Should films with a distinctively religious theme and
narrative water down the theological dimension so to be more acceptable in
modern, secular society (i.e., a broader range of movie-goers)? The success of
films like The Last Temptation of Christ,
The Nativity Story, The Passion of the Christ, and Son of God suggest that theology should be embraced rather than
tempered if box-office numbers are at all important. The genre should thus be
distinguished from historical drama.
Screenwriters and directors engaging in the religious
genre would be wise, therefore, to distinguish the theological from the
historical even in handling religions in which the historical is salient in the
theological.
Adam Holz, an editor at the Christian pop-culture site,
Plugged In, warns against making a Christian film as a historical piece. “I
think we live in a culture right now that isn’t particularly interested in
history, so with historical epics, you almost need some {hook}.”[1]
That hook is none other than a distinctive take on the theology. Mel Gibson,
for instance, emphasized the violence in the Crucifixion in The Passion of the Christ. Last Temptation notably challenged some
fundamental theological assumptions. Both films are set in a historical
context, but history itself is not the issue. Neither film is a historical
biography like the relatively unsuccessful film, Paul, Apostle of Christ.
In the cases of Judaism and Christianity, the concept of
salvation history makes it difficult to ply apart the theological as distinctive.
God makes a covenant with Israel at a certain point in its history—in the
exodus from servitude in Egypt—and Jesus makes the vicarious sacrifice for
mankind when he is crucified when Judaea was a province of the Roman Empire. Even
just in using the present tense in referring to theologically-rich moments in
the past, I am expressing the tension between the theological and the
historical—that the theological in such cases is not simply history. Because
the Exodus and the Passion Story were both written as faith narratives, they cannot be taken as historical accounts. No
historical evidence exists, for instance, of a historical Jesus, and yet, Jesus
is depicted as such in the faith
narratives of the Gospels. It is indeed difficult to view the theological in
such a case as distinct. Even though
the historical Jesus movement sought to get back to the historical, I submit
that the proper task of the Christian religionist is to uncover the
distinctiveness of the theological. This doesn’t mean divorcing it from
history; the two are so intertwined in the Gospels. Rather, the task, of which
screenwriters and directors can partake, is to depict in moving pictures how
theology is its own stuff—how, in other words, it can come into its own even
when it is mixing with other domains like history, psychology, science, and
even metaphysics.
My favorite scene in The
Greatest Story Ever Told eerily depicts the whipped and thorn-crowned Jesus
carefully walking down a hallway toward Pontius Pilate. The Roman’s facial
expression suggests that something very different—a different, unknown kind of
strength—is in the frail man who is remarkably still intact. The strength being
depicted so well by the images and the music gives the viewers a glimpse of something
distinctly theological. The historical setting is thus transcended; the film is
not really about history. This example illustrates how filmmakers and actors
can wrestle with the distinctive nature of the theological and how it can be
depicted and heard onscreen.
An elaboration of the distinctiveness of theology, with implications for relations to other domains, is in the booklet, "Spiritual Leadership."
An elaboration of the distinctiveness of theology, with implications for relations to other domains, is in the booklet, "Spiritual Leadership."
1. Patrick Ryan, “Christian Films’ Success Deserves More Faith,” USA Today, March 28, 2018.
