In his book on director Martin Scorsese, the late film critic Roger Ebert described the ominous context in which he previewed The Last Temptation of Christ (1988). Prior to its release, he was invited to a private screening and watched the film alone. "This was not a perk," he writes. "It was a security measure." Ebert was led to a townhouse where the director was living under a shadow of death threats. The TV evangelists of the time had thundered with denunciation and outrage. One church leader, Campus Crusade for Christ founder Bill Bright, offered to cover the costs of the studio investment if he could obtain all the film negatives. He vowed to destroy them.
The graphic content of the film was understandably upsetting to religious audiences, but the level of reaction that it provoked was astonishing. During the film's release, a French fundamentalist group launched Molotov cocktails inside the Parisian Saint Michel Theater and injured thirteen people. Organized protests and boycotts in the United States caused major theater chains to refuse screenings. Some cities sought wholesale bans, many succeeding. The following year, Blockbuster Video caved to pressure and declined to rent the video in stores. The charge was blasphemy, and Scorsese's film was a tipping point in the "culture wars." It would become a key target in Michael Medved's influential book Hollywood vs. America (1992).
This mood is not an unfamiliar one to us today. The cultural divide in America has widened even farther, and conflicts over ideology occur in new arenas every year. Fast-food restaurants and pizza parlors become staging grounds for bitter power plays. Religious groups continue to struggle for influence and fight their cultural enemies in politics and the arts. Antagonistic, "faith-based" films are produced at an increasing rate, with 2014's God's Not Dead bringing in a remarkable $62 million. For many Christians, the box office remains a battle to be fought and won.
When films have religious subject matter, devout viewers tend to be primarily interested in questions of theological accuracy. Is the scriptural text taken seriously and interpreted rightly? Are the historical details correct? Does it teach the right ideas? These concerns can dominate discussion and are often the only point of reference, determining both the value of the work and our level of engagement. Theater attendance is cast in terms of "support," with even participation seen as an economic move for or against an artist's ideas. Films based on the Bible bring out our tensions with art into stark relief, and doubly so when the subject is Christ himself. Some portrayals are made by Christians, others by atheists. Some seem subversive, others commendable. What is our response? What do we do with the cinematic Christs that come our way?
Ignoring them is one reasonable option. The church is called to embrace a confident faith, and we can certainly stand to shrug things off better. The latest media sensations needn't determine our talking points. Various films come and go and are always of relative importance. Christians like me who work in the arts may have a larger responsibility of engagement, but those conversations are best done without hand-wringing. Criticism can (and should) be made, but it must always be done with integrity and care.
Son of God
One of the more popular recent productions is the evangelical film Son of God. Extracted from the hit History Channel miniseries The Bible (2013), it was produced by reality television producer Mark Burnett and his wife Roma Downey. In an interview with Christianity Today, Burnett stated that his goal was to "affect a new generation of viewers and draw them back to the Bible." The team consulted with a range of pastors and academics, striving to craft an outreach tool that would be accurate and devotional.
The film is sincere and inoffensive, although out of context it loses the admirable ambition of the miniseries, which was to show the thematic connections in the Bible's unfolding narrative. Unfortunately, the filmmaking is quite poor, weighed down by generic cinematography and flat direction. It plays like a Sunday school felt board in motion, a tedious swell of music scoring each scene to little effect. The key story points are hit, but the movement is stale and perfunctory, leaving it more tract than art.
Actor Diogo Morgado is an unfortunate casting choice for Jesus, his attractive features and wry smile giving him the qualities of a supportive boyfriend. He always seems slightly amazed at his own miracles, overcome with emotion as he pleads with the crowds. The insertion of trite, contemporary dialogue such as his invitation to "change the world" doesn't help much either. While I'm unpersuaded by Calvin's view of the second commandment, sights like these certainly give iconoclasm appeal.
The Passion of the Christ
Much more evocative is Mel Gibson's film, The Passion of the Christ (2004). It too is an earnest, pious rendering, but Gibson's directorial approach takes full advantage of the cinematic medium and uses striking imagery and mood to powerful effect. He produced the film independently in order to make bold creative choices, using Aramaic and Latin languages and keeping dialogue at a minimum. It is richly poetic, full of theological allusions, and the scene progression draws from the classic Stations of the Cross iconography.
Gibson's approach focuses on the gospel's core event, the crucifixion, avoiding the rote proceedings of many adaptations and finding an intense, emotional center. Interwoven flashbacks bridge moments in Jesus' life to the violence of Calvary, and the effect achieves a kind of musicality. It skillfully highlights the connections between his teachings, Palm Sunday, and the Last Supper, drawing everything toward the central image of the cross. The Passion of the Christ achieves what few gospel films do’truly embodying its central message. As the violence escalates, Christ's prayer to forgive his oppressors is shown as truly radical. The lengthy experience is brutalizing but pointed. Here is the gospel: a shocking display of God incarnate, broken for sinners.
The emphasis, however, on graphic violence is disturbing, and there's a tortured angst to the filmmaking that has become more pronounced in hindsight. Two years after the film's release, Gibson's battle with alcoholism reemerged and his personal life imploded. His inner demons and savage outbursts were exposed and laid bare by the media. Despite earnest work to make reparations and become stabilized, his career in Hollywood has still not recovered. When one watches Passion now, the dark energy and ferocity are haunting.
This reveals an important feature of art often lost on moviegoers. To a participant, the viewing experience is not merely an engagement with a story or a set of ideas. Fundamentally, to watch a film is to encounter another human being. Mel Gibson is expressing himself and reaching out to you as a viewer when you watch his film. We meet him through the art. Even with the distance that mass media brings, we are making a connection with an artist, and how we choose to respond and relate is important.
The Last Temptation of Christ
The Last Temptation of Christ isn't one of Scorsese's better films, and the director later acknowledged he is better suited to explore spiritual ideas on the "everyday scale" of modern life. A case can easily be made that it is in fact heretical, a portrait so interested in the human side of Christ that he is depicted as fallible and sinful. Jesus' divinity is discovered (or possibly earned) through his infamous "last temptation" to forsake the cross and marry Mary Magdalene. The film's theology is deeply confused and incoherent.
Yet, like Gibson's Passion, one feels the weight of a sincere, spiritual wrestling. Scorsese is a lapsed Catholic, and his films regularly employ Christian imagery and themes. Roger Ebert writes, "The Roman Catholic Church was for him like a heavenly father to whom he had a duty, but did not always fulfill it." Ebert believed the church once played a larger role in Scorsese's inner life than is generally realized. He describes a time when "talking with me after one of his divorces, he said, 'I am living in sin, and I will go to hell because of it.' I asked him if he really, truly believed that. 'Yes,' he said,'I do.'"
When we treat art as just a product we can use or a tool to send messages, we miss out on the human element at play. Scorsese made the film because he wanted to "get to know Christ better," but the reaction he received was shameful for those who claim the name. An opportunity for grace and understanding was lost. Culture is something we build with everyone, a diverse space for common grace that we all share as our lives are intertwined. Art is one of our most sophisticated forms of communication, an imaginative invitation to greater empathy and connection. Even if we're deeply offended by something, we're called to turn the other cheek. It's tragic when the church prefers to take up pitchforks instead.
Ebert saw that what gives Last Temptation value is "not that it is true about Jesus but that it is true about Scorsese." Like the director, Willem Dafoe's Messiah is filled with anguish and conflicted over his true purpose. The film shows us Scorsese's tortured soul, struggling with God and burdened by doubt. One can only imagine the effect the hostile response must have had on him.
Love is easily lost in a culture war mind-set, but Christians must strive to transcend the power struggles of the surrounding world. We're called to look to the interests of others above ourselves, and this extends to artists in Hollywood. In film, Jesus can be depicted with varying degrees of accuracy, but there's a much more important reality at play. What matters most is that when we encounter the Christ of the cinema, who we're really seeing is our neighbor. How will we respond?
