Brehm Blog
Elijah Davidson Aug 16, 2010
Scott Pilgrim Vs The World feels like the film adaptation of the graphic novel adaptation of a video game adaptation of a movie. Somewhere along the line everyone forgot where or how the story
originated, and Scott Pilgrim's (Michael Cera in his usual goofy, sweet guy role) tale is destined to be re-adapted for all eternity, but that will be ok as long as the re-telling remains as entertaining as this movie.
In truth, Scott Pilgrim is an adaptation of a graphic novel (like so many movies these days). The story is also as old as time, so in a way, we've been adapting this story for eons anyway. It's your standard knight and princess tale. Scott Pilgrim is your knight in shining cotton t-shirts, Ramona is his lady locked in the tower of a castle (an actual castle makes an appearance in the movie), and her exes are the dark knights and dragons Sir Scott must overcome (yes, there are even a few dragons in this movie as well).
Now, what makes this movie so entertaining, besides the outrageous humor and the talent of the cast, is the form this Arthurian legend takes. Scott Pilgrim is Lancelot meets the arcade. The various locations in the movie are depicted as levels and the parade of exes are the bosses. Scott and the exes meet, they fight, and Scott experiences various degrees of success. The effect is manic, corny, and ultimately endearing and fun, and I have to think especially so if you are of the raised on video game generation. I'm twenty-five, and I thought it was fantastic.
Is there a theological dimension to this film? Is there anything I should comment on from the spirituality-focused point of view we specialize in here at Reel Spirituality? No, I don't think so. Are there issues of morality at play in this movie? Sure. There always are, but to focus on them in this case would be to be argumentative and delve into didacticism when neither is invited by the film.
Scott Pilgrim is an old story told through a contemporary lens in a hugely entertaining way. Let's leave it at that for now.
-- Elijah Davidson, Co-Director of the Institute for Reel Spirituality at the Brehm Center for Worship, Theology, and the Arts
Elijah Davidson Aug 15, 2010
My first semester in college, I took calculus with Dr. Stone. In Dr. Stone's class, I sat next to Harrison. I met Harrison in Dr. Stone's class, and out friendship did not extend beyond the classroom except for a polite nod to one another as we passed in the gym or elsewhere on campus. Dr. Stone's class met twice a week, and twice a week, Harrison and I discussed one subject:
Rambo movies.
Harrison loved Rambo movies. He had seen them all many, many times. I had never seen any of the Rambo movies, but Harrison never knew that, and I didn't let my unfamiliarity with the franchise hinder our conversation. This is a testament to both A) my conversational skills on the subject of movies (I say that acknowledging my pride) and B) the mindlessness of most action movies (I didn't have to have seen the movies to know what happened, more or less, in each one).
With regards to "B" above, The Expendables is no exception to the rule. (With regards to "A," I did actually see this movie before writing this review.)
And therein lies The Expendables' glory - it is not trying to be anything other than an action movie. In fact, its stated goal is to be an homage to the blood and guts, wham-bang-boom action movies of the past.
Here, we have Stallone. We have Statham. We have Li. We have Rourke. We have Lundgren. We have Austin.
I'm sorry. I didn't write that last paragraph correctly. Let me try again.
Here, we have Stallone! We have Statham! We have Li! We have Rourke! We have Lundgren! We have Austin!
That's better.
We even have Willis! and Schwarzenegger! for a very brief moment. This is the Dirty Dozen of action flicks by design, and it excels at its purpose. I'm sure Harrison will love this film.
The story (Does it matter?) involves Stallone's team of aging commandos' attempt to overthrow the corrupt dictator of a nondescript island nation, apparently by killing everyone. I've never been sure how that's supposed to "free the people" in these movies, but I am sure I'm not supposed to think too hard about it.
Along the way, Stallone meets an idealistic resident of the island, who also happens to be female and beautiful, and toppling the powers that be becomes more about Stallone's character proving to himself that he still has a soul after all his years of gun play and bloodshed.
Oops! My review is about to get a little poignant. I honestly didn't see this coming.
In recent years, Sylvester Stallone has become a bit of a curiosity to me. With each subsequent rehashing and reinterpreting of the films of his glory days (Rocky Balboa in 2006,Rambo in 2008, and now The Expendables), I've wondered what he's trying to achieve. Is he doing it for the money? I don't think so. He doesn't seem greedy. Is it fame? No, I think he has that, and he doesn't come across as vain either. What is it then?
I don't know, and this is purely speculation, but maybe Stallone is looking for absolution, or rather (and better), maybe he has found it.
Both Rocky Balboa and Rambo (2008) were marketed as "Christian films." Stallone talked at the time about his return to his Catholic faith following the birth of his daughter in 1996. She had severe health problems, and he said the experience made him realize his need for God, his inability to handle the stresses of his life on his own. He surrendered his life to Christ at the time, he says, and found new life.
In Rocky Balboa, Stallone plays a man trying to be a good person and reconcile with his son. I haven't seen Rambo (2008), but (in case I ever run into Harrison) I know it's about a group of missionaries who are captured by terrorists, and John Rambo goes in to save them. Now, in The Expendables, Stallone plays a man haunted by his past who wants to prove there is still a man somewhere beneath the years of violent action.
If indeed Stallone has come back to Christ, and I have no right to disbelieve his word on the matter, he has absolution. His past does not haunt him anymore. In Christ, we are free from our sins. No matter what Stallone has done in the past himself, and no matter what he has depicted on screen, he is forgiven. Christ hung on the cross and shed His blood for all the blood man has ever shed, and then He rose again. Sin's curse is destroyed. Through Christ, life courses through Stallone's and everyone else's veins.
The Expendables is about an aging hero who wants to know if there is hope for his soul.
There is hope for our souls, of the blood and guts, wham-bang-boom kind, and perhaps Stallone knows it. Maybe this is his way of telling us about it using the language he knows best.
-- Elijah Davidson, Co-Director of the Institute for Reel Spirituality at the Brehm Center for Worship, Theology, and the Arts
Elijah Davidson Aug 14, 2010
After the credits rolled, as I sat in the emptying theater contemplating Eat, Pray, Love, the older woman next to me turned and struck up a conversation with me. She asked what I thought of the movie - a good first line at such moment - and let the conversation go where it may.
She told me I looked like a very interesting man. She asked what I did ("I'm a writer," I said). She said she thought it was probably something like that. She asked what kind of writing (I told her I was here today because I write film reviews), and then she told me Eat, Pray, Love doesn't seem like the kind of movie many men are going to "run out to see by themselves."
She has a point.
Eat, Pray, Love is the film adaptation of the popular memoir of the same name by Elizabeth Gilbert, a book heralded by book clubs across the country. The story follows Elizabeth as she travels the globe trying to figure out her life following a divorce. She eats a lot of good food, wears out a prayer mat or two, and loves and is loved by as diverse an international community as you can imagine.
Elizabeth, more than anything else, is trying to learn to love again. She has been hurt by... I don't know, actually. I guess it doesn't matter who or what hurt her. She is broken, and she wants to be fixed. Somehow, by someone.
A lot of this movie is devoted to spiritual practice. Liz prays and meditates and works and chants and confesses and empties her mind and fills her stomach and has sex and abstains and does nothing at all. Liz samples it all in her search for what is right, in her search to be right.
Many Christians are going to balk at Eat, Pray, Love'sfluid spirituality devoid of any interaction with Christ or the Christian faith (save for one mention of Ingrid Bergman in The Bells of St.Mary's and two nuns eating what looks like great gelato). Understand though, Liz isn't looking for God. She is looking for herself. Along the way she decides that god is in her, that god is her, and for her, that is true.
Liz is her own god, and over the course of her year-long excursion, she finds herself/god, comes to peace with herself/god, and learns to live with herself/god..
As a person who knows what it is like to have a broken heart, I really, really appreciate Liz's journey. Having been broken, it is difficult to dare to love. Love is dangerous. Love breaks everyone, I think. After all, love broke even Christ.
And what does it mean to love? At one point in the film, a man asks Liz if she loves him, and she cannot answer. He thinks the answer should be an easy "yes" or "no." The answer etched vividly across Julia Roberts' (who is amazing by the way) face is that love is very complicated.
Considering that moment in the film, it would be very easy for me to echo the words of the woman sitting next to me in the theater, and say that this is clearly a film for women, because only a woman can understand Liz. Maybe so, but I know that as the tears welled up in Julia Roberts' eyes as Javier Bardem asked for her love, something inside me welled up which screamed, "Do not answer that question! Words will not suffice to express the depth or complexity of how you love him."
Can we understand love? If "God is love," can't we also ask, "Can we understand God?" Of course we can't. If it can be comprehended, it is not God.
All we can do, I think, and I think Liz ends up thinking as well, is reach out to love/God, hold on to love/God, and let love/God take us where it may.
(P.S. The movie is great.)
-- Elijah Davidson, Co-Director for the Institute for Reel Spirituality at the Brehm Center for Worship, Theology, and the Arts
Neville Kiser Aug 10, 2010
There are a handful of people from history I would love to share a meal with; Oscar Wilde is one of them. When I first came across his short story The Selfish Giant, I did so because I heard he often read it to his children before bedtime. Once upon a night, his son Cyril asked his father (Oscar Wilde) why he always cried at the end of The Selfish Giant. Oscar replied, "Because really beautiful things often makes me cry."
Sometimes, these 'beautiful things' can only be approached through story, through metaphor, through a roundabout way. Maybe that's why a movie like The Passion of the Christ didn't affect me personally as much as the movie The Wrestler did. The first is a straight story of the cross. It's about what happened, it's about going through the 'facts' (or, at least, the facts we have come to know), and the lives of Jesus, Mary, and the disciples. The second, however, is a metaphorical story of the cross. It's about the emotional, spiritual undertones. Pain. Suffering. Exclusion. Isolation. All these play into the scenes of the ripped, torn (human) flesh. All of them are as much about the physical as they are about the emotional, the spiritual. Many would argue that The Passion of the Christ succeeded in being about this, too, but I would heartily disagree. The Passion of the Christ gave us torture, gave us violence, gave us torn flesh, but the context was so stooped in religious controversy (and in religious historical debate), the story failed to connect to many. And why? Because it was too focused on the facts, rather than the spirit and truth of Christ's lived experience.
In The Wrestler, we see how scared, how confused, how alone Christ must have felt. We glimpse, ever so briefly, the existential characteristics of Jesus. Similar to The Gospel According to Mark's rendering of Jesus (recently re-visited in John Carroll's semi-controversial yet fascinating book aptly titled, The Existential Jesus), the essence and substance of The Wrestler's lead man, Randy "The Ram"'s experiences--or in Greek, what would be called 'his ousia'--is what the filmmakers are asking us to relate to and engage with. It's similar, in a cinematic sense, to what Nikos Kazantzakis did in his brilliant novel, The Last Temptation of Christ. In it, Kazantzakis understood what human beings were missing when they were reading the Gospels. They constantly sought out Christ's divinity without every giving much thought to his humanity, his finite nature. That's not wrong or anything, but I don't think it's much help to us in terms of how we live, how we feel, how we love, or how we forgive. Furthermore, there's a distance that's created from the former approach compared to the latter. When you watch The Passion of the Christ you rarely think, "I am like Jesus. He understands my pain." No. All you (can't help but) think is, "I'm sinful. I would have killed Jesus, too. I could never do what he did for me." But when you watch The Wrestler, one is eerily empathetic to "The Ram's" plight because, well, we've all felt like he's felt before. We've failed in relationships, we've let our family down, we've abused our bodies for the sake and pleasure of others and ourselves. The loneliness, the drugs, the wrinkles in our faces. They all reveal time's toll on us. They all reveal the fact that we will one day die.
To take the analogy one step further, it's as if The Passion of the Christ was all about overcoming death and looking towards eternity, and The Wrestler was mostly about facing death and accepting one's own fate, one's own path into eternity. And what does this have to do with Oscar Wilde and The Selfish Giant? Because in it's final (short story) sentences, I was reminded of this indirect, literary-metaphorical power. The way you can hear the same story a thousand times and then, hear it told indirectly and finally 'get it.'
I still don't think I've 'gotten it,' but I do think Wilde has helped me see the Passion narrative in a new light (similar to what director Ingmar Bergman does in the final scene of his cinematic masterpiece, Winter Light). In the spirit of hospitality, charity, and comforting the week, the lonely, the down-and-out, Wilde has crafted a simple, short, beautiful story that reminds us (through a different type of garden encounter), how to be human. How to, as Wilde would put it, 'be divine.'
This is imago dei, fully realized. In art and in life.
Elijah Davidson Aug 08, 2010
The Other Guys stars Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg as a pair of desk-bound detectives living in the shadows of more popular police officers. They're paper-pushers relegated to mundane tasks as long as detectives Danson and Highsmith (Dwayne Johnson and Samuel L. Jackson, who together are the funniest part of this film) are on the case. When Danson and Highsmith are taken out of commission, the "other guys" have a chance to shine.
Will Ferrell and director Adam McKay are anything but unfamiliar with comedies about men who are overly confident in their own greatness. Together they've sent up news anchors and NASCAR drivers in two of Will Ferrell's most popular films. Now they've taken on law enforcement officials and financial market magnates in one fell swoop. The crime the film's dynamic duo is trying to solve isn't a common burglary. It's a Ponzi scheme.
When it comes right down to it, Anchor Man and Talladega Nights are simply better movies than The Other Guys. The jokes here are pretty much the same, but much of the ingenuity is gone. I'm glad they didn't try to make the same jokes again, but they didn't exactly think up anything new either.
Frankly, it seems Ferrell and McKay had more trouble making fun of police officers than they did race car drivers. After all, race car drivers are essentially entertainers. Police officers risk their lives to keep us safe. Their parodies of financial big wigs are funnier, but, well, I have more to say about that at the end of this review.
Unlike in his other comedies, Ferrell isn't the egotistical center of this film. He leaves the megalomania to the surrounding characters. Everyone else in this film is the character Will Ferrell typically plays, except, I suppose, for Mark Wahlberg, who spends the duration of the film yelling angrily. In other Ferrell comedies, his characters' arrogant behavior is highlighted as ridiculous. Here, everything is ridiculous, and Ferrell deadpans through in apparent apathy.
All that being said, if you like the other Will Ferrell/Adam McKay comedies, I imagine you'll like this one as well. I laughed off and on throughout it, but I left wishing it had been better.
Now, a final word on the Ponzi scheme focused part of The Other Guys' plot.
My favorite part of this movie was the end credit sequence. As the cast and production credits cycle through, those audience members who have lingered in the theater are treated to an infographic about the state of the American economy. The graphics seek to illuminate the audience to the cost of the recent bail-outs, the discrepancies between executive and lower lever employee salaries, and the heinous nature of the crimes committed by Bernie Madoff and the like.
As I watched this inforgraphic, I knew I was supposed to feel outrage at what has been perpetrated on the American people. I was supposed to recognize Madoff and the other executives of big companies as unforgivable villains. I was supposed to cheer when it was revealed that Bernie Madoff will be in jail until 2159.
As I watched the graphic however, the words of a popular preacher resounded in my head. In telling the story of Zacchaeus, he likened the diminutive tree-climber to Bernie Madoff, and then the preacher challenged the congregation to treat the enemies of the kingdom of capitalism like Jesus treated Zacchaeus.
Yes, the men and women who stole from the American people and by their actions plunged our nation into an economic ditch should be held responsible for their actions. Many of them broke the laws of this country and based on those laws should be prosecuted.
But they should not be hated, and especially not by Christians.
We are citizens of a Kingdom Coming. We live by a law of love that supersedes the laws of the free market. Should Madoff be in prison? Probably. Should he be reviled? No. He is not beyond Christ's love and mercy, and that love and mercy is supposed to be exemplified in us Christ's Church.
-- Elijah Davidson