Movies

Mass Media Manifesto

The problem of our culture is "if it isn't on TV it isn't real."

TV is not made for truth; it is made for stirring up emotions.

The makers of media must make money. They must play to the mob. And most people are dominated by concupiscence. Therefore, our media are dominated by concupiscence.

Sin photographs beautifully. Most acts of virtue are interior and leave the virtuous characters looking as though they aren't doing anything. At best, the camera shows lots of anguish in order to represent the interior struggle (Frodo, Harry Potter). It's not great theater.

Filmmakers have found that tales of superheroes sell well. So do ancient Greek myths. So why not exploit the stories of the Bible? Telling a Bible story, complete with God's action in it, does not imply any commitment to the reality of God, any more than the movie Thor implies a commitment to the Gods of Greece. It's just a good story, with interesting characters, beautiful costumes, exotic settings, and lots of action.

These films are not going to preach the gospel for us. They do, however, give us a chance to get a word in edgewise among our unchurched family, friends, and colleagues.

B

The Bible

"The Bible" TV miniseries

LightWorkers Media

D

Day of War

About soldiers in David's army.

The cinematic action movie is based upon the biblical characters of King David and his elite warriors known as the Mighty Men. This is a live action, in your face, gritty, major motion picture. David and Goliath, one of the most well-known stories in all of history will be presented to the big screen like never before, according to those behind the film.

"Day of War, author Cliff Graham's first novel, has earned him a film option for the entire book series---Lion of War---from director David L. Cunningham (Path to 9/11) and producer Grant Curtis (Spider-Man films). In ancient Israel, at the crossroads of the great trading routes, a man named Benaiah is searching for a fresh start in life. He has joined a band of soldiers led by a warlord named David, seeking to bury the past that refuses to leave him. Their ragged army is disgruntled and full of reckless men. Some are loyal to David, but others are only with him for the promise of captured wealth. While the ruthless and increasingly mad King Saul marches hopelessly against the powerful Philistines, loyal son Jonathan in tow, the land of the Hebrew tribes has never been more despondent---and more in need of rescue. Over the course of ten days, from snowy mountain passes to sword-wracked battlefields, Benaiah and his fellow mercenaries must call upon every skill they have to survive and establish the throne for David---if they don't kill each other first."

Dogma

Bleaugh.

E

Exodus

IMDB: "Exodus" (a.k.a. "Moses")

Christian Bale

In an interview with Esquire magazine, [the directory] Ridley Scott called religion "the biggest source of evil", explaining, "Everyone is tearing each other apart in the name of their personal god. And the irony is, by definition, they're probably worshiping the same god".

It is further rumored to be more in the vein of "300" than "The Ten Commandments."

G

Give Me Shelter

"Give Me Shelter."

Documentary about saving animal species.

pro-life?

Gods of Egypt

Gods of Eqypt

H

Heaven is For Real

Little boy, near death experience

"Heaven is For Real" website.

J

"Joseph, King of Dreams"

Dreamworks

Prologue: "While artistic and historical license has been taken, we believe that this film is true to the essence, values and integrity of a story that is a cornerstone of faith for millions of people worldwide."

Judah treated as more important than Reuben.

"Half-brother." -- Four wives.

"I am a Miracle Child": "I am special, I am smart, any rules don't apply, for I am set apart."

Greydanus: B.

"Movie Review / Joseph: King of Dreams."

• Potiphar learns that his wife alleges she is pursued by Joseph. When he asks Joseph about this in front of her, he denies it. When Potiphar looks at his wife h e understands that she was lying and throws Joseph in jail.
• Potiphar later releases Joseph from jail and reconciles with him.
• Joseph gets married and has two kids before his brothers ever come to Egypt.
• Joseph has to learn to forgive his brothers and how to control the anger he had toward them for trying to kill him.
• His brothers reassure Joseph that God had intended what happened for the purpose of saving many people! Talk about backwards!

K

Korean Drama

"Korean Drama: A Refreshing Entertainment Alternative."

L

The Last Song

• "The Last Song: Book and Film Review."
• "Nicholas Sparks: The Spark Behind The Last Song."

N

The Nativity Story

IMDB: The Nativity Story

Noah

Survivalist take. If you build an ark, a lot of undeserving people will try to get on it.

From a person who saw the preview: "Told in a fantasy type of way a la Lord of the Rings."

Lots of CGI. Ever since "Independence Day," moviemakers have thoroughly enjoyed destroying the whole earth.

IMDB.

Rediscover the epic story of one man and the most remarkable event in our history.

The end of the world ... is just the beginning.

Russell Crowe, Emma Watson

"With a $125 million budget, the film is said to be more of an edgy action epic that depicts a man who fights off his enemies as he prepares for a coming apocalypse, rather than a story of a 'preacher of righteousness' who calls the world to repentance from sin."

"A number of battle scenes are said to fill the film, which in some aspects are reminiscent of Gladiator. Six-armed angels, known as Watchers, are also introduced, 'who came down from Heaven to help fallen humanity by granting them wonders of knowledge from magic to science to stars, metal, and fire.'" <YUCK!>

O

October Baby

• "Harvesting the Fruits of Contemplation," a review of October Baby.
• "October Baby: A Professionally Produced Pro-Life Film."

P

Passion of the Christ

"The Passion of the Christ."

Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ is the ultimate example of the style which Giotto began. It is also the ultimate in our great contemporary tradition of victim chic. Gibson’s Jesus (James Caviezel) is presented not as godhead but as victimhood incarnate. Nobody — not Marlon Brando in The Chase, not Sylvester Stallone in Rocky, not Denzel Washington in Glory, not even Mel himself in Braveheart is going to take a more impressive beating than Jim’s Jesus does. But without any more of a context than they are given here, his sufferings are merely bewildering, sickening. Surely, whatever other heterodoxy he may be guilty of, Mel cannot believe that pity is the same thing as piety? ...

Mel Gibson must have known that, in taking torture and brutality as his subject in preference to more traditionally spiritual considerations, he ensured that not only those who were implicated in such a crime but also those with a history of being unfairly implicated in it would feel themselves aggrieved. My guess is that he’s not sorry to have stirred up this hornet’s nest. ...

All of which is simply to say that The Passion of the Christ is like every other Mel Gibson picture in being ridiculously overproduced. As the British would say, he has once again over-egged the pudding. The new age music with pan pipes and wordless choruses, the swelling orchestral sounds at moments of significance, the flashbacks cross cut with the main action so as to produce heavy-handed ironies — all these things take us annoyingly out of the period and plonk us down jarringly in the entertainment culture of the present day.

"Prince of Egypt"

Dreamworks

Prologue: "While artistic and historical license has been taken, we believe that this film is true to the essence, values and integrity of a story that is a cornerstone of faith for millions of people worldwide."

The murder is accidental. Softens the Biblical account: "Ex 2:12 He looked all around, and when he didn’t see anyone, he beat the Egyptian to death and hid the body in the sand."

Moses doesn't stutter.

Greydanus: A+

Irreverrent followup--The Road to El Dorado.

Zipporah replaces Aaron as Moses' sidekick before the Pharaoh.

"No Kingdom should be built on the backs of slaves."

There can be miracles
When you believe
Though hope is frail
Its hard to kill
Who knows what miracles
You can achieve
When you believe
Somehow you will
You will when you believe

S

Son of God

Visually beautiful: casting, costumes, cityscapes, and landscapes.

Contemporary dialogue. Instead of saying, "I will make you a fisher of men," Jesus invites Peter to come "change the world."

Theological, historical, and scriptural problem: "Son of God" does not mean "God the Son."

"Son of God" (History Channel)

Based on "The Bible" mini-series.

LightWorkers Media

Dialogue from the trailer: "Are you the Son of God?" "I am." "Blasphemer!"

The blasphemy is in the next part of the verse, not in the claim to be "Son of God": "And you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Mighty One and coming on the clouds of heaven" (Mk 14:62).

R

"Religulous"

Bill Maher

"Lord of the Rings" vs. Godless worldviews

The existence of God is powerfully asserted in The Lord of the Rings, though, if I remember correctly, the word "God" does not appear in The Hobbit or the Trilogy.

I loved the spirituality of "Star Wars" episodes 4-6. There seemed to be room in the theology of the Force to understand it in monotheistic terms. Episode 1 made that charitable interpretation untenable. The Force is a byproduct of symbiosis between midichlorians and humans.

The "Harry Potter" series is also a Godless universe. Christmas is celebrated, but there is no Christian content. It is simply the winter holiday.

Miscellaneous Movies

• Godspel
• Jesus Christ Superstar
• Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
• Passion of the Christ
• Veggie Tales

Sabbatical Movie Festival (2013)

These are the movies that I watched online with Netflix. I also watched six or seven DVDs along with some Amazon on-demand videos.

"In a Lonely Place" -- Bogart.

"Radio Days"

year	title	comments
2011	30 for 30: The Real Rocky	Chuck Wepner--inspired the franchise. Sued, got a settlement.
2005	As It Is in Heaven	"This Oscar-nominated drama tells the story of Daniel Dareus, a small-town boy who escaped his tiny village to become a famous conductor. A tragic mishap sends him back home in search of a fresh start, and he ends up leading the local choir." "Singing in tongues" at the end. One song from the film became a pop hit, I think.
1991	Barton Fink	Coen brothers. Writer's block is just the beginning of the horrors.
	Best Worst Movie
2011	Buck	"Buck Brannaman, inspiration for 'The Horse Whisperer,' is revealed as a complex figure in this Sundance Audience Award winner for Best Documentary by Cindy Meehl. The master horseman reveals details of his troubled childhood and his dawning awareness of new ways that humans and horses might work with one another."
2010	Cave of Forgotten Dreams	"Werner Herzog offers an unprecedented examination of the Chauvet Cave, a cavern in southern France that contains the oldest human-painted images yet to be found on Earth."
1988	Cinema Paradiso
2009	Cleanflix
1985	Clue
2007	Death at a Funeral
2010	Devil	M. Night Shyamalan.
2008	Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog
	Everest: Beyond the Limit
	Everest: IMAX
2010	Four Lions	"In a scathingly hilarious indictment of true believers and the social systems that create them, this outrageous comedy follows an inept group of young Islamic Brits who fancy themselves bloodthirsty jihadists of the first order." For good or for ill, the film makes us sympathize with the terrorists and grieve their deaths.
2010	Happy People: A Year in the Taiga	"Venerated documentarian Werner Herzog teams with director Dmitry Vasyukov for this observant look at life along the River Yenisei in northern Russia, where the industrious inhabitants of a rural village truly live off the land." [No, they don't. They are fully armed and mechanized by industrial civilization!]
2007	Helvetica	Story of the ubiquitous type font.
2008	I Sell the Dead	"As 19th-century grave robber Arthur Blake faces the guillotine, he confesses his sins to a priest, revealing a life filled with unearthly high jinks in this macabre comedy starring Dominic Monaghan as the doomed digger and Ron Perlman as the cleric." One of the worst movies I saw. Dreadfully bad!
2008	In Bruges	An extremely black comedy. A friend gives his life to save his friend.
2003	Intolerable Cruelty	Coen brothers. "A revenge-seeking gold digger marries a womanizing Beverly Hills lawyer with the intention of making a killing in the divorce."
2007	Lars and the Real Girl
2010	Life After Django Reinhardt	"Born to Gypsy parents in 1910, musical genius Django Reinhardt is considered by many to be the single most important guitarist in the history of jazz. To honor the legend, a hundred of his disciples gathered for the Django 100 Centennial Tour."
2012	Lunarcy!	Space dreamers.
1979	Manhattan
1990	Miller's Crossing
2012	Mirror Mirror	"Much darker than the well-known animated Disney version, this remake of the classic Grimm tale follows fair-skinned princess Snow White on a quest to regain her royal throne with help from a team of shady dwarves." I didn't like it at all.
2011	Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol	I enjoyed this more than I thought I would.
2001	Monsoon Wedding	Mira Nair.
	National Geographic: Return to Everest/Surviving Everest
1984	Once Upon a Time in America	A former Prohibition-era Jewish gangster returns to the Lower East Side of Manhattan over thirty years later, where he once again must confront the ghosts and regrets of his old life. Director: Sergio Leone.
1968	Once Upon a Time in the West	Director: Sergio Leone. Classic Spaghetti Western.
1998	Pi	Aronofski. Obessive, paranoid "mathematics."
2005	Serenity	"Malcolm Reynolds, captain of the ship Serenity, picks up two fugitives from the powerful coalition ruling the universe. Mal and his mates find themselves at the center of a cosmic conflict, pursued by military forces and space-roaming savages."
2012	Skyfall
2010	Tabloid	"Director Errol Morris profiles another intriguingly dysfunctional personality in this complex documentary about Joyce McKinney, a former beauty queen whose lovely exterior hides a genius IQ -- and a criminal disposition."
2009	The Achievers: The Story of the Lebowski Fans	All about Lebowski fest.
2011	The Artist	"Winner of five Oscars, this artful black-and-white silent film follows the romance between a silent-era superstar on a downward spiral and a rising young starlet who embraces the future of cinema at the dawn of the 'talkies.'"
1989	The Dream Team	"While escorting four of his patients to a Yankees game, a shrink (Dennis Boutsikaris) gets waylaid by crooked cops, and his quartet of crazies is unleashed on the streets of New York City in this comic gem from director Howard Zieff."
1926	The General
2005	The Ice Harvest	"Unethical dim-bulb attorney Charlie Arglist embezzles $2 million from a mobster. Not content with the cash, the sleazy lawyer plans to skip town with pretty club owner Renata Crest -- until the cops and townsfolk grow increasingly suspicious."
2007	The Island (Ostrov)	"Father Anatoli (portrayed by former Russian rock star Pyotr Mamonov) lives a hermitlike existence in a remote Russian Orthodox monastery, where he's visited by people who believe he has the power to heal, see the future and exorcise demons. But Anatoli's odd behavior confuses his fellow monks, who are unaware that he's tortured by a past sin and considers himself an unworthy fraud. Pavel Lungin directed this poignant parable."
2003	The Italian Job	Team heist with small cars.
1938	The Lady Vanishes
2011	The Mill & The Cross	Watched this for the love of my friends. Slow, symbolic, surreal.
2009	The People vs. George Lucas	Fan criticism of what Lucas has done to Star Wars.
2009	The Road
1986	The Sacrifice (Offret)	Andrei Tarkovsky's final film. Dedicated to his son. "A birthday party is interrupted by news that World War III has begun and mankind faces annihilation." I did not like the "sacrifice" that is made at the end.
1988	The Thin Blue Line	"Filmmaker Errol Morris's gripping investigation into the murder of a Dallas police officer was responsible for freeing the man who was originally -- and erroneously -- charged with and convicted of the crime."
2010	The Way Back	"After narrowly escaping from a wretched World War II Siberian labor camp, a small band of multinational soldiers desperately undertakes a harrowing journey to traverse Siberia, the Gobi Desert and the Himalayas on foot."
1999	Topsy-Turvy
1981	Vernon, Florida
2009	Vision: From the Life of Hildegard von Bingen
2010	Who Is Harry Nilsson (And Why Is Everybody Talkin' About Him?)	Wrote "Everybody's Talking" from Midnight Cowboy. Huge talent, party animal, admired by the greats, peaked in 1969-1972, seems to have lost his way, became a family man, died with work unfinished.
2010	Windfall	The downside of wind turbines.
2011	Woody Allen: A Documentary: Part 1
2011	Woody Allen: A Documentary: Part 2

Links

• Barbara Nicolosi, "A “Christian” Cinema? An interview with Av Venire."
• Steven D. Greydanus, "Decent Films Guide."