Gibson film not meant to offend Mel Gibson insists his forthcoming film about Jesus Christ will "inspire not offend" Catholics and Jews.

The movie, which the actor directs, stars James Caviezel as Christ during the last 12 hours of his life and Monica Bellucci as Mary Magdalene. The reported $25-million US production will feature dialogue only in Latin and Aramaic with no English subtitles. "The Passion is a movie meant to inspire not offend," Gibson said in a statement published in the trade newspaper Variety. "My intention in bringing it to the screen is to create a lasting work of art and engender serious thought among audiences of diverse faith backgrounds." He made the statement to rebut criticism that The Passion is anti-Catholic and anti-Semitic. The film has not yet found a distributor. "If the intense scrutiny during my 25 years in public life revealed I had ever persecuted or discriminated against anyone based on race or creed, I would be all too willing to make amends. But there is no such record," the actor's statement read.

Nothing lightweight about Hulk

Director Ang Lee says that despite tackling a movie about a comic book hero, he wasn't about to make it one-dimensional. "I wanted to do it all," the 48-year-old, Taiwan-born director of The Hulk told Newsday in Sunday's editions. "I wanted a movie that satisfied the audience's desire for action. But I also wanted to establish . . . a psychodrama, a kind of emotional intensity that drives the action along." The Hulk opens Friday. The director, whose previous work includes Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Eat Drink Man Woman, Ride With the Devil and The Ice Storm, said making a film about a mild-mannered man who can turn into a muscle-bound monster was a way of tapping into a new kind of energy. "With the comics, especially, there's this rich tradition of visual storytelling. It's just that no one can take it seriously. So I saw (this project) as an opportunity to do something crazy, intense and artistically fulfilling. With no rules."

Tesh settles copyright lawsuit

A settlement has been reached in a lawsuit that claimed former TV host and current New Age musician John Tesh based a song on a Sept. 11 poem written by a Missouri woman.

Stacey Randall filed a copyright infringement lawsuit last month in U.S. District Court in Nashville. She named Tesh as a defendant along with his Louisville, Ky.-based Internet service provider, MaximumASP.

Randall said she wrote Met in the Stairwell five days after the terrorist attacks. It describes the airplanes crashing into the World Trade Center from God's point of view. Randall said she posted the poem on her family's Web site. A few people copied it and sent it to friends, and soon it was crisscrossing cyberspace, often as an e-mail attachment.

Marin loans out art collection

Two museums in El Paso, Tex., are displaying one of the largest travelling collections of Chicano art, on loan from actor Cheech Marin's collection. Marin launched two exhibits: Chicano Visions: American Painters on the Verge at the El Paso Museum of Art and Chicano Now: American Expression at the Insights El Paso Science Museum. "It's a source of great pride, hopefully, and everybody can enjoy some world-class art that comes from their own communities," said the 56-year-old, who co-starred with Tommy Chong in the Cheech and Chong comedies of the 1970s and '80s.

Trading Spaces guy draws crowd

Not only can Vern Yip design a room -- he can fill it, too. More than 500 people flocked to a new furniture outlet in Honolulul for a chance to meet Yip, one of the stars of The Learning Channel's interior decorating show Trading Spaces. "First, every one wants to know if the show is really as much fun as it seems," Yip said of the enthusiastic crowd. "Then they all want to know if we're ever coming to Hawaii to film." On the show, two sets of neighbours have two days to redo a room in the other's house on a $1,000 budget with the help of a few professionals. Lisa Holland, an account manager with the Discovery Network which produces the show, said the show receives about 500 online applications a day. "When we get enough interesting applications from here, we'd definitely like to come," she said. Among those waiting to meet Yip was A. May McCurdy. "Vern's one of the good guys," she said.