The Last Temptation of Christ generated as much protest as The Passion of the Christ, first by Christians who hadn't yet seen it, and then by those who had. The original novel by Zorba the Greek author Nikos Kazantzakis restages the key battle of his own life, his work and his tradition: the eternal clash of flesh and spirit. Given that the Incarnation marks history's first and only true integration in of those two oppositions, the setting seems perfect. But Kazantzakis warns us that this treatment is less a real Gospel than use of the Gospel as a vehicle for exploring that conflict. On the surface, this sounds like the Monty Python strategy — not really Jesus, but someone who looks like him. The key difference is that Kazantzakis' alternative-universe story isn't just the punchline of a schoolboy snicker, but rather the serious result of a lifetime of agonizing over the split between his own higher and lower instincts. Thus, his Christ bounces from extreme to extreme, in a tale that climaxes with a vision of Christ on the Cross reconsidering the earthly life he is rejecting — a blasphemous notion for some, but an obvious and intriguing speculative direction for others.

The collaborators for the screen version are famously Christ-haunted in three traditions: Orthodox-raised Kazantzakis, Catholic director Martin Scorsese and Calvin College-grad screenwriter Paul Schrader create an agonizingly personal confrontation with Christ, one difficult to untangle into its varied authorial intents. Those who approach the film expecting — based on its controversial reputation — either artistic perfection or diabolical genius are liable to be disappointed, for the film is conflicted at every level — thematically and tonally, not to mention theologically — and remains a problematic, if provocative, sometimes frustrating, and often insightful work.

The emphasis on humanity makes Willem Dafoe's portrayal at times one of the most believable onscreen Christs, more connected to his times and ideas than many a sterile and sanctimonious treatment that emphasizes Word over flesh: he smiles, dances, loves, and shares from his heart; one can see why people would be drawn to this Jesus. At the same time, this is one of the most iconic of Gospels: jolting from realism to surreal symbolism, including — ironically — the most abstract depiction of the temptation sequence of any Jesus film, complete with special effects like bad DeMille. The relationships depicted, likewise, swing from naturalistic to variations on the central debate: love versus force, religious ideals versus domestic life, power and force versus weakness and love. Foremost among these character/symbols is Judas, easily the most fully-realized and sympathetic Judas of any Jesus film, worldly-wise, practical, a man of action, who is won over to the point that his betrayal of Christ is portrayed as an act of faith, a collaboration in Christ's mission.

In the final vision, as Jesus considers the temptation to avoid the Crucifixion, we see Judas as the one who feels betrayed. The vision begins with an angel — and obviously he might also be interpreted as the devil — who helps Jesus down from the Cross and into the life he might have had: marriage, sex (fairly chaste, though extremely disturbing to many), family, and old age. We visit the opposite extreme of flesh as Christ adopts the angel/devil's idea that "all women are really the same woman", and takes up with both Mary and Martha. This development will continue to blunt some viewers' sympathy for the film's artistic strategy, but is representative of the tortured Kazantzakis's confused musings on the maddening conundrum that is man, a being of both spirit and flesh. On his deathbed, the aged Jesus realizes with horror that he's been a Prodigal Son, calling out, like George Bailey or Ebenezer Scrooge from the depths of their own dark might-have-beens, and is restored: with the same sort of incredible relief we feel at those Resurrections.

If you can get past the difficulties and take The Last Temptation as the authors intended, the work offers some unexpected entries into the Gospel. Even in the odd confrontation in Christ's vision of Jesus with Paul, shown as the inventor of Christianity, one senses how often we cling to the Jesus we wish to believe in rather than face the Jesus in front of us. In any case, this film demands engagement: if it pulls Christ to earth, it pulls the viewer into the story, into encounter, and hopefully with more than ideas alone.