PASSION DISTRIBUTION

The word is that The Passion of Christ (note name change due to the fact that Miramax has another film previously registered as The Passion) will be distributed by Newmarket Films. This seems to me an odd choice -- but I know nothing about it. Newmarket is a small distributor. Their biggest films of the last couple years have been Whale Rider and Memento. The Passion of Christ will do for Newmarket what Blair Witch did for Artisan and Harry Potter did for Scholastic Books.

But it's a puzzlement why the studios would pass...