The Otherworldly Jesus in Film

If you want to keep your Christian audience happy, you want a Jesus that is pretty much out of this world.  Not like an alien (although the main characters in Starman and Knowing were pretty Christ-like), but a Jesus that isn't like the rest of us.  Someone who seems to come from another dimension.  Let's look at a few films that make that choice for their Jesus:

The Gospel According to St. Matthew—This is an Italian film, made to represent a traditional view of the New Testament book.  Every spoken word comes from the book, as close to the text as possible.  And every scene looks like it belongs in a stained glass window.  Jesus himself is very handsome, so he’s nice to look at.  He’s primarily a teacher who does the occasional miracle.  But the problem with this interpretation of Jesus is that it doesn’t really say anything.  One example is the teaching montage.  Jesus is seen as speaking familiar teachings, most of the Sermon on the Mount and other teachings, one line after another in fifteen minutes.  But it is without context, and it is edited so close together that we don’t have time to hear what he is saying.  We hear a familiar line then whoosh! we’ve got the next one halfway done.  Just like how Scripture is often read in church. While the overall portrayal gives the film a saintly veneer, it also is pretty boring.  We could go to a church and get the same experience, and we can meet interesting people at the same time.  There is no real insight given in this film at all. Jesus-2/5 Film- 3/5

Jesus (1999)—The boy band Jesus.  This Jesus is a celebrity.  He knows how to work the crowd, how to use the blowdryer on his hair to let the wind give it that lift. Hip yet nondescript.  Complete fail.  Jesus- 0/5 Film-1/5

The Gospel of John—(Or is it the gospel according to Lost?-- Henry Ian Cusick who plays Desmond of Lost plays Jesus in this film)The irritating Jesus.  I know that the script comes just from the gospel of John, but the way it is performed… well, we can see why THIS Jesus was crucified.  He keeps implying that he’s God and then he insults the people he’s talking to.  And he is a equal opportunity offender—the “Jews”, his disciples, his apostles—they all get insulted at some point in the film.    I know that the text all comes from John, but Jesus doesn’t have to be so personally angry when speaking it.  The “Matthew” Jesus had it better, with more scorching text: you are preaching, not interested in personally insulting.  You can speak harsh statements with a more general delivery. Jesus- 1/5 Film- 2/5

Jesus (1979)—This film is actually an edited version of a filming of the entire gospel of Luke.  Because the purpose of that original film was to film every verse, in context, of the Gospel of Luke, this Jesus feels very textual.  The English is a dubbed over the original Greek, the settings are from Israel, all to give a very authentic feel.  To me, it just feels flat.  It is a good version of the book, but I might recommend a person to just read the volume.  The Jesus of Luke is much more socially radical and more energetic.  Jesus- 3/5 Film- 3/5

Jesus of Nazareth—Probably the best portrayal of an otherworldly Jesus.  He floats from scene to scene, doing good, speaking wisdom, but he is always focused on something else… another dimension.  His eyes are focused on people and things no one else can see.  It is stunning, but unnerving.  It is rumored that Robert Powell took drugs on set to give him that mystic-look.  In fact, Powell was given make up to accentuate his blue eyes, and he never blinked while the camera was focused on him.  The effect is that Jesus doesn’t seem to be responding to other people, just speaking his lines in the most gentle, saintly manner ever.  We can see why people would love this Jesus, but not why he would be crucified.  Still, marvelous job. Jesus-4/5 Film-4/5

You might notice that I didn’t review the King of Kings’ or The Greatest Story Ever Told’s Jesus.  Frankly it  is because I can’t bring myself to watch these traditional American films on Jesus.  If you feel I should watch them, let me know.  And tell me why.

Of course, as Kenny points out, if you portray a Jesus that is so completely different, then you will end up with a Jesus whom no one can relate to.  In the next post, we'll look at Jesus' that are more down to earth.

Jesus In Film: Part 1 of 4

Jesus is difficult to portray.  Frankly, it’s a difficult role.  Jesus is often mysterious, and his motivation is difficult.  If you are portraying a divine Jesus, then how could you know his motivation?  Perhaps you might want to be as otherworldly as possible, and so make him to be as disconnected from personal motivation as possible.  The result is to make a Jesus that is saintly, but not really comprehensible.

Or you might make Jesus a very human man.  After all, it isn’t heresy to declare Jesus human.  And it shouldn’t cause waves to say that Jesus was tempted in every way that we are (yeah, right, even though it says just that in the Scripture located in Hebrews 4).   The problem with this Jesus is to interpret him as too human is to make him too modern.  Jesus WAS human, but he probably didn’t have existential doubt.  Jesus was an ancient Jewish rabbi, not an American rock star.

In overviewing different Jesus’ in film it is clear that Jesus is hard to get right.  How can we make him both charismatic and enigmatic; both caring and angry; both mystic and down-to-earth?  Not only that, but Jesus is the second most popular person in the United States—how can one draw on that, but still match the “Jesus” they have in their heads?

In the next episodes, I’ll look at some films and rate how Jesus is portrayed in each.  Then I’ll draw some conclusions at how I’d like to see Jesus portrayed.

Absolutely No Theme To This Group of Reviews

I've just started listening to Kermode and Mayo's Film Reviews and am impress how many reviews they can punch out in such a short period of time.  I do this myself, but not as entertainingly as them.  Still, let's talk about the films I've seen this last week:

Do all the situps you want-- the film won't get tighter

Limitless (2011)
Lots of irritating edits, a meandering plot that doesn't go anywhere and the moral seems to be that if you're the smartest person in the universe, you can become rich, powerful and eff off anyone you want. Still some nice tension, sometimes. Mostly forgettable.  3/5

Kidman and Eckhart looking delightfully normal

Rabbit Hole (2010)
Amazing performances.  I don't think I've ever seen Kidman or Eckhart has ever given more realistic performances.  Every time I see them I know they are acting-- but not here.  It was wonderful to see them become these troubled characters.   The pacing and arc is almost perfect.  But still, the movie seemed pretty small.  We didn't see their anguish just after the death, we only see the grieving and the process their marriage goes through when it is subtle and seemingly without an end.  Brilliant, but I just didn't care enough, I guess.  Perhaps I should have.  Should I feel guilt about not caring enough?  4/5

Human existence is shocking-- even eating!

Life In a Day (2011)
This is the obvious choice for the winner of "Top Five films To Show To An Alien".  If you want to know about humanity, here it is.  It's all real, all ordinary and yet, somehow, extraordinary at the same time.  It is beautiful and disturbing, shocking and touching, dull and busy.  In the end, I felt that I spent an hour and a half watching cool videos on You Tube.  Lots of interesting stuff, but I don't know that any of it will stick with me next week.  4/5

Barbara Stanwyck involved in criminal activity-- running through a stop sign!

Witness to Murder (1954)
I watched this for Noirvember, but I was so tired on Nov 30, I finished the film in December.  Me falling asleep wasn't the fault of the film, though.  It was so much fun.  Barbara Stanwyck as a woman who witnesses a murder (in the first minute of the film!)  She turns all Rear Window on us, but with way more doubts than Jimmy Stewart.  George Sanders (Shere Khan!) is the killer who is causing doubts upon her sanity, both with the police and with herself!  There's some great points about feminism here (like when the policewoman is chasing the killer and then suddenly disappears so the MALE detective can fight with him!), and some Hitchcockian turns (but Vertigo is a few years later).  Still, great film.  4/5

Grant (looking aged) and Hepburn (looking eternally young)  in Beyond Sunset

Charade (1963)
This is not a thriller, in my mind, but a comedy.  Cary and Aubry just keep the sit com rolling and I haven't laughed out loud at a film for a while.  Just for fun, James Coburn, Walter Mattheau, and George Kennedy are there as the clueless bad guys.  My favorite bit is where the boy goes up to James Coburn and asks if he is a cowboy, like in the movies.  The film is so busy having fun, I don't care if the plot is a little confusing or the end doesn't make any sense.  It's like most Bond films-- the joy is in the journey.  4/5

By the way, all of these films can be watched on Netflix Instant, so if you have Netflix, you have no excuse.  And, yes, I do rate a lot of movies something other than a 4, it just happened to be a particularly good week for film.  My chooser ain't broken yet!

Sexism in Cinema

Originally posted on the Filmspotting Forum


In the last couple days I watched a few movies that caused me to reflect on the relations between men and women in film.


The Chronicles of Riddick
This sequel to Pitch Black is easily more imaginative as the first.  You have a militarized fundamentalist group and one bad guy who is seen as the savior against them, although he has his own motivations.  The universe is more complex than one might expect, and the editing and special effects are quirky and fun (except when they are overblown).   The worst of the film was its characterization of women.  It is a male teen fantasy, more than anything.  The men are tough and fight to prove superiority.  The women are seductive and pursue the strongest men, but the strong men resist the woman crawling over them lasciviously.   I understand it's a fantasy, and a Van Diesel film, but why must we have films that perpetuate this caveman fantasy?  Again, it had a lot of positive points, but overall it left a bad taste in my mouth.


Caesar and Cleopatra (1945)
This is a pretty shoddy adaptation of a fascinating George Bernard Shaw play.  Except for Claude Rains and (occasionally) Vivian Leigh, the acting was horrible.  The physical set up of many in between scenes were awful.  The script, however, shone.  It is about how Julius Caesar comes to Egypt and teaches Cleopatra to be a woman-- not in a sexual sense, for it is clear that Shaw thought Caesar to be too old for Cleopatra-- but instead taught her to be independent and regal.  The verbal play, of Caesar especially, is wonderful, and a joy to hear.  I love Shaw scripts.  Even so, it is clear that the play was written in 1898, and an attitude of "a woman needs a man to teach her wisdom" prevails all the way to the last scene.  A woman can be strong in this movie, but never wise.  That is something that men must teach them.  Foolishness.


In A Lonely Place
I have seen a number of Bogie's films, and only a couple have really stood out to me-- The Big Sleep, Key Largo.  But this one tops them all.  What a charming, lighthearted film with a heart of sorrow and oppression.  Dixon is a screenwriter who has had trouble keeping relationships, especially with women, due to his reliance on violence.  If someone says a bad word about himself or another, he flairs up and begins to get physical.  Overall, he's a good guy-- charming, funny, smart.  One day, he is suspected of murder, and through that gets involved in a relationship with his funny and smart neighbor, Laurel.  Rarely have I seen a better screenplay.  The relationships are perfect: believable and fascinating.  It is all so wonderful until it goes gradually wrong.

Dixon actually has the same immature attitude toward men and women that is displayed in the Chronicles of Riddick: Men fight to prove their superiority, women desire men and should be dominated. 

** Spoiler Paragraph** (and the conclusion of the matter)
 However, by the end of In a Lonely Place it is clear that reality doesn't work this way.  You can't have good relationships with people in modern society as if you were a caveman.  In this way, not only is In A Lonely Place a superior work of art, but it is also morally powerful.  It shows the end of living in a teenage fantasy: frustrated, angry loneliness.  So sad, but so true.  There are many people like Dixon who I wish could learn this lesson before it is too late. 

Miyazaki's Saint

As a Miyazaki fan, it is my sworn duty to occasionally post a review of a film by the greatest animated film maker ever.  No, I do not consider that hyperbole.  Today, it is on Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind.  Deal with it.

Some important facts to know about Nausicaa:

-She is a princess.  Who flies. But she doesn't sing which is why she isn't a Disney princess.

-She lives in a poisoned world.  Poisoned by us modern warmongers.  Yeah, she lives in the future.

-She is a badass.  She's not all sweetness and light. She can carry a machine gun twice her size with a wounded leg.  When she really gets ticked off, she can kill a dozen men twice her size in a heartbeat. I guess that's another reason she's not a Disney princess.  

-She is an environmental scientist. She not only creates a garden pure from the deadly radiation that makes nature become poisonous, she also figures out how nature was cleansing poison out of the earth on its own.

-She is a nature goddess.  She can communicate with animals and they do what she says.  Maybe she's really Dr. Doolittle in disguise.

-She does NOT go around naked without any pants.  Her pants are flesh colored.  That confuses and embarrasses a lot of men. 

Someone once mentioned that it is a pretty long title, but with Miyazaki one must expect that occasionally, such as Ponyo on the Cliffs By the Sea.

Nausicaa is Miyazaki's second feature film, and the first that begins using the themes that reflect his later films, among which are relationship between humanity and nature, flying machines, and war. It is based on a much longer, more complex manga written and drawn by Miyazaki.

Nausicaa takes place a thousand years after human war has poisoned the soil of earth to such a degree that poisoned jungles grew up, insects became gargantuan and huge protectors of nature were created-- Ohms. There are a number of human kingdoms, but the film deals with only three, Tolmekia-- a war-like kingdom that wants to rule the others; Pejite, the sworn enemies of Tolmekia; and the Valley of the Wind, a struggling utopia that gets caught up in the other kingdom's war. 

Nausicaa herself is Miyazaki's saint-- the ultimate peacemaker. She is frankly an ideal Buddhist saint, who communes with all creatures, and seeks to make peace with all. She is especially focused on creating harmony between humanity and nature, trying to heal the 1000 year old rift. Throughout that thousand years, the poisoned jungles and humanity have been warring with each other, each attempting to overthrow the other's rule. Only Nausicaa realizes that humanity would perish without the jungle and that the jungle can flourish under humanity's enlightened guidance. Nausicaa is somehow able to understand the true nature of whatever she is facing. Instead of reacting to a threat, she responds to the fear behind the threat. Instead of seeing the death of the toxic jungle, she sees the beauty of it. She works with the nature of whatever is before her in order to create harmony with all creatures.

On the surface, this film seems weaker than other Miyazaki. Most Miyazaki are amazing in the detail of the world that was created for the film, and Nausicaa is no different in that. But the dialog is less rich and entertaining, the colors seem washed, and the style of animation is not as fluid as other Miyazaki films. Part of this, though not all, is due, I think because Miyazaki is trying to communicate the bleakness of the world in disharmony with nature. War-- both human and natural-- has taken its toll, draining life from everything. At the end of the film, the colors suddenly are brighter and everything changes. 

Despite it's weaknesses (including a truly lame 80s score), this film is one of my favorites of all time. Despite it's bleakness, it is possibly the most joyful and optimistic of Miyazaki's films, and it plots out the general outline of hope for the future. Other Miyazaki films may communicate that war is bad and that bad guys aren't really all that bad, but this film actually lays out what would need to be done to end war, to change people's hearts. It isn't childish in any way, nor simplistic, if perhaps naive. It communicates that self sacrifice, listening to the another's heart, boldness for another's good and some basic reasoning can create a path out of the bleak world.

Perhaps I like this film because it is very much a religious philosophy I agree with. Perhaps it is because Nausicaa is such a strong character that to me she is the perfect moral hero. But with each time I watch it, the higher my estimation of it is.

The final important fact about Nausicaa is:


I may be secretly in love with her.  You can go ahead and tell my wife.  She already knows.

How I Was Converted By A Film

I am a pastor of a church of the homeless.  I'm not one of those guys who feels like he needs to evangelize every homeless person he sees, first of all because I believe in showing more than speaking, and secondly I know that most these folks are doing the best they can, whether being a Christian or not and they don't need anybody yelling at them, and only occasionally telling them what to do.

One thing I've always been firm about and that's politics doesn't help anybody who really needs the help.

I've got a lot of reasons for that.  First of all, democracy is about helping the majority, and the desperately poor is certainly the minority.  Second, to really get political action done, especially national or state action you need money and even if you got some political money it means compromising with the big boys who do not have your best interests at heart.   Finally, politics has a lot to do with bureaucracy and petty rules.  I am allergic to such things.

Instead, we get help for the homeless from community groups, especially churches.  We do as little as we can with the various governments.  Last year, when doing activity that benefited everyone, a local city governance group tried to shut us down, and that had been the extent of our relations with them.

Last week, I saw the movie Milk.  It stars Sean Penn, co-stars James Franco and is directed by Gus Van Sant.  It is based on a true story, chronicled in the film The Life and Times of Harvey Milk, about a gay community representative that becomes a city supervisor and eventually gets assassinated.  I heard that it was good and I'm a fan of Van Sant, so I thought I'd check it out.

It was a revelation.

Like the homeless, the gay community was actively oppressed, with laws on the books giving permission to their oppression.  Like the homeless, the police targeted them as a community and would do violence to them with no provocation or criminal activity.  Like the homeless, the gay community had community centers, but no voice in their community.

Through tenacity and a slow process of learning, Harvey Milk changed that.

Like Harvey Milk, I just want to see the books that actively oppress the homeless shut down.  I want to see people granted freedom to be who they became through no fault of their own.  Honestly, although it may be hard for some of my supporters to hear, Harvey Milk inspired me.

The fact that the film was so well made doesn't disturb me at all. Van Sant is a master-- no, strike that-- genius filmmaker, who can tell a story is many different ways and yet put it all together in a mind-boggling continuity.  Penn is very good and Franco is fantastic.  Each character is seen as a full human being, not just a gay stereotype (although you can see where perhaps some of the stereotypes originate).

Mind you, I am not ready to run for office.  In fact, my wife said that she'd vote against me if I did.  But it did happen that this last weekend a couple city officials did come up to me and say that they'd work with our goals for the city this week.  Huh.  Maybe there's something to this politics thing after all. 

Feasting Amidst Famine

From ancient times, food and community have been connected, and this with spiritual life.  Sacrifices weren't the surrender of goods so much as the participation of feasts with one's family and friends, held before the gods or God.  One of Moses' tithes was an annual community feast, held at God's temple, which was so rich that ten percent of all their harvest that year was to be used at one time.  To eat together was to be family, even if you were not blood, and to be family was to be unified before God.  From this rich tradition Christians have their mass, and Muslims have their Id.  And Americans have Thanksgiving.

The film Babette's Feast (1987) imagines a town where everyone was so pious that feasts were unknown.  Not hard to imagine, is it?  To partake in pleasure, for many, is to forsake God, and a feast is tantamount to a gluttonous orgy.  That which God had originally ordained to enjoy, these religious zealots determined to forsake.  A "sacrifice" for God.

Through a particular, and wonderful, set of circumstances, this group of aesthetics sat down to eat the most scrumptious meal ever presented.  Each course is described in the most delectable detail, and the palate is cleansed between them with the finest of wines.  They are determined not to enjoy themselves but the spirits-- or Spirit?-- fill them and they are beside themselves with joy at this feast.

The film itself is simple and quiet, but full of joi de vivre.  It is like Amelie without the quirkiness or plotting.  Despite the spare tastes of this religious order, the film is full of deep charity, deeper relationship, all of it finally spilling over to overwhelming joy.

The basic conceit of this film is the idea of a group refusing to take pleasure in the most magnificent feast.  How difficult this must be!  And the idea of refusing God's gift of enjoyment of food, the very mortar of community, for the sake of God? Truly an abomination.

However, how much more of an abomination that there could be someone watching this film who did not have enough to eat.  A hungry man after laboring all day watching this film would be horrified at the town's refusal to enjoy what any starving child would take the greatest enjoyment in!  To think that some might have the greatest feasts, while others have nothing.  That some could eat whenever they felt like it, while a billion people go to bed hungry each night.  That there is now an orphanage in Uganda, in the midst of a famine-covered region, where the managers desperately seek to find food for their children, while I am overfull of my wife's soup and banana bread, writing about a movie about feasts.  That is an abomination.

May we all find ways to help the hungry to be fed.  Wherever they are.  Whoever they are.  To deny food is to deny community, to deny God.  Let us feed others, not just ourselves.

This post is part of Blog Action Day: 2001