Breaking Free From The Bubble: Christians vs. The Movies

This morning, I decided to peruse some of the film reviews on a Christian website. Usually, the reviews on this site are fairly unbiased, focusing more on the qualities of the film itself rather than pointing out what some may consider “offensive”. However, there are other conservative sites that offer quite the opposite. You find sites such as these all over the internet. Some self-proclaimed Christian builds a “film review” site and then, rather than give an actual review of the film, what we get is a list. Yes, some Christians like to make lists. This is especially true when it comes to Christian film reviews. We have lists galore: lists of certain types of profanity (including the actual number of times that the individual words are used), sexual content (in explicit, graphic detail so that you can almost see it play out in your head), violent content, drug content, spiritual content, and just about any other kind of content that you can think of. It’s all right there, leaving nothing to the imagination – and most of the time, there are spoilers included – without warning. Context is rarely even considered. This is all very disturbing to me. Mind you, not all Christians are close-minded when it comes to the arts, but some of them are. It may be a sense of self-righteous pride, or the way in which some were raised which contributes to this narrow opinion of the film industry; either way, it is unfair.

As an artist, whether you are Tyler Perry or Stanley Kubrick, it is your job to present “truth”. What is truth, you may ask? People have been asking that same question for many years. Pontius Pilate himself even pondered upon this from time to time. To me, truth, as it is portrayed in art, should be a reflection of the world around us. Now, I personally cannot speak for anyone else, but the last time that I stepped outside of my home and into the real world, I encountered things that may have been unpleasant. If some people would just read their Bible, they would see right away that the book is pretty intense. I mean, this is God’s word, and all of these naughty things are present: fornication, adultery, profanity; violence, false doctrine, rape, murder - it’s all there on full display for anyone to read. Let’s not fool ourselves. The Bible is not an easy read. The truth as it is presented in the Bible is unfiltered and raw and ugly, but it is also redeeming, providing a balance with shades of light and grace. This is what most artists, Christian or non-Christian, are trying to convey in their work. You cannot escape the fact that darkness exists and must be dealt with. It may be a tough concept for most people to handle, but this is the way that it is.

Christian cinema is often riddled with cliches, proven by films such as Facing the Giants and Fireproof. The characters in these films are caricatures at best, and as a result, we cannot connect with them. The conflicts in most Christian films have been whitewashed and cleansed of any questionable language or content considered offensive, leading to a false view of the world. Christianity is dangerously portrayed as being "safe", leading to sanitized films that are labeled "family friendly". Why should audiences pay for a diluted version of reality? Why should we settle for anything less than the truth? Why should we expect every film to be suitable for family viewing?

Filmmakers such as Terrence Malick, Paul Thomas Anderson, and Ingmar Bergman engage our intellect as well as our heart, in films such as Magnolia, The New World, and Winter Light. They deal with similar issues, such as faith, redemption, grace and God, and yet nothing is held back. Life is shown in all of its beauty and ugliness. There is no spoon-fed Christian conversion at the end. Ambiguity is the key, and the audience isn't limited to Christians. These films are for everyone, from every walk of life. Because these films are honest, they win our respect. Because they don't insult our intelligence, we revisit them, learning from them time and time again. Modern audiences are often smarter than we give them credit for.

I believe that some Christians today are so comforted by the safe little bubble that they surround themselves with, that they are incapable of knowing, or maybe even forget, that we live in an R-rated world and read from an R-rated Bible. Philippians 4:8 is often used as a battle cry from conservative Christians as a poor defense of this illogical war on modern culture, particularly the arts.

"Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things."

One particular area of this Scripture is largely ignored. Not surprisingly, the conservative argument crumbles in light of this.

"Finally, brethren, whatever is true..." 

Whatever is true.

Truth. 

Film is art. Art should represent truth. It simply isn’t debatable. If you are going to represent truth on film, you should portray it the way that you would encounter it in the real world. Don’t shove the ugly bits under the rug. After all, even Scripture tends to bring us down to reality and rub our faces in ugliness from time to time. Not everything in the Bible is "right, pure, lovely" or "worthy of praise". Sunday after Sunday, pastors around the world encourage their congregation to explore some of the darker elements. Some of them proceed to condemn "Hollyweird" as well as adult content in film, when the very book that they preach from contains the same type of abhorrent content in spades. This is an unfortunate double standard. The Bible takes us to some pretty disturbing places. So should the arts.

Enjoy the everlasting feast of cinema which is laid out before you. Sample everything. Learn how to properly discern the good from the bad. If you must, use 1 Corinthians 10:23 as your guide:

"Everything is permissible"--but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible"--but not everything is constructive." 

Let's face it: you cannot have light without the darkness. It’s time to break free from the bubble. Embrace your freedom. Explore. Christians of the world, it is time to stop making useless lists, and instead, be thankful that we have artists in the world who do not wish to lie to us.

After all, isn’t “Thou shalt not lie” one of the big Ten?