Movies

Sierre Leone has allowed itself to be torn apart by the discovery and cultivation of diamonds. The movie allows the viewer to decide for themselves whether the writers are really trying to blame the resulting violence on the people in far away countries for buying the diamonds. Some of the characters certainly do try and make that point, and sometimes even take the typical Hollywood / liberal "Blame America First" approach. But the writers also allow you to feel - as I did - that the story is a poignant example of how third world countries really do become and stay that way.

It is abject ignorance and base stupidity that allows the locals in Sierre Leon to take what could have been a boon to their quality of life and turn it into an excuse for civil war. This they do in their own country, where their families eat and sleep. Even dogs know better than to defecate where they eat. Sorry if that sounds insensitive to those of you who are politically-correct, but making excuses for them that do not address the roots of their problem has not helped them, so how compassionate is the politically-correct approach, really?

Faced with the conscious choice on the part of many in Sierre Leon to create trouble - whether driven by political corruption that is the usual source of misery in such places, or by ignorant greed at the individual and tribal level - I have my typically hard time blaming their in-house troubles on a blushing bride on the other side of the world who likes having a nice ring from her husband-to-be. Their desire for their pricey product is an opportunity for Sierre Leon to evolve beyond sustenance living and to share the kind of quality of life that they envy and blame others for not having. Then they blame the first world for their troubles, and many of the people in the first world buy into the blame game because they have allowed themselves to be made to feel guilty for not sharing in the squalor of a lesser-educated society that insists on remaining backwards despite opportunities to advance themselves.

But countries like Sierre Leon squander this opportunity and then have the nerve to blame those who provided the opportunity in the first place - all in the name of jealousy...not even realizing that they have made their own bed for sleeping in. Again...pure ignorance. And the movie, as I said before, is a model for how third world countries become so and stay that way. Bravo.

Certainly not all of the people there can be blamed for the troubles, but that fact doesn't make the source of their opportunity (i.e. the First World that created the demand) any more culpable.

Having said that, if I were in the market for a diamond and had some way of knowing which diamonds came from such troubles, I would probably choose to buy a different one, just as I would not have bought "slave salt" in the time of slavery in England when that boycott was being effected. The trouble with "blood diamonds," however, is that the structure of the world diamond market makes it impossible to know which ones are produced from the troubles. If something can be done outside Sierre Leon, perhaps it is to change that.

The Da Vinci Code: As a piece of movie-making, it's beautifully done...as you would expect from any Ron Howard film. Having said that...well, it's WAY too late in the evening to really tackle this one...but there are a couple of glaring problems that are easily and quickly dispatched.

I know it's just pop religion, at best...but a lot of people get their theology from such sources. Even they probably know they shouldn't, but in our Jerry Springer, "gotta-have-a-picture-of-Bradgelina-with-the-new-baby-at-the-mall" culture, it can become, well...gospel (but with a little "g").

I only had one real problem with the movie - that the entire premise is flawed. That's all.

In the story, the church runs around killing people in order to hide it's biggest secret...that Jesus Christ was married and had a child. In the writer's view, all of this would somehow mean Christ wasn't Divine after all, and the church doesn't want anyone to know it. Apparently, in the view of the writer, doing something mortal like being a dad means that you're too much like everyone else to be God. What he's missing (aside from the fact that His whole reason for coming here in the first place was an intentional act of "human-ness") is that the proof of Christ's Divinity is not to be found in his celibacy. The proof was and is in all the age-old prophesies He fulfilled and the final Proof provided in the Resurrection that was witnessed by over 500 people. Jesus walking around after being CONFIRMED dead.

The movie does start to address what they think about Christ's miracles when Tom Hanks' character says "why couldn't he have been a father and done all those miracles." But elsewhere in the movie he also says that the only thing Christ is proven to have done is a bunch of good things and a few miracles. In this line he very conspicuously doubts the Resurrection by omitting it. Yet the same standard of proof for the miracles Hanks and the writer "concede to" is the standard of proof for the Resurrection as well! ....word of mouth from eyewitnesses.

On this note...some people have said that Christ should have come later - when mankind could more irrefutably document the miracles and the Resurrection. But if He had, then the same cynics among us would say that it was all done with "special effects." It would seem that a simpler time actually lent itself better to proof of these miracles. Of course, one could also say that the magicians of the day could have also pulled off such an illusion...and they'd be partly right. Magicians are mentioned in the time of Moses. In Pharaoh's court, these guys could duplicate many of Moses' miracles...and the Bible Itself acknowledges their ability to turn sticks into serpents right after Moses did. Miracles alone are not the source of Faith...if they were, then God would have to come to each of us individually and perform a magic show so that we wouldn't have to take the whole thing on someone else's word. Well, my friend, what kind of a small god would feel compelled to song and dance for us? Who is the god in that model?

Again, the ultimate miracle was the Resurrection. No one else has ever done that. Pretty good trick, actually. We are WAY beyond sticks and snakes here. Even David Copperfield couldn't pull that off, I'm pretty sure.

I guess that's where Faith comes in. Anything could be chalked up to some "rational explanation" if you try (and reach) hard enough. I'm going to digress for a moment and give you an example of what I mean by people reaching in an attempt to take God out of the picture. We are told by many that the Universe, with all it's complexity, was formed out of nothing into everything and just all fell into place. Can you imagine tossing the materials for paper, glue and ink together into the air and it all coming back together as a Webster's Unabridged Dictionary with all the spellings, definitions, and alphabetizing in place?? Impossible, no matter how many monkeys do the tossing - or for how long. That example doesn't even touch the complexity and organization of the Universe, and yet people find a way to believe that such a thing MIGHT be possible over enough time. In my dictionary, that defines "reaching." And I won't even go into the fact that the atoms for the glue and ink in my metaphor weren't even around yet...nor the monkeys to toss it all into the air...or the fact that the law of entropy says that things erode - not improve - over time. But let me get back on point, we'll tackle all of that somewhere else when it's not so late.

What makes the Message of Christ all come together as Divine is the unity of the message; all the prophesies that DETAILED Christ's life since the beginning of time, through EVERY book of the Bible, and via so many different authors...plus the Resurrection. Put it ALL together, and you see the Truth form. At that point, only cynicism can harden your heart to the Truth of it all. Being a skeptic is obviously okay with God, or He wouldn't feel the need to offer Proofs and Prophesies at all. He knows our logical nature, because He created it. A skeptic becomes a cynic when he remains doubtful AFTER something has been proven to him. The proofs are strung all through the Bible, there to see for anyone to read and verify for themselves - anyone, that is, who isn't trying REALLY HARD to be a cynic. Many of history's best (eventual) apologists FOR Faith started out as skeptics - trying to DISprove the Bible. But they found Faith in the process because they were not cynics.

I definitely see the logic God has used in providing prophesies - for Christ's Life as well as so many other things. Without prophesies, one could justifiably wonder why certain books are included in the Bible and others are not....and you could easily think that each book was corruptible because they are man made. The prophesies weed out the imposters, show the world that God won't allow His message to be corrupted, and give credibility to both the books and the people in them - Christ the Chief among them. God has a long tradition of partnering with man to make things - like the Bible - happen. And He's competent enough (go figure) to make sure that our imperfections don't spoil the mix. Part of the reason He partners with us, is to further prove His involvement in the process...because it's hard to credit flawed mankind with the kind of miracles and prophesies, signs, and wisdom in the Bible. It's the same logic that led Christ to choose simple fisherman - rather than Bible scholars - to be His disciples. If He had chosen scholars, the world could have placed more credit for the ministry on the men - rather than on Christ. 

And Christ is what it is all about - the Da Vinci Code notwithstanding. For more on this subject, head to The Summit

Movie Review (Don't read this if you haven't seent it): The 40 Year Old Virgin with Steve Carell and Katherine Keener. Funny that it has such a great - even Christian - message embedded in so much profanity and vulgar humor. If you can get past that, you'll see that the main character was presented not as a loser for being a virgin at 40. He was the most emotionally healthy among his group of promiscuous friends, and he gave his fiancé' the best compliment a woman can receive when he said that "All this time, I was just waiting for you." They also make the point that - because of his abstinence - she can know that he wants her for her, and not just what he can get from her body. Further, in a scene where he and his fiancé' almost have sex, the writers even seem to go out of their way to point out that she only has condoms in the house from "when she was married."

Finally, they even highlight his example to his fiancé's teenage daughter (from the previous marriage) as she struggles with whether or not to have sex with her boyfriend. That says a lot about how single parents can't rightly expect sexual responsibility from their children if they are not setting the example themselves. In the end, the two main characters don't even have sex until they get married. Amazing for Hollywood! Great message, and I laughed out loud all through it - vulgar or not. The "Official" Movie Site

My Favorite Movies

Rocky 1-3: Yes, probably my favorite movies. I'd say most of my favorite flix feature a theme of striving to achieve a lofty goal, and Rocky is the all time greatest of such stories. The first three movies are inspiring and well-written, the fourth is good but not as much so, and the fifth is unwatchable.

Raising Arizona: THE funiest movie ever made! You've gotta' like DRY deadpan delivery to get the comedy, but it's the most qoutable movie I can think of. Every character is perfect.

The Lord of the Rings: Creator / Director Peter Jackson has done probably the best service possible to the people who love the books. He was true to them in every possible detail, and the imagery he created is worthy of Tolkein, who (while I am not a fantasy genre reader) is certainly among the greatest story tellers to have ever lived.

You're not allowed to be a soldier these days without having seen this movie. Fantastic docu-drama about some of the heroes of WWII. All the stories in this mini series are not only historically accurate - they are augmented by interviews with many of the actual soldiers who are being portrayed.

Napoleon Dynamite: I didn't expect to like this movie so much. I thought it would be brainless...and it was! Turns out that was what was so great about it. Uber dry, terrific deadpan humor. It's basically about a high school student in Idaho. I hesitate to call him a loser, but there it is. No way to describe this movie...you just have to see it for yourself. Minimal plot. Just funny. Amazingly, it's an MTV production that accomplishes all that it does without resorting at all to nudity, profanity, or raunch. Go now to the Official Napolean Website

Forest, Forest Gump: Tom Hanks is one of my favorite actors, and he does a great job portraying this character who has a genuine-ness to which we could all aspire.