The buzz out here, and in the entertainment pages in general, has been about Mel Gibson's new film The Passion, and it won't be released for another seven months. The film chronicles the last twelve hours of the life of Jesus. Gibson plans on Easter as the release date for the movie, but not everyone is okay with this film. After screening an early version of the film with Mel Gibson, the Anti-Defamation League's national headquarters began to voice concern.

The ADL, whose mission is to "stop the defamation of the Jewish people and secure justice and fair treatment to all people alike," argues that the film is theologically and historically irresponsible in regards to the crucifixion.

Many conservative Christians who have attended private screenings of The Passion have called it "the most powerful depiction" they have seen of Jesus' final hours. But [the ADL] has argued for months that the portrayal of Jews in the events leading to the crucifixion will promote anti-Semitism.

And of course Bill O'Reilly has had Gibson on his Fox News "The O'Reilly Factor" to counter Jewish criticism of the film. The "conservative Christian right" is rallying around Gibson.

Frank Rich, the media critic for the New York Times is ticked off about the film. And that provides and opportunity for the right to fulminate about the evil, liberal, Jewish New York press of course. You know, those guys who hate us harmless Christians and like Hilary Clinton.

... Gibson says Rich's comments made him quite angry, or as Gibson put it - "I want his intestines on a stick... I want to kill his dog."

The film isn't even out yet and the "whining" Jews and "self-righteous Christian" folks on the right are going at it.

ORLANDO, Fla. (Reuters) - In Mel Gibson's new movie about Jesus Christ, Satan assumes a physical form and stands with Jewish leaders after they condemn Christ, whose beating at the hands of Roman soldiers, barely mentioned in the Bible, becomes a bloody, sadistic centerpiece of the film.

If "The Passion of the Christ," about Jesus' last hours, has not attracted enough controversy already, there will likely be plenty of ammunition for its detractors once the movie is more widely seen.

Late Wednesday, a rough cut of the film got what may have been its widest screening yet, before 4,500 evangelical Christian pastors attending a conference in Orlando, and a few reporters who also managed to get in.

Gibson has weathered a storm of criticism so far, particularly from Jewish groups worried the film will incite anti-Semitism because of the depiction of Jews' role in Christ's death.

So far, the two-hour motion picture has been shown only to audiences hand-picked by Gibson and his production company. The film will open Feb. 25 - Ash Wednesday on the Christian calendar - on 2,000 screens in the United States. Pastors seeing the film had to sign a form agreeing not to say anything negative about it.

? among elements likely to attract attention when the film reaches wider audiences is Gibson's decision to have Satan personified by a pale, human figure that appears periodically. The Satan figure appears alongside Jewish authorities but not by Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, who actually sentences Jesus to death.

At Jesus' trial portrayed in the film, the Jewish high priest not only strikes him but spits on him.