Post-911 movie-making

Great idea for a screenplay: The persecution of the early Christians from the lion's point of view. Given how Hollywood views the current clash of cultures, it's sure to get the green light.

First an NBC producer says a projected miniseries on the 9/11 attacks will "humanize" the terrorists. Next, Maggie Gyllenhaal opines as to how her new 9/11 film, The Great New Wonderful, may cause Americans to reflect on what they did to incur the wrath of the terrorists. Which is a good thing. Now comes Kingdom of Heaven, Ridley Scott's epic on the Crusades.

Guess who the real villains are? If you said Christian fundamentalists you got it in one.

The film chooses unambiguously to place the blame for the Crusader-Saracen conflict, which causes the eventual downfall of Baldwin's kingdom, squarely at the door of fundamentalists in both camps, but overall it is the Christian fundamentalists who come off worst of all.

Scott, of course, just wants to make sure he "humanizes" the Muslims.

I wanted people to see events from the Muslims' point of view as well, and the way to do that was to develop strong, multidimensional characters on that side. Especially Saladin, as played by Ghassan Massoud, a wonderful Syrian actor. I felt it was important to use Muslim actors to play Muslim characters. You see Saladin in private moments; you see his leadership, how he tries to keep the peace. He was under pressure from his people, and on the other side there was the radical faction of the Templars and other knights - what we might call the right wing or Christian fundamentalists of their day.

Update: Jeff at Beautiful Atrocities has more. And he says it better, too.