New Mature World Theater $3 million for showing it. "If I were to write that (decision) today, I would be deemed a fool," Judge Tyler, now 71, reconsidered on the eve of his retirement in 1991. "Movies and television have completely changed our outlook on the human form."

Well, not completely. Since the New Mature World Theater never appealed the ruling, Judge Tyler's decision has never been overturned. "Technically," says Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz, who conducted the Tennessee appeal, "it's still illegal for a theater to show the X-rated Deep Throat in New York, even though you can rent it at pretty much any video store in Manhattan."

Reuters 3/31/96:

Howard Works on Lovelace Film

"Apollo 13's" team of Ron Howard and Brian Grazer are preparing a picture about former adult film star Linda Lovelace. That's according to Variety's Army Archerd. Lovelace is best known for the porn flick "Deep Throat." Her film titles also include "Linda Lovelace Meets Miss Jones" and "Linda Lovelace for President." Grazer tells Archerd the project is being scripted by Ken Hixon and directed by Pat O'Connor.

[Howard later cancelled plans for the film.]

The Evil That Men Do

When I was 15, I wanted so much to be"one of the boys." Boys, I thought, did fun things; girls stayed home and made doilies. And I thought I was smart. It was while hanging around with the boys that I got my introduction to hard-core pornography. I remember, it was one of those high school party over at a classmate's house. At close to midnight, the boys started disappearing into the house den, leaving us girls to gossip in the living room. But being an honorary boy, I was soon let in on the "secret" and told that I can join the rest of them big boys if I wanted to. The big mystery turned out to be a porn movie called Deep Throat starring Linda Lovelace, who the boys told me was porn superstar of the moment.

I was out of that room in a flash. "This is sick," I remember telling one of the boys before walking out.

Fast forward to 1997. I just read Andrea Dworkin's Pornography: Men Possessing Women, and I'm still reeling from the experience. Someone asked me how it was. I don't know, I said. Well-argued treatises are not supposed to hit you in the gut, only in the head. It's not just Dworkin, but other feminist writers as well who are able to combine meticulous research, clear thinking and solid prose who can make your world seem like it's been turned upside down. In Pornography, Dworkin dove deep into this most terrible of crime against women, to surface with a lucid examination of the real source of pornography-the power system that creates and perpetuates the systematic rape of women, and the culture that makes people inured to this violation. I emerged from Pornography with a clearer understanding of a subject which, almost 20 years since Dworkin's book rolled out of the presses, continues to fire up and sometimes divide the women's movement.

Dworkin's Pornography was first published in 1979, the same year I saw that grimy betamax in a dark den. Linda Lovelace, a.k.a. Linda Marchiano, also figures in Dworkin's book. Marchiano and other women who survived pornography made me see where that retching, sickening feeling came from. "Every time someone watches that film, they are watching me being raped," Marchiano said. Another woman intoned, " They knew a child's face when they looked into it. It was clear that I was not acting of my free will. I was always covered with bruises...It was even clearer that I was sexually inexperienced. I literally didn' t know what to do. So they showed me pornography to teach me about sex and then they would ignore my tears as they positioned my body like the women in the pictures and used me."

I have long stopped wanting to be one of the boys. Boys don't always do fun things. As Dworkin made it plain in her book, boys also do evil, nasty things to girls.

Copyright 1997 Isis International

Villanueva, Pi, The Evil That Men Do., Women in Action, 01-02-1997, pp 52.

***

LINDA LOVELACE'S NEW LIFE IN COLORADO WOMAN ONCE KNOWN AS PORN STAR OF ``DEEP THROAT'' BELIEVES SHE'S FOUND CONTENTMENT IN COLORADO

By Fawn Germer

(Rocky Mountain News 4/20/97)

She's a single mother of two who has been out of work for six months.

She knows Wordperfect, Excel and Lotus.

But what her resume does not say is that her name was once Linda Lovelace, and she was the star of Deep Throat, the most profitable pornographic film of all time.

Today she uses a different last name and lives in Colorado. She wants her identity kept secret. She knows her past won't help her land the kind of job she wants.

``I will always be branded with the name Linda Lovelace,'' she said.

At 48, she wears her years but is still thin and attractive. Her hair is dyed auburn, and it's still long.

She is broke. She and her family moved to Colorado in 1990 when her husband's drywall business collapsed in New York. The couple divorced in August after 22 years. She loved him for only two years. She stayed with him because - considering where she'd been - she'd found Nirvana.

A 1974 article in the London Express described a life very different from the one she lives in Colorado today:

``Miss Linda Lovelace, the famous American film star, is installed at the Ritz in London. What's that you say - never heard of her? Ah, well, let me try to explain. She has a house in Beverly Hills with neighbors like Lucille Ball and Sammy Davis from whom she can borrow a cup of sugar. She drives a Bentley and . . . ''

``Oh baloney,'' she said recently.

In 1975, she married the man who fathered her two children. She gave up the fast life to be a stay-at-home mom married to a drywall hanger in New York. Her son is now 20, her daughter is 16.

During the early years of the marriage, she tried to make it as an actress and entertainer. The reviews were awful, whether she was onstage in a play called Pajama Tops or in the movie, Linda Lovelace for President.

By the late 1970s, she broke her silence on Traynor. She wrote Ordeal ``to set the record straight.''

By the late '80s, Lovelace had taken her husband's last name, but was back in the headlines when doctors thought she needed a double mastectomy because her breasts had been damaged by silicone injections she received during the Traynor years. Tests showed there was actually a problem with her liver. She got a transplant that year.

In the early 1990s, the couple moved to Colorado. She stayed home with her children, taking them to Water World and Elitch Gardens and attending her son's football games.

For a time she worked at an Albertson's store, but varicose veins made it painful to stay on her feet for extended periods.

She started traveling the lecture circuit, crossing the country several times a year on a crusade against porn.

Four years ago, she got a job in purchasing and record-keeping for a computer company, which paid $9.45 an hour.

As her children grew older, she realized she wanted something different for herself.

Her relationship with her husband had been deteriorating for years. She said he was an emotionally abusive alcoholic, which he acknowledged in an interview. She had stayed with him for two decades because of her children.

``I prostituted myself so I could have my kids,'' she said. ``They were the most important thing to me. They were all I ever wanted.' '

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