Catholic Exchange is running a good review of Ben Stein’s new documentary Expelled:

An excerpt:

I confess that when the producers of Ben Stein’s new documentary Expelled called, offering me a private screening, I was less than excited.

It is a reality of PC liberalism: There is only one credible side to an issue, and any dissent is not only rejected, it is scorned. Global warming. Gay “rights.” Abortion “rights.” On these and so many other issues there is enlightenment, and then there is the Idiotic Other Side. PC liberalism’s power centers are the news media, the entertainment industry and academia and all are in the clutches of an unmistakable hypocrisy: Theirs is an ideology that preaches the freedom of thought and expression at every opportunity, yet practices absolute intolerance toward dissension.

Evolution is another one of those one-sided debates. We know the concept of Intelligent Design is stifled in academic circles. An entire documentary to state the obvious? You can see my reluctance to view it.

I went into the screening bored. I came out of it stunned.

Full article here: Ben Stein vs. Sputtering Atheists

Am currently embarked on Bridget-Jones’s-Diary-induced Pride & Prejudice kick. Have watched BBC television version of P & P twice in the past two days. Have crush on Colin Firth and therefore cannot bring self to watch new theatrical version of P & P starring some other actor as Mr. Darcy. I beg you to forgive me, but am unable to speak normally due to excessive influence of Bridget Jones diary-speak and 19th century British diction. Are you not exceedingly diverted?

Related articles:
Bridget Jones’s Diary and the Theology of the Body

Juxtaposition Review: Bridget Jones’s Diary and Children of Men

I wrote recently about Helen Fielding’s novel Bridget Jones’s Diary (”Juxtaposition Review: Bridget Jones’s Diary and Children of Men“) and after reading the book I didn’t think I would enjoy the movie adaptation of Bridget Jones at all, so I put off watching it, with no real plans to do so.

However, I was at the library the other day and it was there, so I checked it out and watched it.

I was pleasantly surprised.

Don’t get me wrong: the movie is definitely not for children or even for teens. Like the book, it’s very very funny (especially if you enjoy British humor) but it’s vulgar, loaded with profanity, contains somewhat explicit sexual references and images and, on its surface, presents a view of human sexuality that is opposed to the Catholic understanding of it. For these reasons I probably wouldn’t recommend it for most adults, frankly.

Except for the fact that it is a pretty good fictional explication of John Paul II’s Theology of the Body.

“Huh?” you say.

As I was watching it, I kept thinking of Christopher West’s image of the dumpster versus the banquet. JP II says in Theology of the Body that men and women long for communion–true communion with one another and especially and ultimately with God. We are wired to long for that communion–the hope of Heaven. We are starving for love and connectedness.

Christopher West says that the modern world presents to love-starved men and women a vision of human sexuality that is equivalent to leading a food-starved person to a dumpster and telling him that’s as good as it gets. Modern sex–hooking up, shacking up, and so on–is dumpster diving. It is rubbish fed to people so desperate for love that they’ll settle for anything.

The Catholic Church, on the other hand, presents love-starved men and women with a banquet of true love and connectedness in the practice of chaste married love and the understanding that all human love is a mere glimpse into the perfect communion of Heaven.

Bridget Jones is a stand-in for all men and women: she doesn’t want to be alone. She longs for connection. Daniel Cleaver is the dumpster. Mark Darcy is the banquet. Early in the movie, Bridget dives head first into the dumpster, gorges herself on garbage, and thinks she’s happy this way. The banquet is always there, in view. At first she can’t see it for what it truly is (the “sin makes you stupid” concept. Hat tip to Mark Shea.) but eventually she comes to see that the banquet is what she was really longing for.

To perceive this TOTB angle in a movie like Bridget Jones, you must be able to forgive quite a lot of vulgarity and crudity, but TOTB is there, and I’m glad for it–this was an extremely popular movie, so apparently a lot of people were exposed to the positive message that the dumpster does not satisfy and they should keep looking for “something extraordinary.”

The performances were excellent. I’ve seen the movie several times now and the principal actors are “something extraordinary,” especially Colin Firth, who plays Mark Darcy–the banquet. A subtle and fascinating performance.

Definitely not saying you should all go rent it and watch it. It might be offensive. The happy ending to the story is that instead of fornicating with the insufferable prat Daniel Cleaver, Bridget will now proceed to fornicate with the good man Mark Darcy. Oh well. That’s the way modern stories portray it. Perhaps the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice, upon which Fielding based her novel, would be a better choice because it ends with the heroine marrying the right guy. (Firth plays Darcy in that one, too–LOL!)

Other than The Passion of the Christ and Jesus of Nazareth, I mean.

A great movie for the whole family to watch together sometime during Holy Week is The Prince of Egypt. I first saw this movie with my family in the theatre on Holy Saturday, 1998. That was quite an experience. It has some cartoonish elements, like the Egyptian priests and an outlandish chariot race, but overall it is a respectful and moving treatment of the story of Moses.

The direct-to-video sequel, Joseph: King of Dreams is actually quite good also.

Epic Stories of the Bible is a series of animated motion pictures released by Promenade Pictures. Twelve movies are in the works, and first one, available now, is The Ten Commandments. Voice talent on this one includes Ben Kingsley (Narrator), Christian Slater (Moses), Alfred Molina (Ramses), Elliott Gould (God). The screenwriter also wrote the screenplay for Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. I haven’t seen this one but I heard it was good.

Promenade Pictures
founded 2003
produces family films with Judeo-Christian themes
Frank Yablans (formerly of Paramount and MGM)

the next planned films
Noah’s Ark
David and Goliath

Feel free to weigh in with your recommendations!

Just watched The Shop Around the Corner tonight with the kids, the 1940 movie with James Stewart and Margaret Sullavan, upon which You’ve Got Mail was based.

Funny! Very good. Possibly problematic: an off-screen (and unsuccessful) suicide attempt, and an extramarital affair that also occurs entirely off-screen. Less problematic than the co-habitation (and understood fornication) that takes place in YGM.

We all enjoyed it.

Family Friendly Flicks: A New Option for Parents Renting DVDs
http://www.catholicexchange.com/node/69038

http://catholicinfilmschool.stblogs.com/

Good stuff. People of faith need to do more than boycott movies that offend our beliefs. People of faith need to go to film school, learn how to make movies, and get involved in a segment of the popular culture that has been too long without the influence of Christians.

More on this topic:

Barbara Nicolosi’s blog: Church of the Masses
http://churchofthemasses.blogspot.com/

Go to the website of Relevant Radio:
www.relevantradio.com
…and go to the archives section. You have to sign in to get to the archives page. Then go to the archives page for Morning Air, where they have a one-hour segment with Rod Bennett, who talks about “It’s a Wonderful Life”, based on an article he wrote for Godspy called “The Gospel According the Frank Capra.” Towards the end of the interview he basically says that during the Golden Age of movies, the great moviemakers were all Catholics (Capra, Hitchcock, others). Worth a listen. Hurry, though, because they only keep the archives up for a couple weeks after the show airs. This interview aired December 19th, 2007.