Bloodline

This film extends the investigation over the bloodline between Jesus and Mary, but provides some additional information that is quite profound. I'm not a big fan of documentaries, but since I was raised Catholic, I found this film to be quite fascinating, and full of ramifications, should the investigation prove to be true.

I have seen a few of Michael Moore's movies, and this one is similar to his genre of film-making. I found the line of reasoning plausible and quite illuminating. Given all the trouble that the Catholic church has endured in recent years, this is the icing on the cake.

I'm familiar with the music of Miriam Cutler, as I knew her through some fellow musicians when I was in college, when she wrote and participated in a very colorful jazz band. I still have one of her early recordings, and it's a real gem. It's great to see her outstanding work applied to such an endeavor.

In the first place I was dragged down to the movies by my friends to see what they described as 'a really cool movie' and I was not at all looking forward to seeing it, thinking it would be just as dull as The Da Vinci Code. When I started watching it though I changed my mind. I thought it was suspenseful, interesting, intriguing with great pictures of the tomb. I think it's great that an 'amateur' like Ben Hammott could find something like that. He's just an ordinary guy who became interested in this mystery in this little village in France and decided to investigate.

Me and my friends agree that it was an enjoyable and interesting film and I've recommended it to everyone I know. Well done guys for making such a good film, can't wait to see who's in the tomb and what all the artifacts are and I will keep checking the Bloodline website and Ben Hammott's one for updates - they're both really cool btw!

Considering the huge budget that The Da Vinci Code had and the small budget that Bloodline had these guys have done an awesome job and should be proud of themselves for doing such a great film!

In "Bloodline," documentarian Bruce Burgess explores the theory, made popular by Don Brown's recent bestseller "The Da Vinci Code," that Jesus and Mary Magdalene were lovers, that they fled to what is now modern-day France, and that French royalty can trace its lineage back to them and their children. The theory also posits that this "truth" has been carefully guarded by a shadowy organization called The Priory of Sion, and that the Catholic Church will literally stop at nothing to keep the story from getting out. Some contend that The Priory has been letting the details slip out little by little over the course of the centuries – mainly through art works with "coded messages" embedded in them - in a concerted effort to prepare the way for an illumination of the truth which, when finally revealed, will rock the very foundations of Christendom and thereby change the world.

Burgess spends much of the film interviewing people supposedly connected with or at least knowledgeable about the secret, individuals he meets in clandestine, off-the-beaten-path settings who speak in hushed tones about their theories and discoveries, and who claim to live in fear of their lives for even deigning to speak on the subject. The bulk of the second half of the film is taken up exploring what Burgess and amateur archaeologist Ben Hammott claim may be the tomb of Mary Magdalene, located in an isolated area in the south of France.

In all honesty, who knows what to make of this film or the conspiracy theory itself? Half the time the open-minded viewer feels as if he's watching something at least partway plausible – and the other half believing he's probably being made the dupe in an elaborate and colossal hoax. In fact, there are many sites dedicated to debunking the whole theory, including the entry on The Priory of Sion found on Wikipedia.

As a nonbeliever myself, I have to say that nothing put forth by this film strikes me as being any less plausible or historical than what is contained in the gospels themselves – which is to say that I find them both HIGHLY implausible and a-historical. I have no doubt that many people throughout the last two millennia have BELIEVED what Hammott and his minions are proposing, but that doesn't mean that any of it ever actually happened in real life.

Bloodline" is one of those movies that comes replete with a website where you can look up further information on the topic if so inclined. I suggest you look up quite a few others as well.

For me, the most important message of this film is that we are moving forward as a species. We are becoming willing in greater numbers to question what has been fed to us down through the ages. Regardless of whether a "bloodline" really exists -- or if Jesus was, in fact, married -- didn't matter as much to me as the sense of hope I felt. The film left me with a very positive feeling for our collective future because the theater was PACKED with enthusiastic people, and important questions were being asked. The film is really very exciting and moving. Who doesn't LOVE a good treasure hunt? Fascinating and original. I recommend it highly.

Seems the movie is a fraud, staged on a set in an English warehouse.

See:

1) Text of email confession at grailseekers.blogspot.com, search for March 2012 Hoax

2) Podcast of confession at http://latalkradio.com/Rene.php, March 21, 2012.

I'm disappointed, and I now consider Ben Hammott to be beneath the richest con artist or the deadliest drug lord. Preying on one's money or addictions is unconscionable; preying on one's most basic, fundamental beliefs - the universal/cosmic order, correct or not, upon which every aspect of the lives of millions is built - is inhuman.

Even if the questions/possibilities raised by the hoax are interesting as hell. No pun intended.