As we enjoyed dinner at a very fine Spanish restaurant in Washington, one of my companions brought up my (remote) Scottish ancestry, and the discussion quickly turned to Braveheart. I have always thought it amusing that outside the visitors center at the Wallace Monument in Stirling there is a statue of William Wallace, rendered to look exactly like Mel Gibson. The explanation I was given was that since no one knows what Wallace really looked like, why not make him look like Mel Gibson? (We do know, from the Wallace sword, that Wallace must have been taller than Gibson).
As for Mr. Gibson's more recent career, I do not really hold it against him. However, I find it hard to understand how a religious person like Gibson reconciles the imitation of Christ with a career based on extreme movie violence. I do not consider myself a very religious person, but I have never thought that the main point of Christ's life and teachings was the brutality of his death.
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