Whew. Talk about long-winded. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to get all these things sorted out in my own mind, Barbara - though I suspect you feel a bit like I went after a fly with an atomic bomb. That’s a flaw of mine, I know. Once I get up on my high horse, it can be hard for me to dismount. I’ll try to find myself a sledge-hammer next time, instead of a nuclear weapon.
God Bless,
Father Barry
I suspect the conversation is starting to dwindle away, Barbara. Moving from the DVC to C.S. Lewis isn’t that big of a jump in content, other than perhaps one of relevance. But going from Narnia to a really big monkey seems like a fairly drastic diminishment – just trying to tie up all our little loose ends before signing off for good.
On Kong. You are being unfair to me in claiming excellence for this film. It was a mess. But you don’t have to take my word for it. Let’s just wait ten years and see if anybody at all is still watching it. Or maybe we won’t need that long. Maybe by the end of next year it will already be forgotten. And people will still be watching the original. Why? Jackson has lots of talent. But he is self-indulgent and this always messes with his ability to make masterpieces.
Just to clarify: the film was a mess. I can’t disagree with that, and I DON’T. But I do disagree strongly with several things here.
I think that a film can be a mess, and still be enjoyable. Would any “messy” film be better if it were not a mess? I suspect so, though I’m not prepared to make a universal out of that assumption. Does that mean that a “messy” film is simply bad? No. There can still be a great deal of real value in these kinds of films, in my opinion. (I would give The Return of the King as an example here, but your comments about Kong/Jackson remind me that you didn’t care for those films, either. So that might not be a helpful direction to take.)
Also, I disagree with the notion that it was unfair or agenda-laden on “Hollywood’s” part to push it so strongly around Narnia time. Since I considered Kong the “more imaginative and involving, if more flawed” of the two, I could see plenty of reasons why someone would support it rather than Narnia when the two went head-to-head. I did myself, in fact. Does that mean I was anxious to deflate The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe at the box office because I want overtly Christian films to fail? Of course not. Now, should I project that opinion onto Hollywood? Perhaps not. But I do, none the less. We may be into “naive” territory again, but I think it is possible that people simply enjoyed Kong more than Narnia.
That’s probably creating a bit of a straw man of your argument, though. I apologize. Basically, it boils down to this. I enjoyed Kong a great deal, and didn’t care much for Narnia. And that is primarily a matter of opinion; and though it sounds badly clichéd, opinions will always vary. My reactions to your Kong comments were partially influenced by my own opinions of the film, and partially by the fact that I disliked the assumption that the only reason to prefer Kong was that I was tearing down Narnia. They seem essentially unconnected to me, other than being tent-pole films released in close proximity to one other.
And lastly, there is this point of almost certainly insurmountable disagreement: I object to your claim that Jackson is self-indulgent. My description of Jackson as a cinematic child is exactly how I think of him. And I don’t think of kids as self-indulgent. Or at least not “self-indulgent” in a way that includes the negative connotations you mean to include.
I love watching someone have as much fun doing what he’s doing as Jackson does. I applaud his willingness (even eagerness) to use absolutely every tool at his disposal for sheer “love of the game.” I am swept up when watching that sort of thing. That’s why I loved the Lord of the Rings films, and that’s why I enjoyed Kong. Would a bit more discipline have been better for Jackson? Certainly. Would it make his films better? Again, yes. But that fact would doom most films, were it the only criteria. I simply can’t bring myself to condemn someone that is having so much fun.
As for how history will judge him and us, I have no real comment. I can’t imagine history looking on either Kong or Narnia with much affection, really. They are both badly flawed – Kong, by its excesses and Narnia by its utter lack of vision. The Lord of the Rings film are likely to outlive both of them in terms of fame and fortune. Does that mean they are better? Not sure I want to say that, unless we want to start using the “masses” as our measuring stick. And I don’t think I want to do that quite yet. (That would be treading on dangerous ground, I think. I might be forced to change my opinion of Unbreakable, and I’m not ready to do that just yet.)
That being said, I must admit this fact: I do see where you’re coming from. It’s not an issue that was a “deal breaker” for me, but I can see that it was for you. And perhaps more importantly, I can see that it could actually be a deal breaker, without agreeing with your opinion myself.
I feel that this is a more managable sort of disagreement, though. It’s not really a “principled” one, is it? There will probably always be films I consider masterpieces that others consider only adequate. And I am sure you have some of your own films that you consider “unfairly hidden gems.” At some point, personal preference will enter into any discussion. And I think we’ve reached that point here. Do I think you are unfair to Jackson’s film? I do. And you do not. Fair enough. Let’s bury the hatchet on this particular issue, since I don’t really think our minds are likely to be changed. Nor do they need to be.
I’ll take the giant ape, and you’ll take the talking lion. And we’re both right, without having to resort to the principles of intellectual relativism. Besides, we can probably find other things we would rather argue about…
I must apologize for the length of my last post. Things seem to be getting out of hand a bit. At least that last one was the central post, both in terms of location and importance. On to more movie-related (and less faith-related) topics:
On Narnia. I am VERY enthusiastic about this movie as a children’s film. I think Disney went a long way toward reasserting their status as the best purveyor of kids’ entertainment in this project. I think the film could have been better for older viewers if Walden had hired a writer who was actually Christian to to a better job with the theological underpinnings of the story. But the movie worked extremely well with my six year old nephew for whom Disney intended it.
I’m going to steal a bit from Chesterton here, I think. In Orthodoxy, he stresses the importance of fairy tales in the nursery. And what reason does he give? That they serve as the ultimate foundation for a thoroughly Christian life. The notions of the miraculous and the necessary, the imaginative, the sacrificial and the deserved are all key lessons to be learnt. And Chesterton believed that childhood is the best place to learn them. A complex, complete understanding of theology may be for adults, but theological things should be with us from the very beginning.
How does this apply here? Lewis himself said that he writes “for children only in the sense that I excluded what I thought they would not like or understand.” In other words, the theological stuff in Narnia is there for the children as much as it is for the adults. Lewis believed that youngsters were ready for that sort of material at a very young age, and that they needed it. To overlook that fact in one’s work of adaptation is to do a great disservice to the work itself.
Allow me to find my “childhood shoes” for a moment. When I was a child, the single most powerful, most heart-breaking, most spectacular literary moment in my life was Aslan’s walk to the Stone Table. (Followed closely by the end of The Last Battle, I might add.) I can still remember vividly sitting in my parents’ library, reading Lewis’ account of the night-time journey through the trees; Lucy on one side and Susan on the other. And though I did not notice (or perhaps did not trouble to notice) the obvious parallels between his suffering and that of Christ, it was there for me whether I knew it or not.
In the hands of Adamson and Co., Aslan’s sacrifice was barely a sacrifice at all. And it was certainly not what Lewis intended. It was all ingenious WETA creature ugliness, loud noises, extreme lighting, and over in an instant. I thought this was a horrible, horrible mistake, not only as an adult, but as a former child. It reduced the essential sacrificial core of the story to “large CGI battle preparation material.” Would this shift in focus work well for 6-year-olds? Almost certainly. Would it work better than the book itself? Absolutely not.
The film may have re-instated Disney as the foremost “purveyor of safe, shallow kid entertainment.” But it could not possibly have impacted these kids the way Lewis’ book impacted me so many years ago. It did not move, did not teach, and did not elevate those youngsters the way it could have; the way it was meant to. And it is precisely as a “childhood” fan of Lewis’ work that I could not accept such a watering-down of his message: a message which I firmly believe was intended for (and easily accessible to) both the young in years and the young at heart.
OK, we’ve reached the point of actual disagreement here, Barb. I’m pretty sure I’m in the Catholic minority on this one, which makes me uncomfortable. If you could address these issues in particular, I suspect I could ignore the cosmetic and strategic ones. Wandering out onto thin ice a bit:
On DVC. I have read the script. It is full of lies about the Church. Most of the lies are spoken by the character who is the hero, who is styled as being a Harvard educated scholar with no particular axe to grind. He just tells the truth in the movie. Of course, the truths he tells are lies. We do not need to pay money to Sony Pictures to be able to discuss the issues in this movie. Please, don’t drink the p.r. Kool-Aid. (A Kool-Aid, by the way, that was whipped up by an Evangelical marketing company that was hired to triangulate the Christian response to the movie….Their strategy was, “Let’s tell people that they need to see the film as an opportunity for dialogue.”)
The fact that you’ve read the script gives you a decided advantage, I suspect. I’ve only read bits and pieces of the book, which I found to be very, very silly. The reason I stopped reading was not that I was offended or outraged by the material as much as that I was bored with it. Brown’s “opus” reads like pretty much every other NY Times bestseller I’ve ever seen: sporadically written, poorly researched, and far more focused on “page-turnability” than on “content.” It was such an assortment of oddities and absurdities that I had a very hard time taking it seriously, or even imagining that Brown meant it to be a real expose of any kind.
Could it be damaging? Of course it could. But only to someone who has the most cursory understanding of Catholicism and the most dubious reasoning ability. And if someone falls into that group, they are just as likely to miss the attacks as agree with them. Now perhaps I am being too optimistic or too naïve – or perhaps both at once: a lethal combination. But I want to have a slightly higher opinion of my fellow Americans, even those that I disagree with most strongly. And I do not think they are as ready to be blindly led as this book needs them to be. Wishful thinking? Perhaps.
But my most fundamental question is: why pick this particular fight? Why is DVC so much worse than the usual Hollywood Catholic-Bashing? Is it simply its popularity? Or is it something about the nature of Brown’s attack? Is it the combination of “swashbuckling” with “insidious?” Why is this film such a serious issue? Hanks himself calls it a story “loaded with all sorts of hooey and fun kind of scavenger-hunt-type nonsense.” Why is it more than that? The film will come and go, and raising a huge fuss about it makes its “going” much slower and louder, but no more likely.
I’m afraid that I have become accustomed over the last 2,000 years to my Church falling under attack. And I simply can not see this as a more serious assault than a whole host of current political matters that need to be addressed. I would far rather use my clout on those issues. And even if I were inclined to turn my attention to media attacks on the Catholic Church, I can find hundreds of those much closer to home than the DVC, methinks.
Take this as an example: Diane Sawyer’s Primetime piece On the Trail of Pope Joan that aired December 29th, 2005. It was filled with some of the most blatant and mean-spirited Catholic bashing I have ever seen. And I would say that it was a pretty “high-profile” event. Sawyer’s dishonest musings seem even more likely to be painted with the veneer of truth than those of Hanks’ Harvard grad, don’t they? People look at her and at ABC, and they assume there is fact behind what they say. Very damaging, potentially. But I can’t remember much of an uproar over that.
Or take another example, this one from a recent film. Ridley Scott’s revisionist piece on the Crusades, Kingdom of Heaven, couldn’t quite figure out a way to work the Catholic Church’s responsibility for Hitler’s depravities into its storyline. But they accused us of pretty much everything else – quite possibly the most unflattering portrayal of the hierarchy and its followers that I have ever seen in a fiction film. Where was the uproar over that? As far as I can remember, there was almost none. The film itself was pretty poor, and dropped almost immediately out of sight.
Would DVC do that? Given the strength of its fan-base, probably not. But I am having a very hard time understanding why we need to pick this fight. If I could be convinced that it’s a fight worthy of our ammunition (regardless of the outcome), I’d join it. But it seems much more like a waste to me. The comparisons to Last Temptation of Christ seem far more apt to me than you seem to think. And I don’t want our resistance to go that route. (Or should I perhaps say “rout?”)
I am willing to be proven wrong on this. And if you can, please do so. As a gesture of my good faith, HERE is the Othercott link. Every little bit helps, right? Even help that comes from someone not yet in your camp.
Just testing to see if my droning put anyone to sleep yet. If it has, wake up! If not, you’re an extraordinary person. Here’s more.
On the Othercott. This only makes sense if you understand that Hollywood is not a monlithic unity, but a hugely competitve arena for corporate interests. They are predicting an opening of around $4-$5 million for Over the Hedge. If we can increase that figure appreciably it makes a statement that the Christian audience is saavy to the real power in the business. It isn’t about Over the Hedge as a great work of art. In fact, if it were, it would wreck the point of the Othercott. The point is, as a strategic response to a movie we hate - DVC - to make a success out of an innocuous, dumb little movie that would otherwise not have gotten too much notice.
Three “quick” thoughts here. First, I object to calling Over the Hedge innocuous. I think I mentioned that before, but I’m going to flesh it out a bit. Any film that sells itself to the younger generation while winking at adults worries me. And this one relies heavily on Steve Carell’s burped ABC’s, Wanda Sykes’ butt, and “subtle” jokes about a squirrel’s nuts. I don’t like that. It’s part of a general decline in the entertainment value presented to our kids. We’re a long way from Sleeping Beauty or The Rescuers Down Under here.
Course, one might argue that DVC is another sign of an overall decline. But it’s the kind that comes straight through your front door. With a baseball bat. Over the Hedge is quite a bit subtler. (I can’t believe I just typed those words and that title together. Thank goodness for context.) I prefer the enemy I can see to the one that’s trying to sneak into my 5-year-old-son’s mind through the back. I can prepare him (and myself) for one of those attacks, but not the other.
This was the fact that troubled me most about Nick Park’s recent feature-length Wallace and Gromit cartoon. The original shorts were wonderfully funny, and also wonderfully clean. The Were-Rabbit was wonderfully funny, but had lost a great deal of its innocence: a real shame. Animation in particular seems to be suffering from this problem - the medium that is most geared to kids. Troubling for parents to see, especially when it seems to be mirroring so many other societal trends downward. But I digress…
Second, why should we assume that corporate interests will correctly recognize what we’re doing, even if it does succeed? It seems likely to me that any serious and unexpected success in Hedge’s opening could have several different effects. It could serve as a sign to Hollywood that Catholics have decided to stop putting up with all the anti-Catholic trash that is inundating them so regularly.
Or - (and I must admit that I find this at least as likely, if not more so) - it will serve as yet more evidence that CGI cartoons are huge money makers. The studios have completely missed the key to Pixar’s success for years. It’s story, not style. But they seem to think that 2D animation is dead, and 3D stuff is gold. Why should we assume that they’ll get the point we want them to get, instead of some CGI-tinted one? Couldn’t they instead jump on the idea if a Hedge sequel? And then we’d have created a monster…
And third, I have a strategic objection to the very notion of using a boycott in this case. Boycotting is a bit like laying siege to a castle: it’s really only something you want to do if you are sure it’s going to work. Setting out from your fortress with your entire army, only to discover that the city you are besieging is 10 times your strength is a fatal strategic blunder. And I feel like we may be doing this here.
I remember the attempted Disney boycott some years ago. There was a lot of talk about it in Christian circles. We worked ourselves up to a fever-pitch, and rushed out to lay siege to Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. But when we arrived at the gates of Disneyland, we discovered that we were all alone. Our “army” was ourselves. As a result, Disney did not feel it in the least. They were unmoved, and could spend the rest of their time tossing insults over the castle walls at us, John Cleese-style.
I can’t get around the feeling this is likely to “succeed” the same way. Setting ourselves up for a failure isn’t strategic; it’s fool-hardy. Personally, I am convinced that Hollywood is a missionary field. And I am convinced that we can get through to “them.” But I don’t think that shooting ourselves in the foot just as we start to get a foothold makes much sense. Hollywood is all about reputation. And I’m not sure we want to be seen as “loveable losers” just yet.
So, we’ve moved from cosmetic disagreements to strategic ones. That’s not really getting at any “core” principles, but I feel like we’re getting closer. On to Part Three, for those that are still listening.
I will address Barbara directly here, if I might. Familiarity makes me bold. (It also breeds contempt, but I hope I can avoid giving Ms. Nicolosi any more cause for that. I suspect I’ve provided her with quite enough ammunition in that regard already.)
On being irriitable and dismissive…. I always have to work on this. Being caught between a contemporary Church mired ignorantly in ugliness, and a contemproary Hollywood dripping with self-righteous, insane agenda, is a constant provocation to frustration. And we haven’t even gotten started on irony as a weapon. (So, for example, should I learn not to be irritable and dismissive from your comments just below about Tim Robbins? If you’re gonna dish it out…)
Ouch. Hoisted on my own petard. Perhaps the “irritable and dismissive” comment could have been put a bit differently. And I could certainly have chosen a more prudent antecedent post. I probably have a Tim Robbins-shaped blind spot as well as a Barb-shaped one. Only difference is, I want to keep the Robbins one. If I never, ever see him quoted again, it will be too soon.
But a few thoughts in defense of my harshness: Several mutual acquaintances of ours assure me that I’m being unfair in my assessment. And I suspect they’re right. It’s a flaw of mine; I like to make snap judgments based on insufficient information, and then hang on to them for dear life. But, I have only your written work to go on here, and that does strike me as frequently both irritable and dismissive.
THIS sort of thing seems counter-productive, even if it is intended as irony. Of course, that might be to assume that you were actually responding to the particular e-mail, rather than trying to use it as an example - which would probably be warping the purpose of that post a bit. You clearly say: “All kidding with my mailbag aside.” And then move on to a very important point.
However, I think you could make that important point without running the risk of sending people packing before they get to the finale. Might be an issue of how much you’re preaching to the crowd, and how much you’re trying to proselytize. If the former is your goal, irony could play a much bigger part. But do you want to limit yourself to that audience? I suspect not. And as someone who wants to agree with what you’re saying, I frequently find myself tempted to click away before I reach that pot of gold.
Again, that is largely a matter of style and of scope. Perhaps you see your blog as I see mine – as a sort of safe-haven from the real world. Perhaps it is something you write primarily for your friends, and the ironic style could certainly fit with such a purpose. (I only need to look at my own political posts to see an example of just such a style and purpose.) But the attentions of interlopers such as myself could well be unavoidable for someone with your stature. A heavy price to pay for fame, perhaps - but also something to keep in mind. I do feel that you could reach some of us “recalcitrant souls” with a slightly lower level of irony…
The general defense you (and our mutual acquaintances) give in your defense is completely unassailable, though. I’m simply not in your shoes. The fact is that you are in the front lines of a battle I can only imagine fighting. And I can well imagine how tired and depressed you feel from time to time. Would I react the same way in your situation? Quite likely. Would it be justified? Also likely. Would it be effective? That’s a bit harder for me to see. But finally, I find it much easier to just lob stones from over here in my glass house.
Ms. Barbara Nicolosi - founder of ACT ONE and host of the CHURCH OF THE MASSES blog - found my LINK on her Othercott suggestion. Her comments are interesting, and I think deserve a bit more attention. I don’t find my opinion changed just yet, and I doubt I will alter her thoughts much - but a bit more discussion would help clear up my thinking on the matter, at least. And it might help me discover just exactly what my position is. I’m hoping I have a consistent one. (And I apologize in advance for the great length. Once I find a soapbox and get going, there’s no stopping me)
But before I start, I have two quick details to cover.
First, and probably most importantly, I am not a priest. Internet anonymity can be a good thing, and it’s something I actually want most of the time. But it can also lead to unhelpful misperceptions. In my rare brushes with electronic fame, I have felt compelled to mention the ORIGINS of my internet persona. Ms. Nicolosi will instantly recognize the reference, I am sure. And though it will probably reduce the authority of my arguments a good bit, the “Father” is something I can only hide behind when people know my “alter ego” - or at least know that I have one. Otherwise, it’s just not fair. (I once got into an argument about the Church’s position on the death penalty and the war. You can imagine what sort of impact the “Father” had on that conversation.)
Second, I have been fairly harsh with Ms. Nicolosi in the past. (Another thing made much easier by internet anonymity, I might add.) As I once observed to a friend of mine, I agree with her nearly 100% in general and nearly 0% in the particulars. As a result, I have often prefaced my comments to her links in ways that are fairly unflattering. The particular post she responded to is a good example of what I’m talking about, as is my tendency to call her The Barb - though that is meant to be at least partially complimentary.
But her response to my post was neither irritable nor dismissive. Some of that could have been connected to the “Father” misunderstanding, I suppose. But certainly not all of it. So I feel compelled to correct myself a bit. Well-played, Barbara. I appreciate very much the fact that you were able to overlook my own personal animosity to get at my point. I will strive to follow your example. And I look forward to having my opinion of you completely destroyed in the near future. Nothing would give me greater pleasure.
And now, further up and further in!
