Victory With (A Sappy) Heart

As a sports fan, I am well aware of games’ ability to bring people together and create disharmony.  For every story of cooperation across racial and ethnic lives, we hear about violence at international soccer matches in eastern Europe or post-game violence between parents after their kids’ baseball game.  Clint Eastwood’s latest film, Invictus, reveals the power of sport to unite people across great distances and to even uplift an entire nation. [Read more]

A Cinematic Game Changer?

Unless you’ve been in a coma for over a year, you are probably familiar with James Cameron’s latest film, Avatar.  Touted as the most expensive film ever made, it has received rave reviews for its 3D special effects and stunning other-world scenery.  Unfortunately, the plot is as thin and heavy-handed as its effects are beautiful. [Read more]

A Complex Evil

I recently took a break from my Christmas movie bonanza with all its images of love and peace and togetherness to watch Gomorrah, a brutally realistic film about the Camorra, one of the the largest criminal organizations in the world.  I am well aware of the debates over and problems with violence in film, but I do believe it has a place, and Gomorrah is a perfect example of this. [Read more]

The Rapture Exposed: A Review

Hollywood has spent billions of dollars to visualize global destruction through natural and man-made disasters.  Religious filmmakers have spent millions trying to visualize the rapture and the apocalypse.  Conrad Ostwalt distinguishes between the two as secular and sacred apocalypses in an interesting chapter of his book, Secular Steeples.  In preparing for a lecture on blockbuster films and the apocalyptic sub-genre, a colleague recommended Barbara R. Rossing’s The Rapture Exposed:  The Message of Hope in the Book of Revelation.  Rossing’s work is at the same time an expose of a theological lie and a renewal of hope in a troubled world. [Read more]

He Loves to Fly and It Shows

Throughout this semester, I have frequently referenced an NPR interview with film scholar David Thomson in which he discussed how desperate times often birth great works of art.  Think of the films that released during the Great Depression (or about it) for example.  Hopefully, these tough economic times in which we find ourselves will be no different and inspire thought-provoking creative works as well.  Jason Reitman’s latest film, Up In the Air, is certainly reason for optimism. [Read more]

BEING ERICA: RE/MEMBERING SIN!

Check out the latest from Jason Derr on Being Erica after the jump. [Read more]

Tear Me Down: Why Hedwig still Rocks Twenty Years after the Wall

Check out Richard Lindsay’s review of Hedwig and the Angry Inch after the jump. [Read more]

A Fate Worse Than Death?

Roland Emmerich’s disaster films are escapist fantasies that imagine how we humans will respond in the face of certain (almost) global destruction.  As I mentioned in a review of 2012 yesterday, they often present an emotional utopia of family togetherness against this dystopic background.  Another recent film, the post-apocalyptic story, The Road, unfortunately presents a perhaps more realistic portrayal of the human response to global destruction and survival of said catastrophe. [Read more]

The World’s Dead, But At Least the Family Survived

There’s an interesting thread to Roland Emmerich’s disaster films.  Against the backdrop of alien invasions or global warming is the story of geographically or emotionally separated families reuniting with one another.  The same plot can be seen in his third attempt to destroy the planet in 2012.  [Read more]