Film and Religion

The Resurrection in SuperStar

2009-11-11T15:12:00.002-07:00

The question of the resurrection in Jesus Christ, Superstar seems straightforward. To put it bluntly, there isn't one.

Well, maybe the empty cross at the very end (with the shepherd and his goats walking in front of it) is supposed to be symbolic of a resurrection. But it's a stretch to argue that the empty cross is an empty tomb.

But what is Judas doing, descending from heaven on a cross, dressed in white and spangles, and singing the last rousing number? How should we interpret this?

Is it the resurrection of Judas?

Is it the reception of Judas into heaven?

Or, . . .

Jesus Christ, Superstar

2009-09-25T21:38:00.002-06:00

On the face of it, Jesus Christ, Superstar (1972) is a Passion Play. It depicts only the last week of Jesus' life, from his triumphal entry into Jerusalem on a donkey to his crucifixion. But given how different this film is from every previous Jesus film, even from every previous filming of a Biblical story, we should beware the notion that this is a simple depiction of the Passion.

When you think about Superstar, it is clear that it is a love story. The three main characters are Jesus, Mary and Judas. From the start, Mary looks after Jesus, cares for him, anoints him, and watches over his sleep. She sings about not knowing how to love him. When Judas attacks Jesus, she defends Jesus. As Jesus is led away and it is clear that Jesus’ tale will not have a happy ending for Mary’s love, she sings him a good-bye song, “Could we start again.”

Judas plays an interesting role in the film. He is the first to sing, talking about his close relationship to Jesus and how he is worried that Jesus’ actions are going to bring destruction down on the movement. From that point onwards, he acts more like a jilted lover than a worried deputy. He attacks Jesus for not seeing what is happening. He attacks Mary for anointing Jesus and then attacks Jesus for letting Mary close to him. When he receives Jesus’ disapproval, he retreats to the back of the disciples group, casting longing looks in Jesus’ direction.

Fast forward to the end. Judas’ last song before he hangs himself begins, “I don’t know how to love him,”—a reprise of Mary’s song. His last sung words before his death are about Jesus, “Does he love me, does he love me too? Does he care for me?” Clearly, the words of a lover.

It is possible even to see the three main figures as a love triangle. As Mary moves closer to Jesus, Judas is pushed out and acts with jealousy. Of Jesus’ first three stints singing, two of them are defending Mary against Judas’ verbal attacks.

Melito of Sardis and The Ten Commandments (1956)

2009-09-21T11:33:00.000-06:00

In the book’s chapter about The Ten Commandments, we drew upon the Pilgrims’ use of typology exegesis that presented the Jews’ Exodus and crossing of the Re(e)d Sea as a type for the Pilgrims’ own anti-typal action of crossing the Atlantic Ocean.

The Pilgrims were not the first to use typological interpretation on the Old Testament. Indeed, typology was used by some of the earliest Christian writers. Melito of Sardis and other writers were already using typology in their exegeses of the Jewish Scriptures in the second century. Indeed, Melito’s Paschal Homily (=”Sermon on the Passover”) makes extensive use of typology. Moreover, it seems that The Ten Commandments made use of the interpretation found in that work. (While the film’s introduction explicitly cites its use of Jewish sources for authority, it also drew from Christian sources.)

Whereas the Pilgrims’ emphasized the Jews’ journey through water and into the wilderness, Melito’s typological interpretation emphasizes the final plague, in which God killed all the first-born sons of the Egyptians. Melito’s characterization of the killing is picked up by the film. His physical description of the “darkness” that moves across Egypt and kills the firstborn as they come into contact with it (##22-27) becomes Ten Commandments’ mode of representing the way this wide-scale killing was accomplished. Other descriptions, such the angel of Death or even Exodus’ reference to God Himself, are not used.

Melito also makes a big point concerning the blood of the sacrificial lamb (in Melito’s terminology, “lamb” is stated in the singular) that was placed on the lintel of each Jew’s doorway to differentiate them from the Egyptians. (See Exodus 12.) Melito argues that the sacrifice of the lamb is the type which foreshadows Jesus own anti-typal death on the cross (##30-33). Just as the lamb died to save the Israelites from death, so Jesus died to save all people from death as sinners. More profoundly, Jesus suffers as the Passover sacrifice; Melito links the two through a Greek pun indicating that the verb meaning “to celebrate the Passover” echoes the verb “to suffer” (##46-47). Christ suffered for the peoples’ salvation as the lamb suffered for the Jews’ deliverance.

The Ten Commandments picks up on this link between Jesus and the Passover and transforms Moses into a Christ figure. Before Moses can lead the Israelites from Egypt, he is arrested, tried, and bound to a cross-bar, which he carries to the execution of his sentence in a manner that renders his body into a cross. Banished into the desert wilderness, the film emphasizes how Moses suffers and is purified. In this way he is prepared, suffering in a Christ-like manner, to lead his people to salvation from slavery.

The Films of Christmas

2008-12-24T07:49:00.001-07:00

Tis the season for Christmas movies! And after two weeks at number one, this year's big feature is "Four Christmases," a film full of in-law jokes, incompatible relatives, barfing babies and lots of (attempts at) humor.

Last year, the big Christmas hit was "Fred Clause," while the year before that it was "The Santa Clause 3." All three are comedies. None of them feature anything about the religious story of Christmas, namely, the birth of Jesus, Christianity's savior. Indeed, with a single exception, there have been no major release films or general audience TV features focusing on the religious story of Christmas for nearly half a century. The exception is 2006's "The Nativity Story," which had only modest box office success.

Most Christmas films and TV shows are comedies. Some feature Santa, the North Pole and its inhabitants: "The Santa Clause," "Elf," "Earnest Saves Christmas," "Olive, the Other Reindeer," and of course, the 1966 Burl Ives TV special, "Rudolf, the Red-Nosed Reindeer." We learn details of North Pole operations, and laugh at Santa, the elves and the reindeer.

Other comedies feature the interactions among families or a small group of people: "The Christmas Carol," "The Grinch who Stole Christmas," and even "White Christmas." We laugh at the antics of family members and friends (and enemies), and in doing so, laugh at ourselves.

Both kinds of films emphasize laughing. A good Christmas film is about comedy, gaiety, and light-heartedness. It's about having fun, but not above poking fun. It involves "laughing at" someone as much as "laughing with" someone.

If that is the case, no wonder films about the birth of Jesus are unpopular. The Christmas story of Jesus' birth is a serious matter. It is not a humorous tale or one for poking fun. It certainly is not for laughing at the baby Jesus. The Monty Python film, "Life of Brian," may be able to pull off a sight-gag about the infant Brian being whacked by his "Mum," but showing Mary slapping the baby Jesus would never work. Poking fun at this mother and child could only be seen as insulting.

So it clear that a successful Christmas Jesus Comedy cannot be made, but why not a serious film about Jesus' nativity? After all, that is the reason for the season. Surely, since Christmas is the most popular time of the annual Christian calendar and since most Americans claim to be Christians, a film about Jesus' birth should be a hit.

One reason is the altered meaning of the word "holiday," which comes from "Holy Day." A Holy Day is a day for performing religious activity, whether worship, fasting, contemplation or prayer. We have lost that concept and exchanged it for a more festive one. A "holiday" for us is time off work, time for celebrating, relaxing, getting together with friends and family, for having a good time and laughing. A serious film about the true meaning of Christmas does not fit with that.

Another reason that serious Christmas films about the Nativity do not work is that Americans compartmentalize their lives. They, I mean "we," mentally assign particular kinds of activities to particular places and at particular times. Religion is for church, usually on Sundays or Christmas Eve; it does not take place in the mall or the movie theater. When people want to think seriously about the sacred Christmas story, they are more likely to attend church or read and meditate about it on their own (this is the era of private religion after all). Few Americans would want to go to a noisy movie theater and watch a film while surrounded by the smells of popcorn and stale soda pop.

Such compartmentalizing is not new, it lies in the very notion of a Holy Day which can only be holy in contrast to the ordinary and everyday. In today's world, Christians have developed a new sense of the holy, one that keeps the holy out of the marketplace and out of the movie house and in the more private spaces of home and church.

Indiana Jones and the Power of God?

2008-06-11T11:33:00.000-06:00

[Warning: Contains spoilers]

Indiana Jones the adventurer-archaeologist is back in the new film, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Once again, he is on the trail of a powerful religious object, this time a crystal skull worshipped by a South American tribe. The film is set in the 1950s and Indy is opposed by a Russian scientist and her army henchmen who use violence, kidnapping, and murder to get possession of the skull.

With the skull as the central attraction, the film actually constitutes a meditation about the nature of belief, particularly belief in god, or in this case, gods. The Indians believe the skull is a sacred object, made holy as a symbol of divine beings worthy of their worship. The Russians see the skull solely as an object of power; they do not believe in the existence of any gods, but see the object as a source of knowledge and mental powers, which they can use for world domination. Indiana Jones portrays the scientific skeptic; he does not believe in magic, gods, or religion. To him, the skull is important because the Indians considered it important. It should be shared with all humanity by being displayed in a museum and studied.

Once the chase is on, Indy and the Russians head deep into the South American jungle, discovering ruins like those of the Mayans. Upon reaching the temple’s inner sanctum, they discover that the crystal skull is the actual skull of a space alien. When they place the skull on a headless alien skeleton, power is triggered. The skeleton reanimates, along with the nearby alien skeletons, the Russian scientist receives the psychic knowledge she desires, and then, as in the earlier films, Jones and his friends run for their lives.

The film’s climax indicates the Russians’ belief was correct. There were no gods. Instead, there were only space aliens. The Indians had mistaken the aliens for gods, and the aliens had taken advantage of that error. Jones’ skepticism was also mistaken, for the skull had power; not that of magic, but of the advanced technology of a star-traveling people.

The notion that the gods were actually space aliens visiting earth is not new. In the late 1960s and 1970s, this idea was popularized by Erich von Daniken, whose book Chariots of the Gods? sold millions of copies around the world. In this and later writings, he propounded the notion that the technology of the ancient world was given by visiting space aliens. Whether it was the building of the pyramids, Ezekiel’s vision of the heavenly chariots, the statues on Easter Island, or Babylonian stories of heavenly travel, Von Daniken sees them as evidence of visiting aliens.

But Von Daniken’s favorite body of evidence are the Mayan, Incan, and other Central and South American sites of massive temples and pyramids. From the Mexican site of Palenque, Von Daniken identifies a pictorial carving of a human sacrifice on an altar as a spaceman sitting in a space capsule. A picture of a priest in an elaborate headdress becomes for him an astronaut with a space helmet.

So this new Indiana Jones’ film taps into Von Daniken’s ideas, even the fascination with South American ruins, and identifies gods as space aliens. Gods are not divine, supernatural beings, but flesh-and-blood creatures (or rather flesh-and-crystal-skull beings) with advanced technology. It suggests we poor superstitious humans have mistaken technology for divinity.

This message stands in sharp contrast to the three previous Indiana Jones’ films. In them, the powerful sacred object reinforces the presence and potency of the divine. At the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, the Ark of the Covenant’s power is revealed as that of God. The closing scenes of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom show that the village’s stone lingam still brings Shiva’s blessing to the village, and the cup of the Holy Grail in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade remains imbued with the power of Jesus’ blood. And in each film, Indy the skeptic is shown to be the only one who understands and respects the object’s divine power and the divinity responsible for it, even though he does not believe in them.

Study Guide available (in draft form!)

2008-02-20T20:36:00.001-07:00

We have been working on the study guide for our book Film and Religion: An Introduction for several months. To actually finish it, we brought on board Den'ja Pommerane to help formulate insightful and useful questions. The last draft is now available by clicking on the link in the left column. When Abingdon makes the final version available, we will link to that instead. You will also be able to access it from Abingdonpress.com

The Davinci Code

2008-01-19T09:29:00.000-07:00

Paul Flesher and Bob Torry

The movie of The DaVinci Code is jam-packed with religion, real and imagined. It belongs to the genre of mystery, perhaps even detective mystery, and since the “detective” is a specialist in religious symbolism, all the clues are linked to religion. There is a wealth of books, articles, and web-sites identifying the symbolism and debating its meaning. The film lacks some of the book’s details and simplifies the plot in several ways, but it still has more than enough images to satisfy the most ardent “symbologist.”

In our view, the multiplicity of symbols distracts from the film’s central issue. Simply stated, the film asks whether religious truth, particularly “original truth,” can be passed down through the centuries without being lost or distorted. There are many obstacles in the way of successful transmission: failure of memory, misunderstanding, poor teaching or poor learning in the transmission from one generation to another, personality differences, (re)interpretation, etc. If this were not sufficient, The Davinci Code posits the existence of a group of clerics called the Council who actively work to suppress the truth, and is murdering those who know it—namely, the leaders of the Priory of Sion.

To cut to the chase—or rather, to the end of the chase—there is an originary truth that has survived from the beginning up to now. This is the bloodline of Jesus, which began through his marriage to Mary Magdalene and his impregnation of her. The film offers this not just as an unverified fact, but supports it with the suggestion of centuries of documentation and the preservation of Mary’s body now hidden beneath the Louvre’s pyramid.

The meaning of this truth is less clear. As Langdon’s questions to his lecture’s audience makes clear, symbols can have multiple meanings. Just because a swastika or an image of a baby at a breast has one particular meaning to us now, does not mean that those symbols have always had those meanings or even that our understanding of the meaning is presently universal. The preservation of Jesus’ bloodline is a symbol, which for the film is true, but there is no meaning attached to that symbol. Indeed, Langdon tells Sophie that it means whatever she chooses.

Despite the film’s silence about the explicit meaning of this original truth, the hidden events revealed in the narrative show that the film is intimately concerned with a the truth of one particular modern anxiety, not just truth in general. That anxiety concerns the role of women in Christianity, in the church. The Women’s Movement in the USA is less than half a century old. During that time, many Protestant churches have made significant strides in bringing women into leadership roles. The Episcopal Church USA appointed its first female Presiding Bishop this year. These advances remain controversial. The English Anglican church has yet to appoint its first female bishop and many Anglican communions still reject the notion of women as priests. They are not alone. During this same half-century, the Catholic Church has explicitly hardened its stance against the ordination of women—with the Pope invoking his Infallibility in doing so.

The film’s inclusion of Mary Magdalene as one of Jesus’ disciples as well as his wife, its reference to the Gospel of Mary Magdalene, its emphasis on the sexuality of Jesus implying that he participated in the religious ecstasy of the union of male and female leads to the conclusion that the origins of Christianity were more gender inclusive than subsequent centuries supposed. Jesus intended the church, in the film’s fictive presentation, to treat men and women as equals. Perhaps women should even have the leadership role; this is certainly suggested by the Gospel of Mary Magdalene and the fact that the heir Sophie is female rather than male. Thus the film aims to quiet the modern anxiety about the place of women in the church by positing that women played a large role at the time of Christianity’s origins, a role which had been forgotten by all but a few.

Film and Religion book is now available!

2007-08-09T07:13:00.000-06:00

Abingdon Press has completed the printing process for our text book _Film and Religion: An Introduction_ and it is now available for purchase at online booksellers, through local bookstores, or directly from Abingdon (see link on the right).

What distinguishes this work from other books that address the intersection of films and religious subjects?

First, it is a textbook. It is written specifically for undergraduate students and for use in a course on Film and Religion. There are many such courses in colleges, universities and seminaries around the country, but there have been no textbooks composed specifically for these classes. That said, the book is also written in a style that makes it interesting, accessible, and enjoyable to members of the general public.

Second, each chapter focuses primarily on an issue rather than on a film. Of course the chapters discuss and analyze specific films (and are intended to stimulate further classroom discussion), but it is not a collection of disparate essays on a variety of films. By focusing on an issue rather than a film, a course based on this book is not limited to the films analyzed directly. Each chapter sets up an issue for the intersection of film and religion by establishing the cultural context, asking the key questions that elicit insight into the issue, and then working through an example of a film or two to show how the questions play out. Most chapters end with vignettes suggesting other films that address the issue, and many issues apply to yet other films. (See the previous blog for a short example of how the book handles the 1956 film, _The Ten Commandments_.)

Third, this book is about the intersection of film and religion in particular cultural and historical contexts. We see films as presenting or using aspects of religion, from symbols and theology to rituals and institutions, to participate in or intiate debates on issues to the general audience. As we show, these debates range from the use of the atomic bomb to the role of Jesus as an establishment or an anti-establishment figure, from the notion of God as an alien to Islamic fanaticism and its identity with or difference from true religion.

The book's Preface for Teachers introduces the volume this way:

This book began as lecture notes for our course Film and Religion, an upper-level course open to all students, which we have been team-teaching for more than a decade. When we first taught the course, there were no textbooks and no guidelines for teaching such a course, so we set out our own strategy. We began by distinguishing between films that were explicitly based on religion, such as The Ten Commandments and Brother Sun, Sister Moon, and films that were overtly secular, but which covertly drew upon religious ideas, themes, or characters, such as The Matrix and The Natural. This distinction quickly fell apart, for we discovered that films that dealt overtly with religious topics often addressed secular, cultural issues (e.g., King of Kings), while films that were explicitly secular made the heaviest points on religious questions (e.g., The Legend of Bagger Vance).

By wrestling in class week after week with the question of how film uses religion to tell stories and to convey messages, we found that the answer often required us to go outside the film into the social and political culture within which and for which a film was created. That is, films frequently addressed cultural issues under debate in the larger society. Sometimes these issues were of broad national importance, while other times the questions mattered only to a small subsection of society, perhaps as small as the director and his colleagues. Big issue or small, we realized that we needed to ask about each film’s cultural context to interpret its use of religion.

This textbook brings together the three areas of knowledge we have found essential for understanding film’s use of religion: the films themselves, the religious features that appear in them, and the cultural concerns they address. This book serves as a guide for combining these three kinds of information to reach an understanding of how a particular film or group of films uses religious imagery, characters, symbolism, and so forth. Because of space limitations, it cannot give an exhaustive exploration of each film, but lays out its analyses to indicate avenues of exploration that can profitably be pursued further. An understanding of this book’s organization will help it to be used more efficiently.

We have organized each chapter around an issue addressed by a group of films (although sometimes it is a group of one). The chapter analyzes the issue through the investigation of one or two selected films. Many chapters include a vignette or two of related films at the end. Any one of these films may be viewed for the students to follow the chapter’s discussion.

Note: A study guide with helpful questions on each chapter is nearly ready for distribution from this blog and from Abingdon's website.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Preface for Teachers

Introduction

Chapter 1: Christmas Films: The Search for Meaning
How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1967)

SECTION ONE: Ultimate Destruction and the Cold War in the 1950s
Chapter 2: Religion, Science Fiction, and the Bomb
When Worlds Collide (1951)
The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

Chapter 3: Making Rome Christian
Quo Vadis (1951)
The Robe (1953)

Chapter 4: The Ten Commandments and America’s Fight against Tyranny
The Ten Commandments (1956)

SECTION TWO: Filming Jesus
Chapter 5: The Messiah of Peace
King of Kings (1961)

Chapter 6: The Accidental Superstar
Jesus Christ, Superstar (1973)

Chapter 7: The Tormented Christ
The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)

Chapter 8: Violence and Redemption
The Passion of the Christ (2004)

SECTION THREE: Varieties of Religion in American Film
Chapter 9: The Devil: Screening Humanity’s Enemy
The Exorcist (1973)
The Omen (1976)

Chapter 10: God as Alien: Humanity’s Helper
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)

Chapter 11: Religion and Scandal, Crime and Innocence
Agnes of God (1985)
The Apostle (1998)

Chapter 12: The Religion of Baseball
The Natural (1984)
Field of Dreams (1989)

SECTION FOUR: World Religions in Film
Chapter 13: American Dharma
Little Buddha (1993)
The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000)

Chapter 14: Jewish Films: Finding the Path Between Torah and Modernity
The Chosen (1982)
The Quarrel (1990)

Chapter 15: Islam and Fanaticism: Only in the Eye of the Beholder?
Destiny (1997)
My Son the Fanatic (1997)

The Ten Commandments: A Christian Tale

2007-08-07T21:13:00.001-06:00

From the end of World War II to the mid-1960s, religious films reflecting a Christian outlook and emphasizing biblical or early Christian themes constituted a popular American film genre. There were biblical romances, such as “David and Bathsheba” and “The Story of Ruth,” as well as Christians in Rome films, such as “The Robe” and “Demetrius and the Gladiators.” By 1961, a string of Jesus films had begun. But the most popular of all was “The Ten Commandments,” which appeared in 1956.

It is surprising that this story of God bringing the Israelites out of Egypt to give them the “law” was such a hit with American Christians, for the law is an anathema to Christian theology. Although Jesus was careful to indicate he did not aim to “tear down” the law, but to “fulfill it,” the early missionary Paul thought the opposite. In his Letter to the Romans, he spent the first eight chapters arguing that the “law of sin and death” (Romans 8:2) prevented salvation and that Jesus freed Christians from bondage to the law.

To overcome this problem, film director Cecil B. DeMille had to Christianize the tale. Borrowing from the Puritans and from earlier Christian ideas about Moses, he made the entire story into a foreshadowing of Christianity. Robert Torry and I discuss this in our new book, “Film and Religion: An Introduction,” and show that DeMille used two main approaches to accomplish this.

First, “The Ten Commandments” turned Moses into a forerunner of Christ by assigning him events from Jesus’ life. Moses’ birth shows this clearly. While the biblical story of the baby Moses being found by Pharaoh’s daughter in a basket floating in the Nile gives him a special upbringing in the palace, the film provides Moses with the signs of a special birth like Jesus.

A star appears to signal his birth and when the pharaoh consults his wise men, they tell him that it indicates the fulfillment of a prophecy of a deliverer for the Hebrews. Like King Herod, Pharaoh then orders the killing by sword of all the newborn male babies. Years of rumors followed concerning a deliverer for the Hebrews, just as Jesus’ lifetime was filled with rumors of a messiah who would deliver his people from the Romans.

When he grows up, Moses discovers his Hebrew origins and goes out among them. After Moses killed an overseer who was beating a Hebrew slave, the Bible story has Moses running away for fear of discovery. The film, by contrast, adds a Jesus-like trial in which he is accused of being the deliverer who will destroy Egyptian society by freeing the slaves. When Pharaoh seeks to pardon him, Moses answers the king in a way that forces his punishment, as Jesus did in his trial before Pilate.

Second, the law itself undergoes the most important transformation in “The Ten Commandments.” The film does not present Paul’s idea of the law that enslaves humankind, but a law that sets people free from tyranny.

Most important, it is a law written on people’s minds and hearts, as the film repeatedly indicates. At the film’s start, Moses is described as “a man upon whose mind and heart would be written God’s law.” Later, Moses tells Joshua that the Israelites will go to Mt. Sinai where God will “write his commandments in our minds and upon our hearts forever.”

God’s interview with Moses at the burning bush makes clear this characterization of the law refers to Christianity. This scene is quite faithful to the biblical text, with nearly all dialogue coming from the Old Testament Exodus story. But God tells Moses his ultimate intentions with a sentence taken from the New Testament, “I will put my laws into (the Israelites’) mind and write them in their hearts.”

This line from Hebrews 8:10 cites the prophet Jeremiah (31:33) predicting a “new covenant” which will come, and Hebrews interprets this covenant as the one established by Christ. So, “The Ten Commandments” uses this key phrase to present the giving of the law to Moses and the Israelites as a spiritual encounter akin to the inner, spiritual change of each individual in Christianity, and not a mere legal contract.

“The Ten Commandments” film thus presents the story about the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt and their receiving of the law as a story that more than foreshadows Christianity; they become a type of Christian, guided to a relationship with God by a Christ-like savior, Moses, and linked to God through spirit of the law written on their hearts and minds.

Flesher’s and Torry’s book, “Film and Religion: An Introduction,” is published by Abingdon Press (2007) and is available from the UW Bookstore, and local and online bookstores.

Sinbad: Chaos as Necessary for Order

2007-05-08T19:08:00.000-06:00

The 2003 cartoon film, "Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas," contains the usual cartoon features. The film is full of jokes and gags, even in its most serious moments; there is the kind of fighting and narrow escapes that only toons can do; there is little character development; and many of the creatures are simply preposterous. But the film’s plot centers around the struggle between the divine and the human worlds, where the divine world, or least the part that we see, is evil and the human world is primarily good (although not without a few rogues).

The sacred object over which the two worlds fight is the “Book of Peace.” This book unites in peace the city-states of the world—apparently those around the Mediterranean Sea over 2000 years ago. Sinbad, a notorious pirate, attempts to steal the book while it is being taken to its new temple in Syracuse. He fails, but only because Eris, the Goddess of Discord, interferes. Once the book arrives in its new home, however, Eris steals the book and frames Sinbad. He is captured and sentenced to death. Before Sinbad can be executed, the heir to the throne of Syracuse exchanges himself for Sinbad, who is then given 10 days to retrieve the Book of Peace from the goddess’ island or the Prince will be executed. The rest of the film depicts the adventures Sinbad and his crew undergo while trying to get the book.

The interesting part of the film centers on the nature of the Book of Peace; its pages contain the universe. A look inside reveals not flat paper, but a multi-dimensional, “live,” image of the cosmos, with planets, moons, stars and constellations. The book represents the cosmic Order; the rules, the rhythms, and the harmonies that guide the universe as it moves through time and space.

This cosmic Order is what Eris seeks to disrupt—after all, she is the goddess of discord. Moreover, the film depicts her realm as that of the cosmos. Not only does she inhabit the space around the earth, looking down on its “tiny” sphere, but the creatures she commands are themselves constellations.

But "Sinbad" does not leave the idea of order there. Eris knows that the Book of Peace symbolizes the unity and order of the human world, but it is not a talisman that maintains order by some magical means. The human world will not fall into disorder by the Book’s theft, but by the death of the only rightful heir of Syracuse, which she expects Sinbad’s failure to accomplish. Sinbad thwarts her plan by choosing to return to Syracuse and face the punishment for his failure, instead of letting the Prince be executed.

So in the end, the film makes the point that humans and their choices ultimately determine the order of their world, not some magical or mechanistic link to the cosmos. Gods and goddesses may interfere, but in the end human choices and actions shape the present and the future. Order is desirable and important, but the course of that order can be shaped by humans.

Interestingly, this order, as depicted in the film, requires disorder. Sinbad is a theiving and disrespectful pirate who himself represents disorder in the film’s opening scenes. It is this ability to defy order to achieve his goals that in the end make him the only person who can restore order. Even at the cosmic level, then, order requires disorder.

The Prophet in Saved!

2007-02-13T12:53:00.000-07:00

It is odd that no one in the film Saved! ever converts, despite its setting in a Pentecostal high school, where everyone apparently wants to save others for Jesus. This is especially true for Cassandra Edelstein, the high school’s smoking, drinking, foul-mouthed bad girl. Even though Cassandra is the constant recipient of “witnessing” by Hilary Faye—the school’s super-Christian—and undergoes two fake conversions during the film, Cassandra remains unrepentant and unconverted. Instead, Saved! presents Hilary Faye’s Christian message as hollow and corrupt, while Cassandra, who at first seems to act with self-destructive abandon, embodies a prophetic role.

Cassandra’s role as a prophet stands out in two ways. First, her name, Cassandra, comes from Greek mythology. Cassandra was the daughter of King Priam of Troy. The god Apollo fell in love with her and gave her the gift of prophesying truthfully. When she rejected Apollo’s love, he cursed her by causing her never to be believed. In Saved!, the actions and words by which Cassandra rebels against the high school, its students, and its staff are never taken seriously, but are viewed as unstable and perhaps drunken rantings.

Second, Cassandra’s last name is Edelstein, which means “precious stone” or “jewel”; she is Jewish. As such she represents the Jewish prophets of the Old Testament, not the Greek. While modern, popular Christianity often sees prophets merely as predictors of the future, a more accurate characterization of the Jewish prophets would be those who to speak truth to power (the king) and to the populace (the people as a whole). They were often ignored and so took measures to garner attention. Isaiah, for example, prophesied naked for three years (Isaiah 20).

But Hosea provides the best example of the functioning of prophecy. Hosea 1:2 reads, “The Lord said to Hosea, ‘Go, take to yourself a wife of harlotry and have children of harlotry, for the land commits great harlotry by forsaking the Lord.’” God tells Hosea to commit harlotry by marrying a whore. Hosea must go against all the rules of proper social behavior. Even though God uses Hosea to bring his message to the Israelites, he causes Hosea to receive social ostracization by having him violate Israelite social mores. Why? Because the Israelites themselves (“the land”) have violated their allegiance to God by turning their backs on Him and His expectations and following other gods. So Hosea’s actions symbolize the Israelites’ character. Hosea violates social norms because the society has forsaken God’s religious norms.

As the prophetic figure in Saved!, Cassandra’s message comes not through the meaning of her words, but, like Hosea, through her actions. Cassandra’s actions reveal the true nature of the high school community’s spiritual state, especially as seen in its leaders. Hilary Faye, the student leader, uses Christianity to magnify herself, to glory in self-love rather than spread Christian love to others. Pastor Skip, despite his fancy talk, no longer practices the love of Jesus but instead sees Christianity as a set of rules and restrictions (no gays, no divorce) even as he violates the rules by committing adultery. So when Cassandra rebels by smoking, drinking, or saying shocking things, she prophetically symbolizes the corruptness lying hidden under the surface of the Christians around her. Every time she acts out, she reveals the true nature of the high school community. This is particularly evident when she fakes the Baptism of the Holy Spirit and speaks in tongues during the opening assembly. That she can convincingly fake this most intimate of moments between God and an individual, as Pastor Skip’s reaction indicates, emphasizes that the commitment of the Christians around her can also be merely surface acting—as the remainder of the film shows.

In the end, Cassandra’s prophetic message fails to change the society around her. Although the hypocrisy of both Hilary Faye and Pastor Skip is revealed, they do not change and the high school which they represent remains the same. This stands in contrast to Jim Carey’s portrayal of the prophetic Grinch, which we discuss in our forthcoming book, Film and Religion: An Introduction (2007). In the 2000 film, Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the society of the Whos have forgotten the true meaning of Christmas. The Grinch “acts out” in a number of ways through the film to bring them back, climaxing in the theft of Christmas. This monumental deed finally brings the Whos to the realization that Christmas is not about presents but about family. This enables the entire community to re-embrace the true meaning of Christmas, that is, to change in reaction to the prophet’s message. This enables the Grinch also to change—to convert—and to become a believer in Christmas. In Saved!, by contrast, the Christians remain untrue to their values, so Cassandra remains outside the community. Instead, she creates her own community where Christian ideals run true.

In Saved!, the only member of the high school community who changes is Mary. As her inner physical transformation takes place during her pregnancy, she also undergoes an inner spiritual transformation. She moves from the superficially pure yet internally corrupt Christians, to the superficially non-Christians (Cassandra and Roland) who actually have internalized the Christian values of love and acceptance (rather than rules and demands for conversion).

The Nativity Story: First Impressions

2006-12-11T13:12:00.000-07:00

Paul V.M. Flesher

It has been over five decades since a major-release film was made about the Christian story of Christmas, that is, about the birth of Jesus. This is not surprising, given the difficulty of the subject matter. Any film about Jesus’ birth faces the problem that the story is so well known it contains little suspense. Christians know by heart what will happen. Given this difficulty, it is surprising that the new film, The Nativity Story, actually provides a fresh portrayal of this old story, even telling a tale that takes on new dimensions as it unfolds.

Since the nativity’s events and their outcome are known, the film creates narrative tension by emphasizing the contingency of Mary and her pregnancy. The Nativity Story consistently raises challenges to Mary’s well being in general and to a successful pregnancy in particular. This is done not by focusing on how Scripture tells the story, but on what it leaves out; the film places the gospels’ nativity story into the historical context of grinding poverty, oppression of the Jews by Herod and the Romans, an out-of-wedlock pregnancy, and the difficult journey of a pregnant woman. At each stage, the film makes clear the dangers facing Mary, her family, and the fellow villagers. When a fellow villager cannot pay his taxes, his daughter is dragged away. Once the audience discovers Mary’s father cannot pay all his taxes, they realize she stands in similar danger. Shortly thereafter Mary’s father agrees to marry her to Joseph, without consulting Mary first, in order to ease the household’s food needs.

Furthermore, Mary’s pregnancy makes her liable to stoning, but Joseph decides not to accuse her. After the angel visits him, he actively protects her. The villagers shun Mary as her pregnancy begins to show, and shun him once his support of her becomes clear. Finally, when Mary decides to travel with Joseph to Bethlehem, the journey is clearly difficult. At different times, she is in risk of starving and in danger of falling down steep hills. At one point she is swept away by the Jordan River’s swift current. In the film, her birth pains start just before they arrive in Bethlehem. Joseph struggles to control his panic as he searches for shelter, and then, when they are directed to a stable (the film does not even bother with “no room at the inn”), he must be her midwife. So although the story’s end is known, the difficulties facing its successful completion stand out at each turn.

Just as the difficulties facing Mary and Joseph stem from their surroundings, so those surroundings are made as realistic as possible. The village of Nazareth is presented as authentically as possible. A trained eye recognizes much about the houses’ construction that has been discovered by archaeologists. The grape-pressing scene takes place in vat carved into the bedrock, just like a vat actually excavated in a recent archaeological dig.

The clothing, too, is authentic to the period. The colors are primarily tans and browns, in keeping with the natural colors of wool. Missing is the color symbolism of clothing, largely developed in medieval and renaissance paintings and used in earlier Jesus films.

Despite these attempts to be more authentic to the historical past, the film draws extensively from previous Jesus films. Like The Last Temptation of Christ, The Nativity Story uses a raptor to indicate the presence of the supernatural: in this case, a hawk symbolizes the angel’s flight. There are also several crowd scenes reminiscent of Last Temptation, which emphasize too many things and people moving excitedly in too small a space. Like The Passion of the Christ, the film uses spoken Hebrew and Aramaic without subtitles in particular scenes. Indeed, the sentences in these languages were developed in consultation with William Fulco, who was responsible for the Aramaic and Latin in The Passion. The brutality of the soldiers and the interaction between Herod the Great and his son Antipas are borrowed from earlier films such as King of Kings and The Greatest Story Ever Told. The latter film also contributes the type character of the old man who has been waiting for a messiah. In Greatest Story, this was a blind man who followed Jesus to Jerusalem, while in Nativity Story, it is an old shepherd who shares his fire with Mary.

The film itself is quite understated. Apart from various messianic prophecies about the child, there is no explicit religious message. There is little Christian or Christmas imagery in the staging, dialogue, or other aspects of the film. The only obvious nod in the direction of Christian symbolism appears in the way the light of the star shines through the stable roof. Indeed, the film is rather subtly and tastefully executed.

In closing, let me make a few casual observations. First, Morocco is not Palestine/Israel. As dry as Palestine is, Morocco, where the film was made, is even worse. The land seems to be all stones and little seems to grow, while the rivers are bigger and swifter than the Jordan. Second, there are few smiles in the film. Indeed, most smiles appear on the faces of the two pregnant women, Mary and her older cousin Elizabeth. Third, the three wise men are integrated into the story as a sub-plot. Although most of it is completely imaginary, the film humorously manages to breath some life and personality into their characters. Fourth, although several reviewers have made a big deal about the Christmas carols in the film, there are only four total. These are well-situated in the film and do not make a big splash. They are understated in keeping with the rest of the film. Finally, Herod’s tax burden receives historical backing when a scene shows Herod inspecting the building of his palace at Masada. When he tells the builders to add gold tiling to a new pool, he dismisses concerns about the cost. After all, that is what subjects are for.

These are just initial observations and comments, made on opening day. In-depth analysis will have to wait for further thought and viewing. Luckily, I think this film will repay re-viewing.

Film and the Christianization of Nigeria

2006-10-18T13:46:00.000-06:00

Paul V.M. Flesher

Let’s start this column with a quiz question. Which film center produced more commercial movies in 2005: Hollywood (USA), Bollywood (India), or Nollywood (Nigeria)? If you guessed Hollywood, guess again. America produced only 611 commercial films in 2005. Ok, Bollywood then. Nope. Although India outshone the USA, producing 964 films, they produced less than half the output of Nollywood, which released over 2000 films. (Hollywood comes out on top when the criteria is gross sales income.)

Admittedly, the Nigerian film industry operates on different principles from those of America and India. Most films are low-budget, often costing less than $30,000 to make. They are shot in ten days or less by hand-held video cameras, and distributed directly to DVD without ever seeing the light (or is it the “dark”?) of a movie theater. Most films made in Nigeria sell for about $3 and rent for 50 cents.

What is interesting about Nigerian films is that one of the most popular plot lines features the clash of religions, old and new. The key characters are villains who use aspects of traditional African religions, often characterized as witchcraft or voodoo, to work their wicked ways. In the end, however, Christianity triumphs by redeeming the victims and vanquishing the evil doers, although they may be forgiven upon conversion to Christianity. Make no mistake, this plot-line may be camp and hackneyed, but it is usually played down and dirty for all it is worth.

Although The Guardian (London) recently characterized this genre as the “voodoo horror flick,” this really describes the films for the benefit of Western film viewers. Within Nigeria itself, these films echo the historical transformation of southern Nigeria from its traditional religions to Christianity. While Islam entered northern Nigeria as early as the eleventh century, Christianity arrived in the south with the Portuguese in the 1500s and the British in the 1700s, along with the slave trade. During the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, after the end of slavery, Britain established direct rule of Nigeria through a series of conflicts. They brought trade with the West, and with it, education—largely through mission schools. Christianity was seen in the south as enabling upward mobility (as had Islam in the north) and so Anglicanism took hold among the Yoruba in the southwest, while Catholicism became rooted among the Igbo in the southeast. Both worked to eliminate the practices and beliefs of traditional religions. This was so successful that by the 1990s, less than 10% of Nigerians followed traditional ways and Christianity had become the religion of nearly forty percent of Nigerians (nearly all in the south), with the remainder being Muslim (in the north).

The traditional religions of the Yoruba and the Igbo differ in important ways, but they both emphasize the existence of spirits, particularly the spirits of the deceased and of ancestors. These spirits have the power to affect the living. Being morally neutral, they can be used for good and evil, depending on the purpose of the person trying to access their power.

With traditional southern Nigerian religions dying out under the onslaught of Christianity, the theological structures in which spirit worship existed have been forgotten. The activities of communicating with spirits and using their power is now seen in a Christian perspective as witchcraft.

It is not surprising, then, that the popularity of Nollywood films is almost entirely limited to southern Nigeria, for the common Nollywood film plot described above reinforces the social and religious transformation of southern Nigeria from its traditional religious practices to Christianity.

Furthermore, this transformation progresses across the generations unevenly. Older Nigerians are more likely to practice elements of traditional religions, while members of the younger generation often know little about traditional religions beyond superstition. Given the film industry’s cutting-edge character in Nigeria and its popularity among younger Nigerians, these Nollywood plots help solidify Christianity’s increasing hold on the populace.

Nollywood films, with their religious themes, have a broad appeal outside Nigeria, especially where similar religious transformations have taken place. South Africa now has a satellite TV channel devoted to Nollywood films, and BSkyB, Rupert Murdoch’s British pay-per-view satellite company is adding a Nollywood channel for Nigerian and other African expatriates in Europe.

Christian Film rated PG — From Sightings

2006-07-06T14:05:00.000-06:00

Here is a copy of the July 6th 2006 posting from Sightings. Bob and I thought it was worth posting. Thanks to the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago!

Parental Guidance in Matters of Faith
-- James L. Evans

In the latest clash between fundamentalist Christianity and the rest of the world, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) recently assigned a PG rating to an explicitly Christian film. The movie, Facing the Giants, is the story of a football team with a losing record that suddenly gets turned around and starts winning when the coach finds God.
Even though it's a low-budget movie, produced for a mere $100,000, the film may find its way to a national audience. The producer needed to secure permission from Sony to use a Christian song as part of the theme music for the film. Sony indicated they wanted to see the movie first. After viewing the film, Sony agreed to distribute it in 400 theatres.

That's when the MPAA got involved, and that's when the fight broke out.

Don Wildmon, founder of the American Family Association , attacked the rating as a direct assault on the faith. Wildmon's group distributed an e-message under the headline, "MPAA places Christianity in same category as sex, violence, profanity." In this message, Wildmon accuses the MPAA of telling parents that the film is "objectionable."

Unfortunately, that's not the truth. The PG rating is designed to alert parents that certain themes or ideas may not be appropriate for children. It says nothing about teenagers over the age of thirteen (presumably a target audience for a film about high school football!). All the PG rating does is say to parents, "You might want to look at this before allowing your child to view it."

Isn't that what Christian groups are always telling parents to do? In fact, isn't that precisely what the American Family Association does every week with their bulletins about what's objectionable on television? The PG rating is not an indictment of Christianity. It is merely a flag for parents to be sure they know what's going on.

Of course, maybe Wildmon and his ilk expect us to accept anything with the label Christian on it without question. But if that's what they think, they're living in a fantasy world. I would not let my children attend a Bible school at a neighboring church without first finding out something about the church, and my guess is that most conscientious parents are the same way. Just because the package says Christian on the outside doesn't mean Jesus is on the inside.

This is not to say that Facing the Giants is not a faithful rendering of a Christian story. It may be. But alerting parents that a movie has a strong religious theme -- from any religion whatsoever -- is not an attack on faith.

We are left with two conclusions about this matter. First, it appears that a certain segment of Christianity in America has a big chip on its shoulder. Any sort of slight, any questioning of the faith -- or, in this case, any suggestion that parents should guide their children in matters of faith -- and the fight is on.

The other conclusion is more disturbing. It would seem that watchdog groups like Wildmon's American Family Association are capable of twisting even the most inconsequential issue into a national emergency. If they are doing this just to keep their base agitated for the purpose of raising money, then it reflects a level of cynicism that even the most hard-boiled politician does not practice.
This kind of thing makes me want to give the AFA a PG rating, or more.

James L. Evans is pastor of Auburn First Baptist Church, Auburn, Alabama. He can be reached at faithmatters@mindspring.com.
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The current Religion and Culture Web Forum features "Religious Identities of Latin American Immigrants in Chicago: Preliminary Findings from Field Research" by Andrea Althoff. To read this article, please visit: http://marty-center.uchicago.edu/webforum/index.shtml,

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Sightings comes from the Martin Marty Center at the University of Chicago Divinity School.

2006-06-13T14:54:00.000-06:00

The Exorcism of Emily Rose
Robert Torry

The 2005 horror film, "The Exorcism of Emily Rose," is loosely based on an incident that took place in the early 1970s in Wurzburg, Germany. It received significant press coverage at the same time the blockbuster film, "The Exorcist," arrived in German theatres. "Emily Rose" then, might be profitably understood as a movie about events shaped by a movie.

As in "The Exorcist," the devil has possessed a young girl, Emily Rose, a devout Catholic from a small Minnesota farming community. In the new film, a valiant priest struggles on her behalf with the powers of darkness. Her death in the course of the exorcism leads to criminal charges being leveled against the priest, and the courtroom drama that ensues pits the religious interpretation of Emily's tragedy against the authority of modern medicine.

This contest in "Emily Rose" recalls that Regan, the possessed girl at the center of "The Exorcist," undergoes a number of medical tests to determine the cause of her symptoms prior to church representatives finally determining her condition is a supernatural rather than medical problem.

"The Exorcist" shows little ambiguity concerning the cause of Regan's trouble. Indeed, it powerfully affirms that the possession is genuine and that only the intervention of religious specialists can effectively deal with the case.

"The Exorcism of Emily Rose," by contrast, leaves a bit more wiggle room. Emily may well be possessed by a demon, perhaps by the devil himself, but the clashing testimony in the trial allows for a medical/psychiatric explanation of her condition. The trial features a difference of opinion between one psychiatrist who contends that Emily's condition can be explained solely within medical terms and another who accepts a supernatural explanation. It also features testimony by an anthropologist who argues for an acceptance of possession, whether supernatural in cause or not, based upon its wide occurrence in many cultures and historical periods. The anthropologist argues for the effectiveness of a cure produced by the ritual of exorcism.

Thus while "The Exorcism of Emily Rose" is indebted to "The Exorcist,"it is less committed to an insistence upon the supernatural. By presenting both sides as equivalent, the scientific and the religious, it echoes the current cultural debates involving Intelligent Design. The film adapts the stance taken by the advocates of teaching Intelligent Design in American public schools in tandem with teaching evolution. After all, the argument goes, each is a theory, and students should be apprised of the putative intellectual "options" available.

Similarly, the film suggests, juries, like students, should have access to explanatory discourses radically removed from those developed by materialist science and a rationalist legal system. However comforting some may find this postmodern denial of the universal validity of any "master narrative," what would the reaction be if the film depicted a trial approached from a slightly different supernatural perspective? Imagine a film depicting a witchcraft trial arguing for at least a consideration of the sort of "spectral evidence" accepted by the judges in Salem. If the supernatural can be adduced, as "Emily Rose" seems to suggest, in a legal defense, how about its being employed by state prosecutors as the basis of a criminal charge? [Thanks to Religion Today, October 2005)

Hello

2006-06-13T14:47:00.000-06:00

This blog is written by Bob Torry and Paul Flesher. We teach and write about film and its use of religion at the University of Wyoming. Watch this blog for our thoughts on various films that we have used or plan to use in our classes. Feel free to write in and ask us questions or suggest films.