Should Christians Be Causing More Chaos?

I watched “The Dark Knight” again last night and I am still pretty much in awe of it. Both as a film and as a series of ideas, of which there are many.

This time around what I was most intrigued by was the Joker’s conversation with Harvey ‘Two Face’ in the hospital. He said, and I paraphase slightly, that when things go according to plan, everything is fine. People Don’t react. But when you don’t follow the plan, you bring about chaos.

Christians, by there very focus on the hope of the Resurrection and the eventual return of Christ and the merging of Heaven with Earth do not follow the plan of the world. We see things differently.

Should we then be causing more chaos?

As a youth worker seeking to discuss with young people the hope of Jesus, should I be encouraging them to cause more chaos by the way they act?

To the point, is there such a thing as good chaos?

 

What Would Jesus Say to Bruno?

In 2006 ‘Borat’ brought to light the xenophobia at the heart of America. ‘Bruno’s’ attack was a little more scattershot. Over the course of 86 minutes he took aim at celebrity culture, fame, homophobia and how Osama Bin Laden looks like a “dirty wizard”. As Tim Berroth says on “Hollywood Jesus”, it would be too easy to dismiss the film as juvenile filth (but I am sure many will). Cohen is too intelligent for that.

But if we can sit through the film, what else can we come away with apart from sore ribs and an off taste in our mouth?

1 Corinthians 4:5 reads,

“Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait till the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of men’s hearts.” Bruno seems to be doing God’s job here.

What is so alarming about the film is not the amount of screen time dedicated to Cohen’s manhood but to the dark hearts of human beings. Witness the parents who will do anything to get their children a modelling gig. Even if that means the child needs to lose ten pounds in a week. “She’ll do it”, quotes one mother. The mother is so happy when she hears the news that her child is going to be in the shoot even if that means the baby will be playing the part of a nazi officer pushing a barrel that has another child in it who will be “the jew” on their way to the gas chamber.

That when faced with homosexual PDA, a group of men and women storm the set, tossing chairs at Cohen and crying out for his blood!

That there are PR companies set up to find celebrities the “in” issue at the moment that if they campaign for will get them lots of media attention.

Justice has been served to these people. The real question is whether we should be laughing at them. If we ever needed proof that the world is slightly askew, then Bruno will do the trick.

The cult of celebrity also gets taken to town in the film as the main plot involves Bruno trying to find the best way to get famous. We live in a culture where people will do anything to be famous and this is highlighted several times by the film. Is this really what our life is meant to be about?

For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,

I know that full well.

My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,

your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

We have a God who loves us for who we are. Psalm 139 is a call to be content with who we are. ‘Bruno’ shows us how empty the pursuit of fame is.

Paul writes in Colossians 3 , “

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.”

I think Paul would say today, “don’t get caught up in the fruitless pursuit of fame. God has something better in mind. Not something that constrains you, but something that frees you.”

Yes there are things in Bruno that many may find vile and offensive but maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe it opens our eyes to the alternative.

 

Coraline, Creation and Consumerism

I just watched the ‘children’s movie’, “Coraline“. Fantastic. See it!

It got me thinking…

Coraline chooses to live in the ‘other world’ where her parents are much nicer to her and give her everything that she wants. Naturally, there is something sinister going on and nothing is what it seems.

For a long time I viewed the story of Adam and Eve as literal. There really was a garden where these two people lived. I no longer believe that and see it as much more of a fable of how we and the world came to be. If people choose to still view it as a literal story then that’s fine because I think the meaning is still there regardless of if it really happened or not. There are many ‘truths’ in the story but after seeing “Coraline” I was reminded by one of them. We, as human beings, were designed to have limits. The story goes that Adam and Eve could eat whatever they wanted apart from one tree. I used to find that weird but I think I’m starting to understand it.

We were never designed to take everything that we wanted. There were limits put on Adam and Eve and ultimately on all of us. When we live just to please ourselves things get messy. It did with Adam and Eve and it did with Coraline. When the focus is no longer to help other people but to help ourselves, things just don’t work.

Because of this ‘truth’, I believe we are in the place that we are.  We have stopped having limits. The journalist Amitai Etzioni has written a great article in ‘The New Republic’ about consumerism which links everything that I’ve said. But she says it so much better than me. Check out the full article  here.
Here’s a short excerpt:

A culture in which the urge to consume dominates the psychology of citizens is a culture in which people will do most anything to acquire the means to consume–working slavish hours, behaving rapaciously in their business pursuits, and even bending the rules in order to maximize their earnings. They will also buy homes beyond their means and think nothing of running up credit-card debt.

“Coraline” is a story about limits. Once she stops focusing on herself and her wants, she realises what she has. Adam and Eve realised that too late. So did we.

But things can change…

 

The End of the World…Again!

The King of Destruction who brought us ‘Independence Day’ and ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ invites us to witness the world being destroyed again with ‘2012′. And it looks like good cheesy fun.
check it out here

 

Trailer for My New Film is Online!

morning all.

The trailer for my latest short film (running time approx 30 mins) is now up online. watch it below or in glorious HD here…now. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

if you’re interested, you can also check out photos from the shoot here.

the concept of ‘grace’ is something that has interested me for awhile.

How big is God’s grace?

Can anyone, no matter what they have done, repent and enter Heaven?

These are the questions that inspired me to make this film…but don’t let that put you off. It’s the biggest budget film I’ve ever made and the first with a crew. It was a lot of fun but very challenging as well. We will premiere the film in Glasgow during the Summer.

Watch this space for further info.

 

Every youth worker loves a good film clip

A few weeks ago at college, we were asked to create a ‘mystery box’ for one of our lectures. The idea came from JJ Abrams inspiring talk from ted.com.

The objective was to create a learning experience that carried a sense of mystery. Our mystery centred around the questions Where is God? Where can he be found? See some of the pictures here under mystery box 3. Our ‘box’ was broken down into a series of stations.

The one that most intrigued me was on the use of films within christian youth work.  We youth workers love a good bitesize film clip that we can show to our young people from a popular film or TV show that addresses the issue we are going to raise with them.  And I’ll admit right now that I do it all the time as well and,  as a resource, I have no issues with it. Films and TV shows cover a wife variety of issues that we can link in. And they keep young people’s attention. Probably a lot more than the talk we are about to give.

What I do want to address briefly though is our thinking behind the kind of clips we use. For example I’ll use the film ‘the matrix’. Thankfully we seem to have moved away from using clips from this film but for a time every youth worker I know (and probably hundreds I don’t) used the ‘blue pill/red pill’  clip to explore Christianity with their young people. Admit it. You’ve used it…or you’ve at least thought of using it.

Many of you may be thinking right now, “so what? What’s wrong with using that clip?”

And there is nothing wrong with using it. But let me ask you a question. Would you use the rest of the film in a talk? What about the orgy dance scene in ‘The Matrix Reloaded”? Would you use that? My point is that although there is some theology in the film we would agree with there is a lot we wouldn’t. ‘The Matrix’ is full of ideas from Buddhism, New Age religions etc as well as Christianity. What we seem to have become really good at is being very selective with our clips. Just like we are with the Bible. We use the bits of a film we agree with and ignore the rest.

I read an article recently by Christianity Explored’s Youth Evangelist Nathan Morgan Locke that explored the idea of ’sin’ within the film (and graphic novel) ‘Watchmen’ and how we can communicate it with young people by using the film. I would be interested to know if Locke would use the film to explore the number of other thoughts and ideologies the film addresses? Or would it only be the ones he agrees with?

Please here me right. The point is not that we stop using clips. That would be shooting ourselves in the foot. But I do think we need to consider how we use the films we show clips from. Also, we need to think about why we don’t use other films. Is it because we don’t agree with the theology or issues in it? I believe that there is something of God in every film and we should be open to use every film. If we are happy to use films like ‘the matrix’ then why do we not consider films like ‘The Exorcist or ‘Fight Club’ for example? Because they are scary, violent? Maybe we need to rethink our ideology.

To stir things up further I want to ask you another question.

If we are happy to use films like ‘the matrix’ that have been inspired by other religions, is it wrong to use passages from other religious books with our young people? We are happy to use stories about Jesus from the Gospels but would we ever consider using stories about Jesus from the Koran?

Why not? Because they contain theology we don’t agree with? So does ‘the matrix’ but we don’t think twice about using that.

As I have already said, I don’t think we should stop using clips from different films but we have to be clear why we are using them. Rather than using selective clips, maybe we should show our young people the entire film and allow discussion to come from that.

It might be a lot more interesting than what we had originally planned.

 

The Top 10 of 2007

That time of year again where I look back at all that cinema has given me over the last 12 months. This year, unfortunately, it was easier to pick crap films than good ones. Spiderman 3 and Right at your Door hold the joint titles of WORST FILM OF THE YEAR! Why did you do it to me Spiderman? Why?!I generally rate films on if they inspire me to make more films so my top 10 might be very different from yours. 1. The Bourne Ultimatum 2. The Nines3. Superbad 4. Planet Terror5. Atonement 6. Death Proof  (first half. second half was really boring)7. Casino Royale8. Transformers9. 28 Weeks Later10. Jesus Camp What u think? The films that didn’t quite meet the top 10 areThe Fountain, Smokin’ Aces, 300, Hot Fuzz, Zodiac, 30 Days of Night, Stranger than Fiction, Notes on a Scandal, Knocked Up and Venus. All great films in themselves.