Tammie Kennedy
University of Arizona

Accusing Martin Scorsese of misogyny is like accusing Margaret Thatcher of being right wing, but it is his treatment of women which most of us should find offensive
—Stephen Cox, Edinburgh University Film Society

Abstract

While the vast amount of scholarly literature has provided a powerful argument for Mary Magdalene’s leadership and importance in scripture, art and culture, mainstream audiences remain mostly unaware of this fact, embracing the “repentant whore” image circulated by patriarchal leaders for centuries. As 2005 ushers Mary Magdalene back into pop culture consciousness through the success of the bestseller The Da Vinci Code and an ensuing film adaptation, it is important to examine how fictional films represent Magdalene. This article focuses on an analysis of Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ (1988; 2000) because Magdalene serves as a main character, and Scorsese claims he made a “visionary” rendering of Jesus’ life and death, including his relationship with Magdalene. Critiquing Scorsese’s version of Magdalene in light of the wealth of scholarship that refutes the portrait of Magdalene as a prostitute dramatizes how the misrepresentation is maintained in the popular imagination, as well as ways she may be (re)presented in the future.

[1] As Pamela Thimmes surmises in her 1998 literature review, “Memory and Re-Vision: Mary Magdalene Research since 1975,” there have been more than nine monographs and hundreds of scholarly articles written about Magdalene, not to mention thousands of anecdotal references and footnotes. Furthermore, the range of studies is remarkable, ranging from “biblical text-critical, historical-critical and feminist studies to biographies and studies examining the art, music, drama, liturgy, piety and poetry” devoted to Magdalene.1 In Mary Magdalene, The First Apostle: The Struggle for Authority (2003), Ann Graham Brock seconds Thimmes conclusions stating that an “impressive number of studies and monographs on Mary Magdalene have appeared in recent years,” which focus on both canonical and noncanonical sources.2  Karen King asserts a stronger opinion about what the current scholarship reveals: The “portrait of Mary Magdalene as a prostitute, repentant or otherwise, has no basis whatsoever in historical tradition.”3 However, while most scholars agree that the image of Magdalene as a repentant whore is a distortion, they differ in explaining why, how, and when this occurred. Scholars like Antti Marjanen note that since at least the sixth century, the most common perspective among nonscholars remains the conflated version of Magdalene: “Mary Magdalene, Mary of Bethany (John 12, 1-8), and the anonymous anointers in Mary 14, 3-9 (Matt 26, 6-13) and Luke 7, 36-50 were one and the same person.”4 Furthermore, since the time of Gregory the Great in the late Middle Ages, this “interpretation gained such a dominant position in the Western Church that those who disagreed with it risked being condemned by the church.”5This long history of interpretation in which Magdalene is represented as a prostitute rather than an apostle or community leader, as well as Western Christianity’s adherence to this traditional conception, continues to permeate contemporary novels, plays, films and TV presentations.

[2] If, as Jane Schaberg argues in The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene, religion can be assumed as a key role in the dynamics of women’s oppression, then feminist scholars have much at stake for (re)presenting Magdalene and revising the “harlotized” version that has existed since 591.6 Disrupting this skewed image would help to challenge the Petrine Christianity that maintains the circumscribed roles for women, provide an alternative for women who do not subscribe or conform to such doctrines and unsilence those who have been muted in its wake. While the vast amount of literature has provided a powerful argument for Magdalene’s leadership and importance in scripture, art and culture, mainstream audiences remain mostly unaware of this fact.

[3] While scholars like Schaberg point out how Magdalene as a complex, round character has proven too big for Hollywood, there has been little analysis of how she is has been portrayed in mainstream media and the effects of such representations.7 When Magdalene is mentioned in film critiques, such as Martin Medhurst’s “Temptation as Taboo: A Psychorhetorical Reading of The Last Temptation of Christ,” she remains a secondary character, examined only in her relation to Jesus as the protagonist.8 Maintaining this secondary status has far-reaching consequences. As film/media scholars argue, “entertainment texts” are the most powerful and pervasive devices for confirming the ideas and values that underlie our culture—its fundamental ideology (“common sense”) and hegemony (“natural/normal”).9 Furthermore, as Jean Baudrillard claims, mass media establishes ideology rather than reflects it, creating representations of reality, a reality dominated by simulations that give the appearance of reality. From this perspective, media does more than just provide information; it changes the way reality is experienced in that it destabilizes “the real and the true.”10 As bell hooks reminds readers, television and mass media are the great weapons of white supremacist patriarchal values that are projected into our living rooms and into the most intimate spaces of our lives.11 Therefore, it is important to examine how and what films represent and the effects of these choices in order to understand how these images might be resisted and challenged.

[4] A key film to (re)examine is Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ specifically for these reasons: Magdalene serves as a main character; Scorsese represents a respected and popular  director; the film remains steeped in controversy; the director claims he made a “visionary” rendering of Jesus’ life and death; he and Barbara Hershey co-created the Magdalene representation; and the film was made when a wealth of scholarship existed that refuted Magdalene’s portrait as a “penitent woman with a notorious past.”12 While film critic David Ehrenstein asks, “Can we finally look at The Last Temptation of Christ in the 21st century,?”13 I want to pose different questions: How does Scorsese situate Mary Magdalene in his controversial film? How can we better understand the decisions behind maintaining the conflated version of Magdalene as a prostitute rather than apostle? How does the Scorsese/Hershey characterization reflect patriarchal paradigms? As one of the most prominent women in Christian Testament, how does the version of Magdalene argued in his film shape the culture’s consciousness? Scorsese, adapting Kanzantzakis’ novel, reveals his willingness to consider scripture in new ways, imagining Jesus as a carpenter who made crucifixion crosses for a living, Judas as a man of honor, and John the Baptist as a fanatical Pentecostal. While Scorsese takes greats pains to create a visionary film of a human Jesus, he codifies the historical inaccuracy of Magdalene’s role within the guise of opening up new spaces for her. As a result, the Scorsese/Hershey characterization of Magdalene imprisons her in popular culture’s collective consciousness as a reformed prostitute with no apostolic authority, a woman whose agency is usurped by patriarchal discourses.

Searching for the Real Mary Magdalene 

[5]Before looking at how Magdalene is characterized in the film, it’s important to gain a more accurate, historical sense of her as documented in a variety of biblical and scholarly sources. In The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene, Schaberg summarizes the Gospel and non-canonical sources that allude to her:

According to all four Christian Testament gospels, Mary Magdalene is a—perhaps the—primary witness to the fundamental data of the early Christian faith. She is said to have participated in the Galilean career of Jesus of Nazareth, followed him to Jerusalem, stood by at his execution and burial, found his tomb empty and received an explanation of that emptiness. Two texts mention that seven demons had come out of her (Luke 8:2; Mark 16:9). According to three accounts (Mark 16:7, Matthew 28:7; Josh 20:17) she is sent with a commission to deliver the explanation of the empty tomb to the disciples. Also according to three accounts (Matt 28: 9-10; John 20: 14-18; Mark 16:9) she was the first to experience a vision or appearance of the resurrected Jesus. Gnostic materials [e.g., Gospel of Mary] present her as a leading intellectual and spiritual guide of the early, post-Easter community, as a visionary, the Savior’s beloved companion, a conduit for and interpreter of his teachings. 14

However, as the Gospel of Mary chronicles, even while Jesus charged her with the responsibility to serve as apostolorum apostola (apostle of the apostles) after his Ascension, disciples Peter and Andrew took issue with Magdalene’s teachings, refusing to embrace her vision and expressing their jealousythat Jesus appeared to her rather than them.15 Yet she persevered as a visionary leader, defended by Jesus and the other fellow disciples such as Levi who honored her: “Peter, you have always been hot-tempered . . . If the Savior made her worthy, who are you to reject her? . . . Surely the Savior knows her very well. That is why he loved her more than us.”16 In fact, while Brock demonstrates that numerous early Christian texts assign apostolic authority to Magdalene, when “Mary and Peter are both present in the text, Peter consistently challenges her authority or diminishes her status, often in overt and blatant ways.” 17 Brock’s argument illustrates another significant conflict that diminishes Magdalene’s apostolic authority, especially in canonical sources.

[6] But even Christ’s acknowledgement of the importance of Magdalene’s role couldn’t save her from the patriarchal and cultural forces that would marginalize women. Once the pro-Petrine tendencies in the Gospel of Luke were adopted by church leaders who wanted to diminish women’s leadership roles and, as Schaberg argues, “attach female sexuality to notions of evil, repentance and mercy,” political and ideological forces superseded historical realities.18While Mary Thompson notes in Mary Magdala: Apostle and Leader that some scholars trace Magdalene’s misrepresentation as a prostitute back to a fourth century interpretation of Luke 8:2 that juxtaposes immoral behavior with prostitution,19 most trace the inaccuracy to 591 when Pope Gregory the Great falsely conflated her with Mary of Bethany (John 12: 1-8) and the unnamed sinner in Luke 7: 36-50.20 As King argues, once these initial identifications were secured, “Magdalene could be associated with every unnamed sinful woman in the gospels, including the adulteress in John 8:1-11 and the Syrophoenician woman with her five and more husbands in John 4:7-30. Mary the apostle and teacher became Mary the repentant whore.”21 While centuries later, in 1969, the Catholic church officially corrected its error, trying to erase her sinful reputation by declaring that she was one of many followers of Jesus, the conflated image of Magdalene as a prostitute lingers in the mainstream consciousness.22

 [7] The new feminist research on Magdalene provides an impetus to revisit The Last Temptation of Christ as a way to understand the discrepancy between scholarship on Magdalene and her representation in the popular imagination. However, before examining the film, it is important to get some background on its production history. Adapted from the 1955 novel, The Last Temptation of Christ by Nikos Kazantzakis, the film began pre-production in 1983 for Paramount Pictures. Weeks before shooting started, the project was cancelled, largely due to a letter writing campaign engineered by right-wing fundamentalist Christian groups.23 Scorsese persevered, finally gaining production approval from Universal in 1987, enduring a 58-day physically demanding shooting schedule and a wave of protests, beginning on August 11, 1988.24 Even though most of the protestors hadn’t seen the movie, fundamentalist leaders such as Tim Penland and Bill Bright “orchestrated a campaign demanding nothing less than [the movie’s] total destruction.”25 Once Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, Pat Boone, and even Franco Zefferelli voiced their disapproval, the movie assumed its rightful role as the “most controversial film of the 1980s.”26 The main objection stemmed from the film’s focus on Christ’s humanity, which dramatizes the mortal struggle of Jesus as Everyman to discover his divinity.27   The fundamentalist wrath was fueled by a “sex scene” between Jesus and Mary Magdalene. Although the film begins with a disclaimer that it is based on a “fictional exploration of the eternal spirit”28 rather than the Gospels and this scene is part of a dream sequence as Jesus hangs on the cross in agony until he embraces his divinity, right-wingers attacked it as “blasphemous.”

Production Notes: Constructing Mary Magdalene

 [8] In addition to all the controversy, the story behind the making of The Last Temptation of Christ remains almost as interesting as the film itself, especially when examining the available scholarship about the creative choices made by both Scorsese and Barbara Hershey. Scorsese explains that Hershey gave him a copy of Kazantzakis’ book in 1972 when they were filming Box Car Bertha. When he finally read it, he was captivated. Raised a Roman Catholic, Scorsese was intrigued with the human side of Christ. He wanted to make a film that reflected those ideas and prompted people to think about or rethink their perceptions of Jesus. After the 1983 production was cancelled, he told Barbara Hershey, who had been cast as Magdalene, “I’m not going to give up until I make the film.” Hershey assured him, “I was put on earth to play this part.”29 While Scorsese’s vision of Jesus (and even Judas) in the film was open to new possibilities, he only partially considered a revision of Magdalene’s characterization. In the DVD commentary, Scorsese explains that he thought the book’s premise that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute because of Jesus’ rejection was too convenient. Scorsese explains that what is important about Magdalene is that she is part of the overall scheme: “She, like Judas, is part of his sacrifice and redemption. They are both holier than the other characters.”30 In Biblical Epics, Bruce Babington and Peter Evans conclude that Scorsese’s version of Magdalene “does not represent a disdain for female sexuality, but an inability to see women as other than sexual, that is, as female and spiritual.”31 Therefore, while Scorsese grants the character more agency and screen-time than previous films, he still frames her within the same gendered constructs that have libeled her for centuries.

[9] As Hershey waited for the film to be made, she immersed herself in study, focusing on the “Gospel of Thomas” in the Gnostic Gospels. She reports uncovering the patriarchal nature of ancient times and discovering how the patriarchal establishment became very anti-female in order to suppress the older religions where women had power. She also records how she learned that Christ welcomed women among his followers. Even when everyone else ran away, women remained at the crucifixion.32 Interestingly, even though Hershey consulted a Gnostic source that names Magdalene as one of the six disciples, she does not seem to reconsider Magdalene’s leadership qualities or uncover the wealth of evidence provided by scholars that refute her depiction as a prostitute.

[10] While Scorsese and Hershey’s oversights might reflect the barriers that complicate how scholarship enters the mainstream consciousness, they report conducting extensive research about the history and culture, as well as into the scripture itself (on the DVD Commentary, Scorsese documents some of his research over the years to get the look and feel of the film). Therefore, it is important to keep in mind the wealth of sources about Magdalene that were available at that time, including many of the materials reviewed above. Marjanen provides a useful historical overview of the sources that would have been available during the conception of the film in the 1970s and early 1980s. While much of the interest in Mary Magdalene focused on the canonical texts and the question of Magdalene’s relationship to the four anointers of the New Testament, by the 1970s Marjanen illustrates how the situation “changed decisively,” because of three key factors:

First, the publication of the Nag Hammadi Library begun in the late 50s and completed in the form of a facsimile edition in the 70s, offered four new sources in which Mary Magdalene is depicted in a way different from that of the canonical gospels but somewhat similar to that of the Gospel of MaryandPistis Sophia. The Gospel of Thomas, the Dialogue of the Savior, the First Apocalypse of James, and the Gospel of Philip all give Mary Magdalene a significant role. Second,  . . . the number of sources multiplied, but also a new and third perspective  . . . was introduced  . . . religious texts dealing with women have been studied more than ever before under the presupposition that they provide information about attitudes towards women prevailing in the religious circles where the texts originated and were read . . .33

In light of the available scholarship and feminist theories of interpretation and historical recovery and revision, it is fascinating to witness the power of patriarchal ideology to maintain the Magdalene myth even when individuals like Scorsese and Hershey presume to open their minds to other possibilities. Their perceptions were so steeped in the patriarchal system that maintains the inaccurate representation of Magdalene that they did not even question the assumption that she was a prostitute. Interestingly, their inventive process mirrors how Magdalene became recognized as a whore–an intricate process where history and its texts are empowered and disempowered, ignored and observed within dominant ideologies.

 [11] When the movie was finally put into production, Hershey and Scorsese met to discuss the character. After all of her reading in preparation for the part, Hershey recalls that she “brought [a] list of questions about what Mary Magdalene would look like.”34 While a focus on physicality is essential to creating a character, it also suggests some deep-seated assumptions about Magdalene. They had both seen tattoos on women, as well as henna on the feet, when perusing various archeological sources. Agreeing these features were essential to Magdalene’s character, they decided to make these attributes red in the film because “it’s more beautiful, it would show up more, and it seemed like something a whore would do.”35 Immediately, at the inception of the character, Hershey and Scorsese locked Magdalene into a visual representation that reinforced a historically circumscribed view of her position.

[12] From a scholarly viewpoint this assumption suggests a certain historical ignorance or neglect; however, Hershey reports a different perspective about constructing the character. She asserts that all the contradictory research “liberated” them to do what they wanted with the Magdalene character: “Marty had me walking with Jesus and the disciples in many scenes. The only scenes I couldn’t appear in were the ones at the temple where women weren’t allowed. He even embraced the idea of Christ’s having women at the Last Supper.”36 While their meticulous research resulted in some important representational innovations, they never seemed to debate the issue about characterizing Magdalene as a prostitute. In fact, Hershey describes her fascination with the conflated version of Magdalene: “The thing that fascinated me about Mary Magdalene is that she represents all aspects of womanhood: she’s a whore and a victim, a complete primal animal, and then she’s reborn and become virginal and sisterlike. She evolves through all phases of womanhood, so it was a wonderful role in that way . . . ”37 Obviously, Scorsese agreed with this image. While he envisioned Jesus as a man “who broke all the rules,” who wouldn’t tell women to “wait in the kitchen,”38 he could/would not see beyond the Madonna/whore paradigm of Magdalene that Hershey articulates. As such, even though Magdalene appears briefly within Jesus’ trusted inner circle, she is hardly liberated from her historical condemnation as whore. Therefore, applying Gayle Rubin’s framework for understanding prostitution, casting Magdalene as a prostitute keeps her in the “straight-jacket of gender” that condemns women to a secondary position in human relations and perpetuates Christianity’s Madonna/whore paradigm. In essence, Magdalene is “trafficked” in exchange for Scorsese’s vision of Jesus, which ultimately serves the patriarchal misrepresentation he (re)produces. 39

Scorsese/Hershey’s Magdalene on Screen

[13]Frame by frame, Scorsese and Hershey reveal the implications of their complete disregard of Magdalene’s being beyond the prostitute stock character. In The Last Temptation of Christ (LTC), Scorsese gives Magdalene more screen time than other biblical films, past or present. In fact, she and Judas function as main characters in the movie. Unfortunately, much like the fate of most female characters in Hollywood, LTC’s Magdalene soon finds her place among the litany of Scorsese film women–wives, mothers or mistresses who mostly suffer in silence and provide temporary distractions for the male protagonists. In addition to historical inaccuracies, Magdalene’s characterization on screen underscores how sexuality is represented differently for men and women, especially in Western Christianity. While Jesus (Man) can serve as universal signifier for humanity, his sexual drives the norm, women are not supposed to have sexual drives, the model for sexuality being the Virgin Mary (Woman), who remains unscathed by desire. Therefore, women associated with sexuality (Magdalene) must occupy the position of “fallen woman,” a staple of Western patriarchal narratives. When Scorsese casts Magdalene within the discourse of “fallen woman,” he renders her a symbol of men’s temptation. Schaberg articulates the significance of this assignment: “Reduced to her sexuality, she is  . . . blamed for provoking sexual desire  . . ., often the target of male sexual aggression and hostility, moral outrage, and condemnation.”40 Within this conceptual framework, Magdalene the prostitute is viewed as seductress, victim or entrepreneur, which not only greatly reduces the complexity surrounding prostitution but also the scholarly evidence about her apostolic authority. However, as Andrea Dworkin argues, even without demonizing prostitutes, most people are ambivalent and uncomfortable thinking about the nature of prostitution because of the realization that “male domination of the female body is the basic material reality of [all] women’s lives.”41 From this perspective, whatever agency Scorsese/Hershey may have envisioned for Magdalene as the world’s most famous prostitute is quickly thwarted by the historical stigma she embodies in the popular imagination, making her an archetype of sin rather than spirituality and agency. Such a status not only diminishes Magdalene’s significance and complexity, but also articulates far-reaching consequences for women trapped in the same one-dimensionality of being.

[14] Many third wave feminist scholars remind us that the concept of prostitute has meaning only within the patriarchal ideology in which such forms of work carry a stigma generated from double standards of sexual morality and negative attitudes to sex.42 Debra Satz, for example, argues that “if prostitution is wrong it is because of its effects on how men perceive women and on how women perceive themselves. In our society, prostitution represents women as the sexual servants of men.”43 Satz conjectures that the negative image of women promoted by prostitution “shapes and influences the way women as a whole are seen”44 Satz’s view is dramatized within the first five minutes of LTC when Magdalene’s character is introduced. Magdalene appears as a marked body, immediately signifying the male gaze. A close-up of Magdalene’s feet covered with henna tattoos transitions into a pan up her body into a close-up of her face as she spits in Jesus’ face. The tattoos reinforce her inferior status and highlight how Jesus (and society) perceives her. Hershey used the tattoos as part of her backstory, explaining that Magdalene is trying to “make herself despicable because she’s trying to be the lowest of the low.”45The tattoos would give “a feeling of a woman marking herself. And yet, they were beautiful.”46While one might read the tattoos as Magdalene’s attempt to control her body under the most extreme circumstances, to express herself, mapping her rebellion onto a body bound by patriarchy, this interpretation ultimately disintegrates within the film’s gendered environment.

As Schaberg asserts, viewing Magdalene within the typical connotations of prostitute  “underplay the moral agency and survival skills of Magdalene and those she represents, emphasizing instead the power of Jesus and his forgiveness.”47 Ultimately, Magdalene never belongs to herself, whether she is acting out as “whore” or “redeemed” by Jesus.

[15] In fact, Magdalene is defined by her relationship with Jesus. Because there was no backstory about Jesus and Magdalene’s relationship, Scorsese and Hershey collaborated on how to show their connection: [When she spits on him] “you know they have something going on, that she’s a woman, he’s a man–angry enough to spit at someone, there must be something going on.”48 They also conceived the relationship in terms of romantic attractions rather than any semblance of intellectual or theological debate in which the two might engage. Even in Scorsese and Hershey’s attempt to open the spaces that Magdalene might occupy, she remains defined by an emotional relationship to Jesus. Consequently, like any movie ingénue, her worth is determined by the male gaze and enacting her proper subservient role. As Hershey explains, “if she couldn’t get her man, be Jesus’ bride, what she feels is her destiny, then she’ll ‘be mud.’”49 Interestingly, when Magdalene spits on Jesus, there is a glimpse of her power. While the intention of the action was meant to dramatize their intimate relationship, it might also be construed as Magdalene’s appraisal of Jesus’ spirituality. From this perspective, the spitting seems to express her disdain forJesus’ weakness in light of his chosen piety, more than her feelings of rejection.However, Magdalene’s self-assertion is quickly absorbed in the patriarchal paradigm that maintains her as the whore in the mainstream imagination.

 [16] Later in the film the contradictions between artistic intent and patriarchal representations manifest in the film’s“brothel scene,” one of the most memorable sequences in which Jesus’ humanity is introduced, including his sexuality. In the first part of the scene, Jesus sits in the outer room of Magdalene’s brothel, waiting among her “clients,” declining his own turn and watching men of all ethnicities bed her until night falls and only he remains. The intensity of the scene is remarkable, making it difficult for viewers to witness. Indescribable pain and humiliation engulf Magdalene’s face as she essentially endures a public gang bang. Scorsese’s provocative mise-en-scène dramatizes Hershey’s view of the character: “Magdalene was supposed to be fantastic, to warrant the fact that men would come throughout the world to see her.”50 Even though Hershey and Willem Dafoe report that one of the actors “overplayed” his part, actually ravishing Hershey so that Scorsese and the camera man, Ballhaus, yelled out for the man to stop,51  Hershey kept the camera rolling and used the molestation to “express the profound pain” of the character.52 She also rejected the use of a body double: “I didn’t feel that [a double] would move like I would move. I knew if I did the scene, I’d really feel like a whore.”53 While Hershey’s account can be understood as method acting, the degradation of both the character and actor’s body contradicts Scorsese’s vision that the scene should highlight Jesus’ compassion as he “fights his sexual desire for her.”54 The brothel scene also unveils a dramatic shift for both characters. While Jesus gains agency to embrace his destiny, Magdalene assumes a more tertiary role in his life and submits to her role as repentant whore.

[17] Other issues emerge from this dramatic rendering of Jesus and Magdalene’s interaction in the brothel. Interestingly, while this scene is designed to demonstrate Christ’s divinity through his resistance to sexual temptation, it also marks Jesus’ complicity in the patriarchal ideologies that construct “prostitute,” and the slippage between Scorsese/Hershey’s articulation of Magdalene’s agency in the film and the patriarchal condemnation she suffers. While in the novel Jesus sits outside in the courtyard unable to view the action inside, in Scorsese’s version Jesus watches Magdalene and remains fully aware that these sexual acts are self-destructive, not pleasurable or transgressive. The medium point of view shots are edited between the pain and humiliation that resonates from Magdalene’s face and Jesus’ reactions and inability to admit the truth of what is happening to her. In fact, Jesus’ pained reactions suggest more about his inability to intervene or acknowledge Magdalene’s victimization rather than his capacity to resist sexual temptation. While Hershey explains that she approached the scene thinking “what is more difficult for Christ to watch, her pleasure or her pain?”, she also documents how she got to the extreme pain of the character, noting that Magdalene doesn’t ever express sexual pleasure.55 In this way, the scene is not just about Jesus’ sexual desire. Rather, by maintaining the conflated version of Magdalene, it marks another example of Scorsese’s inability to represent women as other than sexual. While this mindset mirrors patriarchal Christianity’s ideology about women’s prescribed roles, it also reduces the film’s narrative possibilities. Instead of Magdalene and Jesus discussing and debating his reluctance to accept his divine destiny and Magdalene serving as an apostle (i.e., a more accurate portrayal of their relationship), she is forced to express herself only through her subjected and objectified body.

[18] In the second part of the scene, Magdalene sees Jesus. The cinematography emphasizes Magdalene’s pain and self-contempt. A tracking, point of view shot leads to a close-up of Magdalene’s naked back as she asks: “Who’s out there? Who is it?”56 Scorsese also uses subliminally slow motion in the moment that Magdalene turns and looks at Jesus, the wretchedness of her exposure and humiliation wash across her face as she tries to cover her naked body in front of him: “You sit out there all day with the others and come in with your head down and say forgive me. It’s not that easy. Go away. God can save your soul.”57 The slow motion creates a feeling of urgency between the characters. While the scene was designed to reinforce Scorsese’s emphasis on the “inner torments of spiritual life” represented by sexual temptation, it also unmasks the realities of Magdalene’s subjugation at the hands of patriarchal discourse.58 Her pain stems from anger and shame, both rooted in her perception of Jesus’ weakness and indecision and the psychic brutality of her subjection to the male will. Scorsese’s intention was to emphasize that Jesus feels guilty because his rejection of Magdalene results in her prostitution. However, Magdalene seems more frustrated by his complicity in her agony and lack of agency than just his “rejection” of her as a romantic partner: “If you weren’t hanging onto your mother, you were hanging on to me; now you’re hanging onto God.”59 While Scorsese describes the core conflict of the film as Jesus’ journey to his ultimate destiny, it is striking how his assent is supported by the diminution of the women in his life who must suffer in the wake of his transformation. The “brothel scene” provides the necessary narrative conflict that propels Jesus forward on his divine journey. However, within twenty minutes, Magdalene is repositioned in the background for the rest of the film, recapitulating centuries of misrepresentation in the public imagination.

[19] Throughout the rest of the film, Magdalene is relegated to serve as bas relief for Jesus’ divinity. In effect, her behaviour/body (i.e., prostitution) rather than her being (Mary Magdalene who steadfastly stays by Jesus’ side even more than the other apostles) becomes the character in the film. Because of her prostitution and thus penchant for Edenic temptation, Magdalene serves as the instrument that grants Jesus his agency. When Jesus goes out into the desert and inscribes a circle in the sand in an effort to assert his will over the demons in his head, a serpent appears speaking in Magdalene’s voice. According to Scorsese, the snake “represents sexuality in all its forms–even in thought.”60 This symbolic choice also reflects the patriarchal ideologies circulating throughout the film. The female, specifically Magdalene, must represent temptation, in all forms. The snake utters, “Jesus, I forgive you.”61 While Scorsese does not resist the temptation to perpetuate the myth of woman as the downfall of man, Jesus, unlike Adam, resists the temptation of carnal knowledge, thus gaining more potency from the encounter.

[20] While it is clear that Scorsese/Hershey empower Magdalene in some ways, once she assumes her role as “repentant whore,” her personal power is depleted. As an angry mob drags Magdalene by her feet preparing to stone her for her sins, Jesus “saves” her, proclaiming: “Love one another.”62 While Jesus begins his ministry, Magdalene, although spared from death, is relegated to a plot device rather than antagonist or even associate. She also grows to be dependent on the paternalistic “help” of Jesus. Furthermore, when she attempts to gain more equality in the relationship after her “conversion,” asking to accompany Jesus on his travels, he demands that she remain in Magdala. After he tenderly wipes the blood from Magdalene’s feet after the aborted stoning, she submits to her role as redeemed sinner, veiling her face, covering her body and penitently following Christ.

[21] Repentance, however, does not spare Magdalene from more pain and judgment. Henna tattoos and black garments are replaced with the bright blue dress associated with the Virgin Mary. As Magdalene, Jesus, Judas and a couple of his other apostles attend a wedding, they are abruptly stopped by one guest who protests the attendance of a whore: “You don’t belong

here. . . It’s against the law.”63 While Jesus proclaims that “the law is against my heart” and that the kingdom of God is like a wedding where God is the bridegroom and man’s spirit is the bride, Magdalene never escapes the victimization that accompanies her characterization of whore–practicing or reformed.64 Even when Magdalene is portrayed at the Last Supper, she embodies the Madonna/whore paradigm, appearing with Jesus’ mother, Mary. Therefore, even in her steadfast support of Christ’s journey towards his divine destiny, she remains configured by patriarchal discourses, a scapegoat upon which male narratives are construed. Remaining as part of the mise-en-scène, Magdalene endures only in the capacity of serving the conflated version that the film (re)produces.

[22] While the “blasphemous” dream sequence provides Christ’s last temptation, it also seals Magdalene’s historical fate on screen. Even though the vision presents her as chaste bride, she is still associated with carnal lust and temptation. A satanic angel dressed as a little girl (not in the book) escorts Jesus to a vision of Magdalene all in white who lives in a little house in the woods. When he arrives, she cradles Jesus in her arms and tenderly washes him. They make love and then take pleasure in their domesticity—Magdalene pregnant and fixing dinner. However, Magdalene dies–a bright white light highlights her smile as she disappears from the screen. In his grief, Jesus grabs an axe and seeks revenge only to learn from the little girl that “God killed her,” and that he should “trust God’s way.”65 Christ soon marries Lazarus’s sister, Mary, “Magdalene with a different face,” the little girl suggests–and raises a family.66 He also enjoys an adulterous fling with Martha, which the little girl justifies, stating “there’s only one woman in the world–one with many faces.”67

[23] Critics interpret the meaning of this interchangeability differently. Friedman, for example, sees it as a narrative convenience designed to “excuse Christ’s hasty remarriage and hastier adultery” and imply the “self-serving” version of what constitutes a “normal” existence.68 On the other hand, Medhurst reads the scene as playing out the Oedipal complex in which Jesus transfers his love for his mother to other mother substitutes (i.e., all the Marys) in order to gain his own identity. From this perspective, there is truly only one woman in the world–the mother.69 As such, Medhurst interprets Scorsese’s film as an allegorical account “structured by a complex calculus of myth, metaphor, and sign.” Furthermore, Medhurst argues that Scorsese’s Christ is Everyman, “a metaphor for universal humanity in both its ontological and psychological dimensions.”70 However, readings such as Medhurst’s call attention to a critical oversight when thinking about the film. A film that purports to offer a vision of “universal humanity” fails when it reproduces the conflated version of Magdalene. In fact, it serves patriarchal discourses that shape social arrangements that deny women’s full humanity.

[24] The final scene in The Last Temptation of Christ imprisons Magdalene in the eternal flicker of celluloid that resonates in popular culture’s collective consciousness. In a brief, final close-up of Magdalene’s face, she reveals her understanding of what has transpired. Dressed in black, her face is washed by a peaceful calm that stands in stark contrast to the wailing grief displayed by the other women or the disbelief and silence etched on the faces of the men who remained. While this moment could launch the real story of Magdalene, the apostle of the apostles, instead she remains in the background, silent and buried within the patriarchal ideologies that have ravaged her in word and art.

Conclusion: (Re)Presenting Magdalene

[25] By disregarding the existing scholarship that refutes the image of Magdalene as a prostitute or failing to contemplate her agency outside of the connotations of this image, Scorsese’s TheLast Temptation of Christ codifies the historical inaccuracy enacted by Pope Gregory in 591 in the twentieth/twenty-first-century imagination. This codification remains more disturbing in light of both Scorsese’s artistic and thematic goals. While he was willing to take creative and financial risks to get this film made, to portray a complex Jesus, full of human foibles that might “provide a spiritual awakening for people,”71 he did not provide Magdalene’s character the opportunity to emerge from the Madonna/whore ideology that has shaped traditional Christianity. Thus, the Scorsese/Hershey Magdalene maintains what Judith Butler chronicles as the fantasy binary distinctions ascribed to male/female, body/mind, Madonna/whore, Mary/Eve that both naturalize women’s inferiority and subvert their agency.72 Even in his attempt to open up the viewer’s minds to (re)consider Jesus and the scriptures, Scorsese’s vision sacrifices any consideration of Magdalene’s apostolic authority and leadership, reinscribing the male as the universal subject. Furthermore, this choice remains more problematic given the historical ramifications of demonizing women’s bodies and the stigma that still remains for women “who show too much, say too much, know too much, and do too much,” regardless of their social reality as wives, lovers, mothers, daughters, or any other “prototype of the female condition.”73

 [26] As the new millennium ushers Mary Magdalene back into pop culture consciousness, there’s no guarantee that filmmakers won’t be tempted to maintain what Schaberg describes as the “harlotized” Magdalene that sells tickets:

The volatile figure of Mary Magdalene is far too big for Hollywood, which sees her as a mix of lust, loyalty, belief, prostitution, repentance, beauty, madness, sainthood. She is the liminal and strange woman, silent, dominated by the great image of Jesus crucified, resurrected. She symbolizes the belief that women are made only deficiently in the image of God, and are ultimately a symbol of evil and of dependent, sinful humanity.74

Thimmes is equally pessimistic about the power of contemporary film to accurately portray Magdalene. To characterize Magdalene as anything other than the conflated version means forsaking the “sex sells” financial strategies that have historically marked films such as Jesus Christ Superstar and The Last Temptation of Christ: “Ironically, just as producer Martin Scorsese’s much-maligned sex scene between Mary Magdalene and Jesus occurs as a hallucination experienced by Jesus as he suffers on the cross, one might say that the personas Mary Magdalene is said to inhabit from the fourth century onward in legend and piety are also hallucinations.”75 Therefore, the question remains: How can this hallucination ever be made cognizant within an enduring patriarchal system that would rather distort, diminish, and erase Magdalene’s influence beyond the archetype of women’s sin and redemption?

[27] The answer may reside in (re)presenting Mary Magdalene in popular culture. In addition to the popularity of The Da Vinci Code, which has sparked discussion and debate from various perspectives, the efforts of feminist scholars such as Brock, King, Jansen and Schaberg have started to trickle down into pop culture, notably in documentary films that focus on telling the “real story” behind Magdalene’s reputation: Mary Magdalene: An Intimate Portrait (1995), Biography’s Mary Magdalene: The Hidden Apostle (2000), and Rediscovering Mary Magdalene: The Making of a Mythic Drama (2001).76 In fact, Amazon Books features a Mary Magdalene booklist and other suggested readings for those who want to buy The Da Vinci Code and The Last Temptation of Christ. Many of these suggestions focus on more historically accurate portraits of Magdalene in both scholarly and popular sources. Mainstream magazines like Time have summarized some of the scholarly accounts of Mary Magdalene that challenge her image as prostitute.77 Even Tori Amos: Piece by Piece (2005) features a chapter entitled, “Mary Magdalene: The Erotic Muse,” which focuses on telling “the greatest story never told.”78 This chapter chronicles Amos’ own research into the scholarship on Magdalene that encourages people to “open up to the Magdalene as a Being, not just as a demeaned prostitute.”79 Furthermore, these kinds of mainstream materials are prompting people to search the Internet for more accurate information. For example, Lesa Bellevie operates a Mary Magdalene website that “celebrates the mysteries of the Woman Who Knew All” (Magdalene.org) and keeps readers up-to-date on new resources about Magdalene (popular and scholarly). After the success of her website (she estimates 2000 visitors a day), she published The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Mary Magdalene (2005) in an effort to present the public more accurate information about Magdalene’s legacy.80

[28] While filmmakers like Scorsese ultimately failed to reconcile historical scholarship with the patriarchal paradigms that inform their artistic visions, publications such as The Complete Idiot’s Guide, The Da Vinci Code and related media suggest that Magdalene scholarship will no longer remain sequestered in dusty archives or buried in journals that few read. Instead, the public may hold filmmakers and other media more accountable for their portraits of historical religious women like Magdalene. Rather than debating the controversial “sex scene” between Magdalene and Jesus in films like The Last Temptation of Christ, twenty-first century viewers, armed with historical knowledge and a commitment to more legitimate images of spiritual women, will confront the representations of Magdalene they witness on screen. Rather than arguing how Ron Howard’s The Da Vinci Code movie betrays the novel in some way, they might question why even in a story that chronicles the patriarchal power dynamics that tarnished Magdalene’s image, the film is still all about him. Hopefully, The Da Vinci Code movie marks a turning point for (re)presenting Magdalene. With the infusion of scholarship into mainstream venues, audiences might finally confront and resist the Magdalene misrepresentation burned in their imagination.

They will demand more accurate portrayals, prompting filmmakers to tell the “real” story of Magdalene. As a result, Magdalene will finally receive her centuries-belated makeover in the popular imagination, her 40-foot image, emancipated, dancing across screens in darkened theaters, projecting the infinite possibilities of our full humanity.

Notes

1. Pamela Thimmes, “Memory and Re-Vision: Mary Magdalene Research Since 1975.” Currents in Research: Bibiblical Studies 6 (1998): 193.

2. Ann Graham Brock, Mary Magdalene, The First Apostle: The Struggle for Authority (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003), 11-12.

3. Karen L. King, “Myth and Mystery," Review of The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene: Legends, Apocrypha, and the Christian Testament by Jane Schaberg, Women’s Review of Books 23 (March 2003): 18.

4. Antti Marjanen, The Woman Jesus Loved: Mary Magdalene in the Nag Hammadi Library and Related Documents (New York: Brill, 1996), 1.

5. Marjanen, Woman, 2.

6. Jane Schaberg, The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene: Legends, Apocrypha, and the Christian Testament (New York: Continuum, 2003), 8.

7. Schaberg, Resurrection, 8.

8. Martin J. Medhurst, “Temptation as Taboo: A Psychorhetorical Reading of The Last Temptation of Christ,” in David Blakersey, ed., The Terministic Screen: Rhetorical Perspectives on Film (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2003), 55-69.

9.  Gary Thompson, Rhetoric Through Media (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1997), 344-45.

10. Jean Baudrillard, “The Masses: The Implosion of the Social in the Media,” in Mark Poster, ed., Jean Baudrillard: Selected Writings  (Stanford, CA: Stanford, 1988), 217. 

11. bell hooks, “Teaching Resistance: The Radical Politics of Mass Media,” in Karen A. Foss, Sonja A. Foss, and Robert Trapp, eds., Readings in Contemporary Rhetoric (Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 2002), 244.

12. Marjanen, Woman, 2-3.

13. David Ehrenstein, “Introduction,” The Last Temptation of Christ, DVD, directed by Martin Scorsese (Universal Pictures, Criterion Collection, 2000).

14. Schaberg, Resurrection, 66.

15. “Gospel of Mary,” in The Gnostic Gospels (New York: Vintage Books, 1989), 15-17.

16. Gospel of Mary 17:7-14.

17. Brock, Mary Magdalene, 102.

18. Jane Schaberg, “How Mary Magdalene Became a Whore,” Bible Review (1992): 37.

19. Mary R. Thompson, Mary of Magdala: Apostle and Leader (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist, 1995), 14.

20. Katherine Ludwig Jansen, in Beverly Mayne Kienzle and Pamela J. Walker, "Maria Magdalena: Apostolorum Apostola," in the Women Preachers and Prophets through Two Millennia of Christianity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 60.

21. King, “Myth and Mystery,” 18.

22. Schaberg, Resurrection, 99.

23. Ehrenstein, “Introduction,” 1.

24. Mary Pat Kelly, Martin Scorsese: A Journey (New York: Thunder Mouth’s Press, 1996), 203.

25. Medhurst, “Temptation,” 55.

26. Ehrenstein, “Introduction,” 2.

27. Ehrenstein, “Introduction,” 2-3.

28. The Last Temptation of Christ (DVD; Universal Pictures, Criterion Collection, 2000).

29. Lawrence S. Friedman, The Cinema of Martin Scorsese (New York: Continuum, 1998), 153-55.

30. Last Temptation DVD.

31. Bruce Babington and Peter William Evans, Biblical Epics: Sacred Narrative in the Hollywood Cinema (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993), 165.

32. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 205.

33. Marjanen, Woman, 4-5.

34. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 205.

35. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 205.

36. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 205.

37. P. Lemos, “Divine Duos.” Ms Magazine (January/February 1989): 126, 124.

38. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 224.

39. Gayle Rubin, “The Traffic in Women: Notes on the ‘Political Economy’ of Sex,” in Rayna R. Reiter, ed., Toward an Anthropology of Women(New York:  Monthly Review Press, 1975), 157. 

40. Schaberg, Resurrection, 106

41. Andrea Dworkin, Pornography: Men Possessing Women (New York; Perigee, 1979), 200, 9.

42. Gerda Lerner, The Creation of Patriarchy (New York/Oxford: Oxford, 1986); Martha Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice (New York/Oxford:  Oxford, 1999).           

43. D. Satz, “Markets in Women’s Sexual Labor,” Ethics 106 (1995): 78.

44. Satz, "Markets," 79.

45. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 206.

46. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 206.

47. Schaberg, Resurrection, 105.

48. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 225.

49. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 206.

50. Friedman, Cinema, 154.

51. Last Temptation DVD Commentary

52. Kelly,Martin Scorsese,  226.

53. Kelly, Martin Scorsese,  225.

54. Richard Corliss, “Body and Blood: An Interview with Martin Scorsese,” Film Comment (October 1988): 42.

55. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 226.

56. Last Temptation. 

57. Last Temptation.

58. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 227.

59. Last Temptation. 

60. Kelly, Martin Scorsese, 227.

61. Last Temptation.

62. Last Temptation.

63. Last Temptation.

64. Last Temptation.

65. Last Temptation.

66. Last Temptation.

67. Last Temptation.

68. Friedman, Cinema, 161.

69. Medhurst, “Temptation,” 59.

70. Medhurst, “Temptation, 57.

71. Kelly,Martin Scorsese, 202.

72. Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1999), xxi.

73. Gail Pheterson, The Prostitution Prism (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996), 84, 55.

74. Schaberg, Resurrection, 8.

75. Thimmes, “Memory,” 194. 

76. Mary Magdalene: An Intimate Portrait  (VHS/ New Video, 1995); Mary Magdalene: The Hidden Apostle (VHS; A&E Home Video, 2000); Rediscovering Mary Magdalene: The Making of a Mythic Drama (VHS, 2001).

77. David Van Biema and Lisa McLaughlin, “Mary Magdalene: Saint or Sinner?” Time (August 11, 2003): 52-59.

78. Tori Amos and Ann Powers, Tori Amos: Piece by Piece (New York: Broadway Books, 2005), 100.

79. Amos and Powers, Tori Amos, 59.

80. Lesa Bellevie, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Mary Magdalene (New York: Alpha Press, 2005.

References

Amos, Tori and Ann Powers. Tori Amos: Piece by Piece. New York: Broadway Books, 2005.

Babington, Bruce and Peter William Evans, Biblical Epics: Sacred Narrative in the Hollywood Cinema. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993.

Baudrillard, Jean. “The Masses: The Implosion of the Social in the Media.” Jean Baudrillard: Selected Writings. Edited by Mark Poster. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1988.

Bellevie, Lesa. The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Mary Magdalene. New York: Alpha Press, 2005.

Brock, Ann Graham. Mary Magdalene, The First Apostle: The Struggle for Authority. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003.

Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge, 1999.

Corliss, Richard. “Body and Blood: An Interview with Martin Scorsese.” Film Comment (October 1988): 36-42.

De Laurentis, Teresa. Alice Doesn’t:  Feminism, Semiotics, Cinema. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1984.

Dworkin, Andrea. Pornography: Men Possessing Women. New York: Perigee, 1979.

Ehrenstein, David. “Introduction.” The Last Temptation of Christ. DVD. Directed by Martin Scorsese. Universal Pictures, Criterion Collection, 2000.

Friedman, Lawrence S. The Cinema of Martin Scorsese. New York: Continuum, 1998.

Kelly, Mary Pat. Martin Scorsese: A Journey. New York: Thunder Mouth’s Press, 1996.

King, Karen L. “Myth and Mystery.” Review of The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene: Legends, Apocrypha, and the Christian Testament, by Jane Schaberg. Women’s Review of Books (March 2003): 18.

"Gospel of Mary." The Gnostic Gospels. New York: Vintage Books, 1989.

hooks, bell. “Teaching Resistance:  The Radical Politics of Mass Media." Readings in Contemporary Rhetoric. Edited by Karen A. Foss, Sonja A. Foss and Robert Trapp. Prospect Heights, IL:  Waveland Press, 2002), 244.

Jansen, Katherine Ludwig. "Maria Magdalena: Apostolorum Apostola." Women Preachers and Prophets through Two Millennia of Christianity. Edited by Beverly Mayne Kienzle and Pamela J. Walker. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998, 57-96.

Lapman, Jane. “Who was Mary Magdalene? The Buzz Goes Mainstream.” Christian Science Monitor (November 2003): 1.

The Last Temptation of Christ.  DVD.  Directed by Martin Scorsese. Universal Pictures, Criterion Collection, 2000.

Lemos, P.  “Divine Duos.” Ms Magazine (January/February 1989): 126, 124.

Lerner, Gerda. The Creation of Patriarchy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1986.

Marjanen, Antti. The Woman Jesus Loved: Mary Magdalene in the Nag Hammadi Library and Related Documents. New York: Brill, 1996.

Mary Magdalene: An Intimate Portrait.  VHS.  New Video, 1995.

Mary Magdalene: The Hidden Apostle. VHS. A&E Home Video, 2000.

Medhurst, Martin J. “Temptation as Taboo: A Psychorhetorical Reading of The Last Temptation of Christ.” The Terministic Screen: Rhetorical Perspectives on Film. Edited by David Blakesey. Carbondale, IL:  Southern Illinois University Press, 2003, 55-69.

Nussbaum, Martha. Sex and Social Justice. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.           

Pheterson, Gail. The Prostitution Prism. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996.

Rediscovering Mary Magdalene: The Making of a Mythic Drama.  VHS, 2001.

Rubin, Gayle. “The Traffic in Women: Notes on the ‘Political Economy’ of Sex.” Toward an Anthropology of Women. Edited by Rayna R. Reiter. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1975, 157-210.

Satz, D. “Markets in Women’s Sexual Labor.” Ethics 106 (1995): 78.

Schaberg, Jane “How Mary Magdalene Became a Whore.” Bible Review (1992): 37.

______. The Resurrection of Mary Magdalene: Legends, Apocrypha, and the Christian Testament. New York: Continuum, 2003.

Thimmes, Pamela. “Memory and Re-Vision: Mary Magdalene Research Since 1975.” Currents in Research: Biblical Studies 6 (1998): 193-226.

Thompson, Gary. Rhetoric Through Media. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1997.

Thompson, Mary R. Mary of Magdala: Apostle and Leader. Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1995.

Torjesen, Karen Jo. "The Early Christian Orans: An Artistic Representation of Women's Liturgical Prayer and Prophecy." Women Preachers and Prophets through Two Millennia of Christianity. Edited by Beverly Mayne Kienzle and Pamela J. Walker. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998, 42-56.

______. When Women Were Priests: Women's Leadership in the Early Church and the Scandal of their Subordination in the Rise of Christianity. San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1993. 155-76.

Van Biema, David and Lisa McLaughlin. “Mary Magdalene: Saint or Sinner?” Time (August 11, 2003): 52-59.