7) Mel Gibson
I’m not sure if there’s anyone in Hollywood right now more reviled than Mel Gibson. He’s pretty much universally regarded as an anti-Semite, a homophobe, a racist, someone badly in need of anger management training and just an absolute nutjob in general. The only press he seems to get these days are when a new recording emerges of him screaming at someone for seemingly no good reason, usually featuring some racial slurs and a lot of unintelligible gibberish. He’d be sympathetic if he wasn’t kind of really despicable.
He presents one of these conundrums though, in that his work is so good. He has wisely, unlike Ben Affleck, recognized how much ire his face induces in audiences and so removes himself from his most recent directorial projects. While primarily an actor these days, one who may see a comeback with the Machete sequel, his direction is where I find him most interesting, almost essential.
For all its issues with violence, anti-Semitism and problematic theological attestations, The Passion of the Christ is an amazing piece of filmmaking. It epitomizes Gibson himself, detestable in its ideas and themes perhaps, but so good at doing what it does. It presents a real problem from a philosophy of art perspective, as does Apocalypto. How can someone so vile create such beautiful work? It’s a contradiction I enjoy pondering and discussing with people, but is it worth it if Mel Gibson continues to spread hatred and perhaps actually hurt people? Selfishly I want to say yes, embarrassed as I am to admit it. I am horrible.