Anker, Roy M. Grand Rapids, MI: William B.
Eerdmans, 2005. 402
+ x pp. $28.99 (CAD). ISBN: 0-8028-2795-0.
[1] Among the numerous books published in recent years
on the subject of God—or religion—and film, Roy
Anker’s Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies stands
apart as a work thoughtfully researched, well written, and
thoroughly respectful of the film as a work of art. While
some other works in this area fall short by either letting
theology determine the reading of the film or by allowing the
film to determine one’s theology, Anker successfully
avoids both pitfalls, holding both his theology and the work
of art in delicate balance.
[2] Catching Light “looks for God” (from
a Christian framework) in nineteen films produced over the
past thirty years, and takes his cue from Frederick Buechner’s Telling
the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy and Fairy Tale (Harper
San Francisco, 1977); Anker discusses the films in four parts,
three of which correspond to Buechner’s categories. Part
one explores the reality of evil and darkness in life, the “Tragedy
of the Gospel.” Anker here presents cinematic stories
in which the “evil devises avenues of destruction by
personal, social, and cultural means” (20). He
points to The Godfather trilogy, Chinatown, and The
Deer Hunter as prime examples of stories in which evil
wins and the reality of evil in the world cannot be avoided.
[3] Light finally breaks through the darkness in the
narratives discussed in part two. Here, films with a
specifically Christian understanding “of the necessity
of Light for human well-being and understanding of life’s
mysteries” (119) are given a thorough and fair treatment. Tender
Mercies, Places in the Heart, The Mission,
and Babette’s Feast are presented as films that
declare that light can and does break through; the “Comedy
of the Gospel.”
[4] Part three shifts emphasis to films with more of
a fairytale feel. A discussion of the first three Star
Wars films produced, Superman, and three different
Steven Speilberg films serve to highlight the otherworldliness
of the Gospel. Anker describes these films: “A
farther stage of the comedy of Christian grace is the radical
surprise of the fairy tale, what is here called ‘fables
of light’. . . As narrative, these stories inhabit territory
somewhere between parable and fable. . . ” (215). He
claims that from films of this genre come “not only the
most popular stories of our time, but also some of the most
potent religious stories of modern culture” (217).
[5] Anker titles his final section “Found.” While
films discussed in part two arise out of a decidedly Christian
framework, and the characters within the cinematic world are
able to see their situations from within this framework, films
in part four are markedly different. Still exploring
the theme of light breaking into darkness, the difference for
films such as Grand Canyon, American Beauty, and Three
Colors: Blue, is that when there is an inbreaking of grace
upon the characters’ worlds, “they don’t
know what to make of it because the culture no longer provides
either a fetching or cogent religious prism for viewing their
experience” (315). The end result in these films
is that “all these folks come to realize what in their
lostness has found them” (316).
[6] Anker, an English professor at Calvin College, understands
his subject well. His thorough research of these films,
as well as his enthusiasm for the cinematic medium, comes across
in his writing. Having taught on the subject since 1988,
Anker has compiled an impressive amount of material and insight
on God and the movies. The book is littered with small
excurses that provide information on each film: screenwriter,
director, principal actors, Academy Award nominations and wins,
as well as other films by the same writer or director. Further,
abundant information is given about the DVD editions of various
films, highlighting the quality of special features and the
insight brought to the discussion by filmmaker commentaries. Finally,
Anker provides interesting and important side discussions on
subjects such as “Film as Visual Medium,” “Film
and Reality,” and “George Lucas and Religion.”
[7] Catching Light differs from other books of
a similar genre in that Anker has chosen a wide variety of
films for conversation. He has not chosen the most popular
films, films which have been over-discussed, or even new films. Even
in his treatment of movies which have found places in other
volumes, such as Babette’s Feast or Star Wars,
Anker’s insight and wit keep the discussion fresh, consistently
bringing something new to the table (his chapter on Babette’s
Feast is one of the best written). His commentary
on each film is exciting; for example, from his chapter on The
Deer Hunter: “Nick, lost in a psycho-spiritual catatonia
resembling nothing akin to an actual human condition of insanity
or perdition, fails to recognize him. Nick’s existential
state is, within the film’s terms, pure metaphor for
what it means to be ensnared by and swallowed up in the powers
of death. His condition is pure anti-life, the furthest
pole from what he most valued before he ran head-on into the
blasphemy of war and Russian roulette” (110). While
at times the reader may feel as if Anker is over-narrating
the film, his narration is done well.
[8] In the book’s introduction Anker makes the
claim that cinema’s “greatest significance and
promise lies in its capacity to “shed light” on
the world it portrays, to see that world for what it is, illuminating
its perils, sorrows, and delights—and how all these tangle
together” (3). Showing the reader how film does
this, and how these films in particular do this, is this book’s
great strength. I highly recommend Catching Light to
anyone interested in film and theology studies.
Casey Barton
Emmanuel College, Toronto School of Theology
caseybarton@gmail.com
