School for scandal ... Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct
Paul Verhoeven, ever keen to fling himself under the wheels of controversy, is at it again. This time he's upset the Catholic church after revealing the details of his new book, Jesus Of Nazareth: A Realistic Portrait, which will be published in September by JM Meulenhoff (and translated in English in 2009, presumably in time for him to be banned from the Oscars). The controversial bit is his claim that not only was Jesus a bastard, but he was the result of Mary's rape by a Roman soldier. So the idea of a virgin birth is, in Verhoeven's theory, little more than a cover-up.
The director has apparently long wished to make a film on the life of Jesus. And as controversies go, this one ought to be up there with the best. But Verhoeven's evident desperation - and the fact both Martin Scorsese and Mel Gibson have already covered the ground - are likely to scupper its chances. So here, instead, are cinema's greatest controversies:
D W Griffith's 1915 epic was hugely influential in terms of technique and narrative. It also happened to be based on Thomas F Dixon's book The Clansman: An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan.
2. The Last Temptation of Christ
Martin Scorsese's film of the Nikos Kazantzakis book suggests that Jesus was as subject to human temptations (including sexual fantasies) as the rest of us. Its release prompted protests around the world (although whether this was to do with David Bowie's casting as Pontius Pilate remain unconfirmed).
3. Freaks Tod Browning's story of circus "freaks" took the unusual approach of casting people with genuine deformities. Despite being an accomplished morality tale in which the true monsters are the "normal" people, the film was banned in the UK for 30 years.
4. The Passion of the Christ
Mel Gibson denied accusations that anti-Semitism was at the root of this visceral depiction of Jesus' betrayal, torture and crucifixion. In an unrelated incident two years later, however, he did apologise for making anti-Semitic remarks to police officers whilst drunk.
5. Basic Instinct
Paul Verhoeven gets gratuitous full-frontal female nudity into a mainstream thriller with Sharon Stone's infamous (and much lampooned) "uncrossing" scene. His next attempt at controversy, Showgirls, straddled the fine line between scandal and high camp with disarming ease.
