Any one who has read this Blog for a while
will know that I usually see films through 'theological spectacles’. That is, they can engage my
living faith and my understanding of that faith, and impact on them,
positively or negatively.
I am not an academic theologian, or even
temperamentally an intellectual. Sometimes I read theologians 'in dialogue with
film' and wonder what they are talking about. That is not their fault, I am sure they think clearly,
it’s just that they don’t think the way I do. Or rather, I don’t think the way they do. Some of them, however, have really valuable insights that do make
sense to me. One of them is Robert K. Johnston, an American who taught at the Fuller Theological Seminary.
In one of his books Johnston talks about
different axis we can use as we respond to films.
One of these compares the Experiential, or Sacramental with
the Reflective/Analytical.
The Sacramental includes the Holy and the
Human, while the Reflective includes the experience of staying ‘in the movie’
and learning from it as a Theological Partner. So a film can lift us beyond
itself, and be revelatory, a sacrament, and/or it can be a thing in itself, to
be appreciated as it is, and become part of a dialogue.
Wondering how to put flesh on these bones
brings me to the last two films I have seen. Noah and Calvary. Both are
obviously concerned with faith matters, the story of the flood in Genesis on
the one hand, and the spiritual journey of a parish priest on the other.
As I was watching Noah I found it really difficult to ‘enter into the film’. I was continuously distracted by
its use and misuse of the Biblical story, the bizarre additions to it and the
changes made in it. I was often annoyed and sometimes
amused. I kept asking myself
‘why?’. Why has Aronofsky,
the writer/director, added fallen angels clothed in lava? Why is the family structure of Noah
changed so radically. Instead of
three sons, each with a wife, we have three boys and one adopted – and
seemingly barren - girl. How anyone knows she is barren
when she is a virgin is a just another distracting question. Tubla-Cain, Noah’s half brother according to Genesis, is now
a king , using his forging skills to wage war on Noah for possession of the
Ark, and then stowing away on it.
It seemed clear that Aronofsky had not found
the original story dramatic enough, so he added to it and changed it. I wondered why is he being so
free with scripture on the one hand, while also trying (presumably) not to
offend faith communities – this story being important in Judaism, Christianity
and Islam - by never naming God,
other than talking about the Creator. Noah does not ‘hear from God’, he has herbally induced
visions. And he totally
misunderstands the nature of God – and his task. If there is one 'good' thing about the movie it is that eventually Noah learns that love and forgiveness are more important than judgement and punishment. But even after that I was disappointed that Aronofsky, like most other people, completely ignored the point of the Rainbow Covenant; that God will not kill us, but that if we take a human life our own life will be taken, not as punishment, but in compensation. Genesis chapter 9 verse 6 is a difficult text, but it is there.
So this is a film that never allowed me to
‘enter into it’. It kept me at
arms length. It never offered me
the chance to learn with it, as a ‘theological partner’. Nor did it offer a
sacramental experience by helping me enter into the divine any better, either
in its transcendent or its Incarnational dimension. I learnt nothing new about God or humankind.
By seeing what this film did not offer I understood what Johnston was saying some films can offer.
And then I saw Michael McDonagh’s new film,
Calvary. You can read my critique of it below, so I will not go
into it in detail. But I notice
that having seen Noah I had nothing to say about
afterwards, whereas as I could not stop thinking about Calvary.
On the one hand I was totally engaged by Calvary from the first to the last. It has a kind of who-dun-it structure, or rather
a who-will-do-it? The central
character, Father James is told at the start that someone intends to kill him
in a week’s time. So we
wonder who the intentional killer is.
But that is not the point of the film. This is not a thriller. Father James says he knows who it is, but he does not tell the police. Something else is going on here. As the film introduces us
to some of the members of the parish we see that most of them are troubled, angry and often in pain. The priest’s own daughter
is depressed, recovering from a botched suicide attempt, and angry with her
father for not ‘being there for her’ when her mother died and she needed him most. It seems that
his own grief in still unresolved in many ways. Maybe it is relevant that I too am an
ordained widower, that I know how
parishioners can project all kinds of virtues and vices onto their priest, that
they sometimes seem to think priests are immune from hurt, or that they we can deal
better with loss, bereavement and
grief. That we are somehow
more than human and less than human. But this film did not simply reinforce my self-understanding; it stretched it.
Calvary also spoke to me of the sacramental nature of faith and priesthood. In this context I must say that I have always believed in
the priesthood of all believers, and in the particularity of how our individual priesthoods are expressed and offered. Watching Calvary was revelatory, it taught me new
things. It was sacramental, it was about the
Holy, and at the same time it opened itself up to me, both as a ‘thing in itself’
and also in reflective dialogue. I
have been talking with it ever since I saw it.
There are many more critical tools and valuable insights in Johnston’s book; Reel Spirituality, theology and film in dialogue, Baker Academic, 2000. If you, like me, take pleasure in reflecting on the films you see I commend his book to you. And maybe I should also be grateful to Aronofsky for his dreadful film. As someone once said, everything has a value, even if it is only to be a bad example.
