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Post by Soulfyre on Oct 26, 2004 12:27:04 GMT -5
Let's discuss the art of filmmaking from the Christian perspective. Do all Christian films have to “preach the gospel”, or can the Christian framework be more subtle? Are their topics with which a Christian, in good conscience, cannot work? What consitutes Christian flimmaking? How has the availability of reasonably sophisticated filmmaking tools to computer users affected the production of films? I'm looking for a Christian filmmaker to moderate here and interact with us. I'm sure the questions would be many! God bless and keep you all, Matthew (soulfyre)
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Post by Soulfyre on Jan 29, 2005 11:06:11 GMT -5
One of the great mysteries to me is the modern emphasis on "gritty realism" to which most modern cinematographers rely, in which foul language, bloody and violent carnage, and sexual scenes that would have once been considered pornagraphic, are now considered de rigeur. Movies throw in gratuitous violence, obscenity, and sex in an effort to receive that much desired PG-13 or R rating, which, it is assumed, is a guarantor of box office receipts. Now don't get me wrong. The Passion had scenes of extreme violence. Nevertheless I can, to some extent, understand its necessity for educational value, since few Christians in the United States, with perhaps the exception of those in the black church (some of whose members have a memory of the abuses that occurred as a result of slavery, and then again as part of a Jim Crow system), had any clear understanding of the terrible price Jesus Christ paid for our redemption. Even the impact of scenes like the landing at Omaha Beach in Saving Private Ryan had a grim appropriateness to a generation unaware of the sacrifices made by the Greatest Generation, as they have come to be known. But these lose their impact in an industry so swathed in blood and gore that scarcely a film goes by where some scene of graphic violence is not used for its "impact" value. In fact, even modern news coverage of military conflict seems vaguely unreal, like a Hollywood movie. Nowadays, one wonders how acting greats like Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, and James Cagney could play characters of great menace without resort to profanity and graphic violence. What about Katherine Hepburn, who managed to play liberated women of great personal presence without resorting to hints of lesbian activity and language that would make a sailor blush? And how did Rock Hudson and Doris Day possibly manage all of those vaguely naughty films without the inevitable steamy sexual sequences and rampant nudity common today. And romance? Positively sterile. Why, Rhett Butler and Scarlet O'Hara were not even shown having sex! Nowadays, Clark Gable would have said a good deal more than "damn", and Vivian Leigh would have graphically displayed her seductive prowess with each man in the crew, and possibly a few of the women. And rather than hearing Butterfly McQueen saying "I don't know nuthin' bout birthin' no babies," we would have seen the entire process on screen. And what about poor Alfred Hitchcock, whose scenes of mayhem in the shower in Psycho would now elicit mild boredom and perhaps the chuckle or two or amusement? Yes, Hollywood has come...or rather, GONE...a long way. What should we be doing as Christians? Should we start avoiding movies with anything over a PG rating like the plague, and walk out of movie theatres to demand our money back at the first scene of Holywood malfeasance? Should Christians not only actively return to movie houses (in spite of their expense) when they hear of truly good family fare? Should Christian businessmen begin to actively invest in the production of more true family fare, both on the big screen and on the small? What do you think we can do, other than close our eyes and mouth and hold our noses, clinging with desperation to our Lord as the moral detritous of society washes over us like a tsunami, and vaguley hope that we can live the odor of the decaying flesh of the victims of this assault on life itself? God bless and keep you, Matthew (soulfyre)
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