Churches 'snap up Passion DVDs'

The Passion of the Christ has made millions despite splitting the critics

Film studio 20th Century Fox has launched a massive marketing campaign in US religious communities for the DVD of The Passion of the Christ.

The studio has sent e-mails to more than six million Christian households, according to The New York Times.

It has also sent 260,000 postcards to churches offering bulk batches of the film, the newspaper reports.

Orders for the Mel Gibson-produced film are 20% ahead of projections, said Fox. The DVD is out in the US on 31 August.

The movie, about the death of Christ, upset some Jewish groups but made $370m (200m) at the US box office.

This makes it number seven on the all-time US box office chart.

Mixed reviews

Fox has also urged church leaders to persuade their parishioners to buy individual copies too.

One man called Fox hoping to buy 100,000 copies, Fox executive Steve Feldstein told The New York Times.

Fox have also distributed 10,000 limited-edition lithographs depicting Jesus and other religious images to church officials.

The film graphically depicts the final hours of Christ and it has attracted both rave reviews and condemnation in equal measure.

Some critics said the film was bloodthirsty and an assault on the senses.