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Journey to Bethlehem (2023)
Nativity story: good in parts
Journey to Bethlehem is a modern retelling of the nativity of Christ, using the modern idiom of a musical song-and-dance movie, but with a realistic setting and costumes in first-century Judaea. It is an interesting blend of classic Bible story similar to the Disney Nativity of some years back, but also is somewhat reminiscent of Mamma Mia, West Side Story, and La La Land.
The movie is mostly faithful to the Gospel story, but there are a number of serious errors of presentation. The very first five minutes were quite disappointing, in that Mary and Joseph are portrayed as meeting in a scene like something out of Aladdin, complete with teenage romantic singing about unknown love. Pretty soon we were treated to a scene (like Mamma Mia) where Mary insistes that marriage and family is not for her: she wants to be a teacher (Surprise!)
Having got through this scene, the movie did improve somewhat. King Herod is played by Antonio Banderas, who acts like a pantomime villain, oozing with self-regard and malevolence. His son, Herod Antipas (here called Antipater) looks like he has just done come off the set of Captain America or Thor. There are some quite impressive military dances by Herod's bodyguard detail.
The Three Magi are very much the comic relief of the movie, every one of their scenes is played for maximum laughs. Not so much Three Wise Men as Three Stooges.
Having said that, when the story gets back to the Annunciation, things do improve. The Angel Gabriel is a little unsteady at first, but soon gets into his stride. The interaction between Gabriel and Mary is quite memorable and faithful to the Gospel story. Pretty soon there is tension between Joseph and Mary and their respective families. I cannot help thinking that the dramatic tension is underplayed in this sequence. Joseph's dream portrays the sense of dilemma by showing him in two minds wrestling with himself: a truly well-done scene.
Mary and Joseph resolve their family problems by heading away to stay with Elizabeth and Zechariah, dodging soldiers on the way. I confess that I found Elizabeth far too static and expressionless. When Elizabeth and Mary first meet, there is no hint of the joy or excitement that we would expect in this scene. Zechariah on the other hand, although he has been made mute because of his unbelief, more than makes up for it in his facial expressions: he is wonderful.
The Nativity itself is wonderful: Gabriel finds a group of shepherds and summons them to the cave, and a heavenly host appears in a scene that reminds me so much of The Veil Removed. It was worth coming to the cinema for this scene alone.
The final denouement is rather disappointing: Herod Antipater appears with a troop of soldiers with orders to kill all the babies, but ends up enabling their escape under his protection.
In summary then, this is definitely a happy feelgood song-and-dance pop movie of the Nativity story, but misses out on so many opportunities to bring out the drama, tension, fear and joy in the story in favour of shoving in another pop song. It is very good in parts, but too many scenes were a disappointment. I cannot help feeling that if the producer had shifted the story completely to a modern setting and costumes it might have worked better.
The Chosen (2017)
Excellent series about the life of Jesus
We started watching The Chosen last year, and as of November 2023 we are watching season 3.
Many others have given very positive reviews here, and this is another. We really enjoy this series. The Chosen is a long-form multi-season dramatic presentation of the life and ministry of Jesus, as seen through the eyes of those around him. There is plenty of dramatic license: several characters are given quite detailed back stories which are used to give context to the stories we find in the Gospels. For example, in the first few episodes of season 1, the main characters are Mary Magdalene, Nicodemus the Pharisee, Matthew the tax-collector, and Simon Peter the fisherman. Jesus only appears at the very end of episode 1, and has only a couple of lines. In effect what this means is that we might read a gospel story of some encounter between a character and Jesus, and it is only a couple of lines in the Bible, but it is expanded into a whole episode in the Chosen. The wonderful thing about this style of story-telling is that the amount of research done makes these encounters very plausible.
Jonathan Roumie plays the part of Jesus brilliantly. He looks very Jewish, with dark skin, dark hair and eyes and a plausible accent. His acting is top rate, he brings out the humanity and kindness of Jesus in every scene. There are a number of scenes where he brings out the anger of Jesus against injustice and abuse, and makes me feel almost as though this is Jesus himself speaking.
The storyline brings out the Jewishness of Jesus and his disciples. We see Jesus and his company engaging in Jewish prayer, wearing tassels, observing Sabbath and keeping to food laws. Mary, the mother of Jesus comes across as a stereotypical Jewish mother, concerned about whether Jesus is eating enough, using lots of Jewish humour almost straight out of Fiddler on the Roof. I love the scene in an early episode where Mary Magdalene is trying to turn her home into a Jewish home, but struggles with remembering everything. The scene of the wedding at Cana does the same thing.
The Roman authorities are much more prominent in the Chosen than in the Bible. Matthew the tax-collector has a guardian, Gaius, and their interactions are portrayed very sensitively. The Romans are portrayed not as vicious occupiers, but as Roman patriots who felt that their destiny was to bring civilisation to the barbarians, by promoting civil society, controlling crime, and keeping the peace, all the while keeping an eye on their own career prospects. Not all that different from modern politicians. The scene where Jesus calls Matthew while Gaius is watching is loaded with dramatic tension.
Having said all that, I do have a few criticisms. The scripting is very 21st century language with lots of contemporary slang and idioms. The Jewish characters all use Middle Eastern accents, while the Romans all have American accents. I do find this grating a little, but it is hard to see what else the producer could have done, other than having them speak Latin as in the Passion of the Christ by Mel Gibson. Perhaps that would be a step too far.
The production values are excellent, but there are a number of howlers: we often see lampstands from Ikea, and I am sure I recognise the rugs. There are several scenes where there is intense discussion happening in the foreground, while in the background you can see a Roman officer on patrol, then five seconds later a beggar limping past, and then a woman carrying a jar of water, and repeat. It reminds me too much of the Truman Show.
Some of the theological issues are interesting, but I am not sure whether they could be called criticisms. The series as a whole is very much American Evangelical in style, but many of the actors (including Jonathan Roumie himself) are known as devout Catholics, and the portrayals of Mary are very Catholic. There are some Mormon expressions in a few scenes and most of the costumes and props are sourced from Mormon missions. For myself, I do not see this as a problem, although others may do so.
In summary, I would strongly recommend that everyone watch this series. If you are already a Christian, you will find that you will derive lots of background knowledge from this. If you are not a believer, but interested in why your Christian friends keep banging on about Jesus, this series will help you understand.
The Shack (2017)
Lovely scenery, but a boring movie, shame about the insipid theology
The Shack – my review
This movie is based on the book of the same name by William Young. I did try to read the book several years ago, but I could not get more than a quarter through before getting completely bored and gave up, so I confess I was not expecting great things. However, many people have told me that this movie is brilliant and well worth seeing. Having seen it myself now, I have to disagree. The plot-line is very predictable. The script is sentimental and mawkish. The whole movie is about an hour and a half too long. The characters are one- dimensional. The acting is wooden. The incidental music is emotionally manipulative. The theology (oh, my goodness, the theology!!!) is insipid, owing more to Oprah Winfrey and Obi-Wan Kenobi than to Jesus Christ. I do have one genuine compliment to pay: the Oregon scenery of mountains, lakes and waterfalls is truly beautiful.
The story itself is quite simple. Australian actor Sam Worthington plays Oregonian Mack Phillips. We are shown a little of his early childhood where his father blends drunken abuse of Mack and his mother with his position as elder in their church. Mack poisons his father with strychnine, although it is never clarified whether this attempt was successful. The action flashes straight ahead to the adult Mack with his wife and three children. The family are preparing for a Dad / Kids camping holiday. It turns to tragedy when a canoe accident is rapidly followed by the abduction of the youngest daughter, whose blood-stained dress is later discovered at an abandoned shack in the woods. The following winter, the whole family is falling apart with grief and failing communication. Mum takes the kids to see a family counsellor, but Mack is not interested. His pastor tries to talk with him, but again he declines. Mack finds a message in his mailbox, inviting him to come back to the Shack where the girl's dress was found, signed 'Papa', which was her name for God. He heads off to investigate and has an encounter with God, in the form of a traditionally built African American woman, a Middle Eastern young man, and an Asian woman. There follows a rather long and dialogue-heavy discussion on the nature of evil and how to get the proper perspective on suffering. Mack realizes that his anger is rooted in a belief that God is not good, that God is angry, wrathful and spiteful. Once he acknowledges this, his healing can start. He has a joyful vision of his deceased daughter, and returns to take up a new role as a loving husband and father.
I found this movie dreadfully boring and predictable. I felt that I was being preached at for about three-quarters of its length. The whole issue of the problem of evil is of course a very difficult one to think through, and this movie clearly does have some echoes of the biblical story of Job. My complaint is that the treatment was so superficial as to be trivial. The argument is essentially that God is too good to judge anyone, and certainly would never condemn anyone. So for example Mack's abusive father is given a free pass because he had been abused in his turn by his father. The murderer of Mack's child is also off the hook, since he presumably only did his dreadful deeds because of some unspecified hurt inside him. Mack himself is never called to account for his own act of Parricide. No- one apparently needs to take responsibility for his own deeds, no- one needs to repent for anything, except God himself for the offense of being the judge. In addition, there seems to be no hint of God's majesty or greatness, or any suggestion that perhaps obedience is due to God: at every decision point, God waits for Mack to make whatever decision he wishes to make, and it is clear that God is OK with that. There is no exposition of God as the creator or ruler of all, instead God is seen as a kindly grandmother who is never happier than when kneading dough with her youngsters. Now of course I do not expect a movie to express theology perfectly, but this movie claims to be an exercise in theodicy – the demonstration of the righteousness of God, and it manifestly fails in this. In addition there is nowhere any acknowledgement that perhaps some answers might be found in the Bible. When Mack is searching for help, he does not get it from his pastor, his church, or from scripture. The only time a bible appears is when Mack falls asleep while reading, and it falls to the floor, and is never seen again. It seems that for this movie, the source for truth is in our own insights, not in the bible. This is the theology of Oprah, not of Christ.
See this movie if you must, but Christian it is not.
Wonder Woman (2017)
Brilliant movie - Gal Gadot excels as Wonder Woman
Wonder Woman – a review
I went to see Wonder Woman this evening, along with my three wonder women: my wife, step-daughter and grand-daughter. I really enjoyed this movie, which is based on the DC Comics mythology, which in its turn draws from themes in Greek mythology. Gal Gadot plays Diana, the Amazon Princess, Chris Pine (you may remember from Star Trek) is Steve Taylor, Robin Wright (from House of Cards) plays Antiope, and Connie Nielsen is Hippolyta, the Queen of the Amazons and Diana's mother.
The story is played as a flashback, in which the present day Diana Prince meditates on a photograph of herself with a group of men taken during the Great War of 1914-1918. It tells the background to the whole story, which involves a struggle of the gods between Zeus and Ares: Ares prevails but Zeus manages to leave a weapon to be used by the Amazon warriors when the time should come. Well, guess what, the time has come. With the prelude out of the way, the main story gets underway with the appearance of Taylor whose place crashes just off the island of Themiscyra. He brings news of the Great War currently being waged and the dreadful slaughter going on. Since the Amazons' very purpose is to bring peace and justice, Diana argues that they have a duty to take part, but Hippolyta forbids it. Diana defies the Queen and escapes, taking what she believes to be the weapons Zeus devised to be used for her purpose. Diana and Taylor head for London where they deliver vital information concerning the development of poison gas which will lead to millions more deaths and prolong the warfare. This time Taylor is forbidden from taking any further action, but he defies his orders. The pair go to war in Belgium along with a small groups of misfits – the scenario reminds me very much of the Guns of Navarone. They deliver a small Belgian village from their occupying force, but soon after the village itself is destroyed in a gas attack. Diana realizes that Ares, her ancient nemesis, is behind all this and defeats him in a final battle.
There are some quite humorous scenes of Diana trying to figure out how to fit into life in the wider world, but the general anti-war message is far more important, indeed sometimes the movie gets rather repetitive about the horrors of modern warfare. Diana demonstrates the positive value of standing up for the weak and powerless against a brutal and oppressive power, and shows compassion for those who are weak. It is interesting to watch her development from one who is idealistic and slightly naive – she thinks that if she destroys Ares that the war will end, while Taylor claims that the problem is in the hearts of men who are too willing to use force for their own gain, who employ whatever means Ares may place in their hands.
There is certainly plenty of fighting and lots of loud booming explosions. At times I felt that the fight scenes looked pretty much like something out of X-Men or the recent Batman / Superman movies, whose genre they share. Diana's special gadgets – her armlets, shield and whip – are all principally defensive weapons rather that offensive, but her style of doing battle was not really all that different from that of the men around her.
All in all though, it was very good to see a strong, self-confident central female character who drives the action throughout the movie. I recommend all men to bring their wives and daughters to see this movie, to introduce them to a new kind of feminism. The line that sums it all up for me is : "It's about what you believe. And I believe in love. Only love will truly save the world."
The Promise (2016)
Excellent movie about the Armenian Genocide
The Promise - movie review
I went to see The Promise tonight. It is a remarkable telling of a love triangle story set during WWI against the background of the Armenian Genocide. The Director is Terry George who also directed Hotel Rwanda.
Mikael is a young Christian Armenian in the Ottoman Empire, who travels to Constantinople to study to become a doctor. While there he meets Ana, a young Armenian socialite and her amour Chris (played by Christian Bale), an American reporter. We witness the abrupt change in Ottoman society, in which before war breaks out Constantinople is a sophisticated capital of elegance and prosperity. But with was comes violence and cruelty. The Armenian minority become the target of Turkish Muslim oppression, and pretty soon are marked for extermination.
The story is very well told, and the love story does not obscure the horror of the first genocide of modern history - which the Turkish government has yet to acknowledge as such. There are several horrific scenes of the aftermath of slaughter and the death marches to the Syrian desert. I strongly recommend this movie for anyone who has any interest in human behaviour and motivations.