YOU WIN SOME…

That handsome fellow up there is a picture of me earlier this morning after I finally got around to listening to last Friday’s Catholic Answers Live featuring an interview with Jeff Miller, The Curt Jester. The ever gracious Mr. Miller was very complimentary about my efforts here and I just wanted to thank him publicly for his kind words. I have to admit, it went to my head a little bit…

…until later this afternoon when I read Stefan McDaniel’s featured article at First Things which seems to suggest that we bloggers represent the end of all intelligent discourse on the planet, completing the mental death spiral begun by television decades ago. Okay, so it’s actually an essay applying Neil Postman’s theory of the Typographic Mind to the blogosphere and has some interesting points worth arguing about, but golly gee whillikers Mr. McDaniel, way to deflate a guy.

THINGS TO COME: ACT OF GOD

Reaction to my admittedly negative take on the trailer for the upcoming documentary Oh My God was quite mixed with some agreeing with my observations and others thinking I was a bit to hasty in dismissing the film before seeing it. Which is great, that’s part of the fun of talking about movies in the first place. But when The Happy Catholic chastises you for being too harsh*, well, maybe it’s time to lighten up a little, at least for one post. So as a token of good will, I offer everyone this trailer for yet another soon to be released documentary, Act Of God, a film which which explores the psychological and spiritual effects that being struck by lightning has had on seven different people. And this time around I promise to be a minimum of 50% less curmudgeonly. At least for one post.

Now obviously this film takes a more how-brow approach to the subject matter than our typical fare around here as there appears to be no mention of the well-documented power of lightning to reanimate the dead and/or grant super human abilities. But even without that, the movie looks interesting anyway. And what I especially like about the trailer for Act Of God is that, unlike that other trailer I was maybe, possibly, perhaps a wee bit too hard on (see, I’m trying to play nice here), it does not immediately strike me over the head with what I perceive as a predetermined agenda. I’ve been watching these things long enough to know that almost no documentary is ever entirely fair or lacking in manipulation, but I like how it appears that the documentarians just cut on the cameras and let their subject’s do the talking.

And it should be fascinating talk indeed as the responses seem to range from one guy who sees the event as nothing but a cosmologically random occurrence, all the way to another guy who interprets what happened to him as a singular act of God worth changing his entire life over. I’m really interested in seeing if I automatically gravitate towards the more spiritual interpretation because of my Catholicism. As Catholic educator David Bennett points out, “a sacramental worldview, rooted in God's revelation to humanity, especially in the Incarnation, is experiencing God acting within the world in which we live, the world in which God chose to dwell for the sake of our salvation. As such, a sacramental worldview, perhaps given completely only through God's grace, allows us to perceive deeper meaning to what appear to be everyday symbols and events.” That being the case, how much more so then would I be tempted to see God in such a statistically unusual event as being struck by lightning? Still, maybe the skeptic will win me over.

So what about this one folks? Sound like a good night’s viewing or will you just wait until it shows up on the Weather Channel?

*By the way, Julie, your use of the word ‘extreme’ implies that I am an extremist. While this may indeed be true, as a nod to these more genteel times, I would prefer that in the future you utilize the phrase ‘catechetical zealot’ :)

INTERMISSION: LET’S ALL GO TO THE LOBBY… AGAIN

After responding to Pseudo Peter Rodger or Colonel Bat Guano or whatever his name was, it dawned on me that I’ve been inundated recently with requests from real people to promote stuff they’d like you to check out. None of it is remotely related to mad scientists or giant insects or anything like that, but in the interest of fooling people into thinking I might be well rounded, I’m going to pass the information along anyway. So let’s step out into the lobby for just a second and see what treats I have to offer you.

First up is Bible Freebies, which at the very least meets our budget requirements around here. (You can’t get more low budget than free.) They recently added me to their blog directory, so I wanted to make sure I reciprocated the favor. Sometimes I’m not exactly sure what it is I provide people around here, but it is most assuredly free, so I guess that’s good enough to get on the list. Be sure to check out their site for free CDs and software and such.

If you’re in the mood to pay for something, however, then I’m sure The Priests would appreciate your patronage. I’m ashamed to admit that, despite their record breaking debut CD, I’d not heard of The Priests before receiving their email, but better late than never I suppose. Here’s the clip for their upcoming album of traditional pieces.

Be sure to grab The Priests’ CD the week it comes out, though, as the boys in black have some stiff competition the following week from a guy some of you may have heard of called… The Pope. No, seriously. Alma Mater, Music From The Vatican is a work of eight specially commissioned works featuring the voice of Pope Benedict XVI, the Choir of the Philharmonic Academy of Rome conducted by Monsignor Pablo Colino and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Here’s the promo.

Well, hopefully you all found something to peak your interest, but the lights are dimming and it’s time to head back inside the auditorium. Can’t keep Blacula waiting for too much longer.

OH MY GOD: THE NAVEL GAZING FOLLOW-UP POST THAT WAS TOO LONG TO LEAVE IN THE COMMENTS SECTION

For filmmakers everywhere the final moments of Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (2001) must have been like seeing there darkest fantasies come true. In case you haven’t seen the movie, that’s the part where the titular characters use their newfound wealth to traverse the globe and beat the living snot out of every single film critic wannabe who ever posted something negative about their movie on the Internet.

In real life you could never approve of those kinds of actions, of course, but you can easily understand the feelings behind them. Take Peter Rodger, the writer/director of the upcoming documentary Oh My God, for example. Here’s a man who spent three years of his life putting together his first major film, a project which must have entailed a lot of physical, emotional, and professional investment, and what’s one of the first things about his movie he runs across on the Internet? Some anonymous guy (some day I’ll have to explain the reasons I don’t use my real name) on a B-level Catholic movie blog who hasn’t seen the film yet, but who still managed to find some things he saw in the trailer to complain about. I’d imagine that could get under a person’s skin. And that’s why it was only mildly surprising to see a post show up in the comboxes this morning by someone claiming to be Peter Rodger (it’s the Internet, so I want to make it clear that I have no way of verifying in this instance that it was indeed the man himself) expressing unhappiness over my concerns. He wrote:

“You really should go see the film. It might open your eyes a bit. The filmmaker.”

Unfortunately, that’s all he wrote. And with only that little bit to go on, I have to say I was left with the same impression as that of commenter Scott W. who noted that “Modern progressivist thinking has devolved to "agree with me or shut up!" for some time now. To wit: lots of pop-culture ephemera proposes to enlighten us rubes with Some Great Insight That Has Eluded Man For Ages.” That may sound like a harsh interpretation of one sentence, but I hope Mr. Rodger understands that the entertainment industry here in the United States is overflowing with narcissistic nitwits harboring an open contempt for what they view as the unenlightened masses. We’re kind of used to being looked down upon by our celebrities.

But maybe it’s different down under. In an attempt to be charitable, let’s suppose that Mr. Rodger’s comments were a spur of the moment gut response meant to express disappointment rather than condescension. If so, then his declaration that “it might open your eyes a bit” could simply mean that his film will actually address the small list of concerns I had upon viewing the trailer. Maybe the film really will accurately portray each individual religion’s teachings on God rather than just parading a long line of freakish nutcases who practice their own twisted take on the various belief systems. And maybe the film really will transcend the perceived bias in the trailer and ultimately point out, as commenter Rick hopes, “that we are wired for God or as St. Augustine puts it, "Our hearts are restless until they rest on Thee my Lord." That would be nice, even if happens unintentionally.

And if that is indeed the case, Mr. Rodger (if it really was you), then please feel free to let all of us here know that’s what your note meant and I’ll happily pimp your movie some more. If not, well, at least you already got some publicity out of all this anyway.

P.S. Phil, my man, if you were gonna drag Hugh Jackman and Baz Luhrmann into your film, couldn’t you have snagged Nicole Kidman as well? Her and my wife share some facial features so she’s the only actress I can openly praise without getting the stink-eye.

THINGS TO COME: OH MY GOD

I had started out calling my feature on trailers for upcoming movies “TRAILER TRASH” because… well, it’s the most obvious name there is, isn’t it? Unfortunately, it’s so stinking obvious that a few other blogs are already using it. So we’re switching to “THINGS TO COME” instead, which has a much more cozy eschatological feel better suited to this blog anyway. And since the title has a nice, new churchy ring to it, the first trailer should as well. Here’s the trailer for the upcoming documentary from newbie director Peter Rodger, Oh My God, which seems to be getting one of those “end-of-the-year limited release just in time for awards consideration” type of things.

I would really love for this movie to turn out to be a true exploration of the different teachings on God around the world and how people internalize them and live them out. Unfortunately, a few things in the trailer and that I’ve found around the Internet seem to indicate that’s not the direction this documantary takes.

1. I like Hugh Jackman, especially his story about how his adopted son hits on girls with the opening line “Hey, my dad's Wolverine.” And I also understand that lots and lots of other people like Hugh Jackman, so it’s good marketing to feature him in your movie. And a small, but notable chunk of the people involved in this are part of the Australian film industry, so Jackson obviously made himself available to help out his countrymen. But man oh man, for a film about exploring the idea of God around the globe, this trailer is pretty darn top heavy with Hugh Jackman.
2. The marketing materials for the film on Rotten Tomatoes contain this paragraph: “Rodger's quest takes him from the United States to Africa, from the Middle East to the Far East, where such fundamental issues as: Did God create man or did man create God?, "Is there one God for all religions? and If God exists, why does he allow so much suffering? are explored in candid discussions with the various Christians, Catholics, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and even atheists the filmmaker meets along the way.” That’s fine on a cursory viewing, but did you spot it? Yep, it’s the old canard of separating Catholics from Christians. Never a good sign that the filmmaker understands his subject matter.
3. Take a look at the complete cast list submitted to IMDB. While the aforementioned P.R. materials appear to guarantee that adherents from all of the major religions are represented, there are precious few listed who would appear to have any real teaching authority. I spot Yitzchok Adlerstein, a well known Orthodox Jewish Rabbi, and Tim LaHaye, Protestant minister and author of the Left Behind series. That’s all Rodger could come up with in his three year track across the globe maing this movie? Where are the bishops, the mullahs, the bhikkus, the swamis? Cripes, where’s Oprah!?! I understand that the director has stated that his movie “is not about religion and the tribes in which people eke out their lives (no condescension there at all, huh?); the film is about what God means to people.” But the fact is, while I appreciate hearing the opinions of the common man and woman in the street (as well as some Hollywood folk, a world famous magician, and a few international recording stars, including an ex-Beatle), with all due respect, it seems a vacuous exercise without having the actual teachings of the various religions to hold those opinions up to for perspective. I’m sorry if I’m being a jerk, but how is 90 minutes of subjective claptrap going to contribute anything of value to understanding how the idea of God shapes the world?

All that being said, keep in mind this is just a trailer. My initial reactions to it may end up being hastily formed and completely unfounded. Oh My God could well end up being an inspirational work of sublime genius. And even if it doesn’t reach those heights, I have to admit I do appreciate the (assuredly unintentional) hilarity of the fact that the only really angry person in the trailer appears to be the atheist. But for right now, based solely on the preview, I’m just not feeling any excitement at the thought of watching Oh My God. What about you guys?

NOW SHOWING AT A BLOG NEAR YOU

We haven’t done a Now Showing posting for awhile now, so some of these links may have a bit of dust on them. They’re not dead yet though (and even if they were, that’s not a problem here), so enjoy.

Let’s start with a little He Said/She Said. First up is Christian filmmaker Dallas Jenkins over at the Big Hollywood blog who asks a question we ourselves have often pondered, “Why are Christian Movies So Bad?” His answer includes the notion that “good art should always put story and character above message… [therefore] most Christian films aren’t going to be very good because they have to fall within certain message-based parameters.” Maybe. For Sister Mary Martha’s part, she would rather light a candle than curse the darkened theater. Over at her place, instead of heaping on more criticisms, Sister discusses what she actually likes about religious movies. Her number one reason: “I like all Bible movies for the hats.”

Despite her somewhat lenient criteria, however, even the good sister might have a hard time finding something to enjoy in the upcoming film Agora, a movie that, as the Catholic News Agency is reporting, “civil rights organizations are denouncing… for promoting hatred of Christians and reinforcing false clichés about the Catholic Church.” Having not seen the film (no American release date yet), I can only take the word of critics who are complaining that the film takes more than a few liberties with history, recasting  the Neoplatonic 4th century Hypatia of Alexandria as a brave Dawkins-style atheist martyred by science-hating Christians for her insistence on teaching empirical investigative methods. Most sources indicate that while Hypatia’s killers were (inexcusably) Christian, their motives were entirely political; no religion or science involved at all. Again, that’s just the advance word, so the movie could turn out to be okay, but for some odd reason in this Dan Brown infested world, I just don’t trust it to get the facts straight. (Maybe it’s things like Penn & Teller. You think?)

Perhaps it’s pretentious propaganda like Agora that is part of the reason I watch the kinds of movies that I do. The people who make B-movies rarely try to hide the fact they’re crap. Take the SyFy Channel’s Craig Engler for example, discussing his company’s penchant for churning out low budget schlock like Man-Thing and Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus. “The joke title we always talk about wanting to make is Sharktopus (half shark, half octopus!).” he noted recently on Twitter. “It's more fun to say out loud than to read.” He’s right. Shark-toe-puss. I would totally watch that without a minute’s hesitation.

Speaking of goofy titles, Fr. Philip Neri Powell took in Zombieland last week, and along with a few laughs, it also caused him to ruminate on zombie, as well as Mayan, apocalypses. Unfortunately, as The Curt Jester points out, we may not need to wait a few years to see such sights as THE ZOMBIES ARE ALREADY AMONG US!

And on that cheerful note, I’ll leave it with you until next time.

THE B-LIST: BABY LOVE

If you participate in the comments section around here, then I’m sure the eloquent (and yet still non-blogging) Xena Catolica needs no introduction. But just in case you missed the good news, she and her husband have recently, in their words, had a “new alien beam out of the mothership!” Translated for my Protestant readers, that’s what John Cleese would describe as “bloody Catholics filling up the bloody world full of bloody people they can't afford to bloody feed!” For our part, since it’s kind of our shtick around here, we’ll just go with the Catechism and say they’ve been blessed with “a gift. The "supreme gift of marriage"… a human person.”

As we are more than familiar with the singular joys of having a new baby in the house, we thought it would be nice way to celebrate and honor this gift by providing the happy couple with a list of good movies to keep them entertained and awake during those late night feeding sessions. But since we don’t watch GOOD movies around here, we’re gonna have to give them these instead. So, for everyone’s viewing pleasure (or maybe not), The B-Movie Catechism proudly (or maybe not) presents the following short list of movies dealing with the arrival of a new bundle of… something. But even though this collection of not-so-cuddly nippers aren’t exactly your typical adorable tots, their mommies still love’em, fangs and all. And more important, even though the filmmakers would probably deny they intended it, all of these movies end up being shockingly anti-abortion. Take a look.

IT’S ALIVE (1974)/IT LIVES AGAIN (1978)/IT’S ALIVE III: ISLAND OF THE ALIVE (1987)

I can’t explain why, but If I had to single out one image from my childhood which qualifies as a true Kindertrauma, it would be the picture of that crib with a claw hanging over the edge from the ad campaign for It’s Alive. It was unbearable. I had to leave the room whenever the commercial came on. So imagine my surprise years later when I finally watched It’s Alive and found a pretty solid little B-movie with a surprising amount of heart in it. Sure, it’s a low budget schlock fest about a mutant killer baby, but Larry Cohen (The Stuff) manages to give the whole thing a Frankenstein twist (It’s Alive!, get it?) and turn your sympathies to the child before the credits roll. The movie ends with the father, who spends most of the film trying to kill his own baby, finally manning up, accepting his duties as a parent, and rushing to save the life of his son. Failing to do so, he spends most of It Lives Again in a courtroom battling for the right for these children to be allowed to live, albeit in a controlled situation. He gets his wish in Part III when the surviving mutants are transported to an island of their own so they can have a chance at life. On the surface it’s all ridiculous, but underneath it’s pretty strong stuff when you realize the first movie came out barely one year after Roe v Wade. And although Cohen tries to keep his cred with the pro-abort crowd by making sure to present the victims points of view as well, it’s pretty clear he ultimately sees the potential killing machines as human. If you have any doubts, then just watch the opening sequence of Part III as one of the mortally wounded infants drags itself into a church and desperately tries to reach the baptismal font before it dies. It just goes to show that when Jesus said "Let the children come to me, and do not prevent them; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these", he meant the ugly ones too.

PROPHECY (1979)

With a $12,000,000 budget (pretty hefty in 1979), Prophecy probably doesn’t really qualify as a B-movie, but you sure can’t tell the difference once the guy in the rubber mutant bear suit starts stomping around on screen. Set in the Maine woods where a lumber mill has been poisoning the local lakes with methyl mercury, Prophecy eschews the humor of earlier environmental horror movies like Frogs, and earns its laughs the old fashioned way… by epically failing to convince viewers to take it seriously despite its ponderous subject matter. I’m not gonna lie, I adore most everything about Prophecy, from its over-dramatized social conflicts to its creepily deformed baby animal puppets. Heck, I even get a kick out of Robert Foxworth’s obligatory concerned white liberal afro. The whole thing is a blast (literally, in the case of the infamous sleeping bag death scene). And the good Catholic boy in me can’t help but respond when the ever fretful Talia Shire digs in her heels and commits to giving birth to her unborn child despite the fact that she’s ingested some of the mercury poisoned fish AND her socially conscious husband has spent the first half of the movie railing over the cruelty of bringing children into this world anyway. You go girl! Plus, any movie with Armand Assante playing a Native American activist participating in a chainsaw fight can’t be all bad, can it?

A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET 5: THE DREAM CHILD

I have to be jumping the shark here, right? After all, wasn’t The Dream Child nothing more than another cheaply produced quickie attempt at dragging a bit more cash out of a slowly dying film franchise based on the concept of a supernatural wise cracking serial killing child molester? Yes, it was. But for all its faults, Nightmare 5 also has one of the most bizarrely pro-life storylines of any B-movie I can ever remember seeing. Having had his butt handed to him by the previous film’s Dream Master, Alice, a severely weakened Freddie Kreuger attempts to use the only door open to him to reenter our world… the dreams of Alice’s developing fetus. Seriously. And not only does Alice have to enter the dream world of her unborn child to battle Freddie, but she actually ends up talking to the boy, who it turns out is really looking forward to being born if only mommy can stop the bad man from corrupting his soul. SERIOUSLY! Planned Parenthood must have crapped themselves over the thought that teenagers would be sitting in front of movie screens watching this. And that idea just warms my heart.

Well, that should be a good starting point for anyone’s list of pro-life B-movies. Suggestions for others are most welcome. Also, AS ALWAYS, any movie recommendations found on this blog should be taken with tongues firmly planted in cheeks. The B-Movie Catechism cannot be held responsible for any mental scarring resulting from the actual viewing of these works of art.

And in all seriousness, our congratulations and best wishes to Xena and her family on the arrival of their new gift. Whatever you do, don’t let him grow up to be like me.