Greeley, Andrew M., and Albert J. Bergesen.
Somerset, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2000. 186 pp. $24.95
(USD). ISBN: 0-7658-0528-6.
[1] If we paraphrase St. Anselm of Canterbury
and claim that scholarship is passion toward the object of
study in search of understanding, then this book contributes
handsomely to its field. Both authors admit their passions
up front: they are Christians engaged in their faith (one
a Catholic priest, the other a Protestant), and they love
the movies. Fr. Greeley may annoy some academically-minded
readers with his frequent substitution of anecdote for argument,
but for the patient reader, there is substance beneath the
casualness of his tenor. The book of essays is published by
a respected academic publishing house specialising in the
social sciences, but effectively addresses everyone who has
an interest in the topic, from scholar to student, from the
converted to the agnostic.
[2] The authors stress that books about
popular culture should be written so that their consumers
can understand the arguments. As if to make the point Chicago
Sun Times critic Roger Ebert was invited to make some
introductory comments; perhaps not your typical consumer of
popular culture, but I can think of a number of academic books
on film that would likely leave him cold. And critics are
worth informing about religion in the movies, since most of
them are, claims Greeley, "with happy exceptions, as
religiously illiterate as filmmakers - and even more religiously
insensitive" (89). All of us likely have our own examples
that support this claim. Even Ebert, one of the "happy
exceptions" according to the authors, seems unaware when
writing about Krzysztof Kieslowski's Decalogue Series
of the two different traditions of numbering the Ten Commandments,
and is puzzled by the obvious Catholic ordering that the Polish
filmmaker uses in his artistic rendition of them.
[3] The assumption common to Greeley and
Bergesen is that religion begins in and returns to stories.
It is hardly surprising, then, that David Tracy's Analogical
Imagination inspires their comprehension of the religious
imagination, stressing the importance of metaphors in God-talk.
Bergesen succinctly proffers the thesis of the book: admitting
that interpreting specific films is hazardous, "no one
doubts films reflect basic beliefs, including, we want to
argue, beliefs about the nature of God" (17).
[4] The book reworks a dialogue in which
both authors engaged through teaching a course on religion
and film at the University of Arizona, and dialogic might
be an apt adjective for its organization. Each chapter is
written by a single authorÚthus we have two introductory chapters.
Some of the films are discussed from a different perspective
by each author, etc. Quite appropriately, the effect approaches
that of scriptural parallelism, since occasionally one of
them says one thing and the other subsequently repeats it
in a different version. Nor do the authors attempt to cover
up their infrequent differences; Greeley argues that Jessica
Lange is a metaphor for God in All That Jazz, while
Bergesen sees her as an angel of death.
[5] Although God in the Movies contains
a number of pertinent insights on the source of contemporary
religious metaphors (for instance, the influence of near-death
experience literature), it is the collaboration between two
different sensibilitiesÚCatholic and ProtestantÚthat is in
some ways its most stimulating aspect. Could this interaction
not have been pushed even further? Consider Babette's Feast;
the film itself revolves around the confrontation and mutual
enrichment of the two distinct sensibilities. Yet this aspect
was barely touched upon in the study devoted to it, even though
the authors seem predisposed to such an undertaking. It might
be considered symbolic that, despite "the artistic genius
and theological power" (53) of the Danish film, that
chapter is among the least developed in the book.
[6] A good number of the chapters deal primarily
with individual films, after which approximately a third follow
more thematic issues. The order of these mini-studies is far
from haphazard. The first three concern films that have marked
God metaphors; moreover, these metaphors are primarily feminine.
According to Greeley, this includes not only Jessica Lange
in Fosse's All That Jazz, but Audrey Hepburn in Spielberg's
Always, while Stephane Audran embodies a Christ figure
in Axel's Babette's Feast. The point Greeley makes
here is punctuated throughout the book by the consistent use
of the feminine pronoun for God. Rather than merely an exercise
in political correctness, the strategy seems to be part of
the authors' concerted effort to bring home to their readers
the need for a full range of metaphors to broach the mystery
of the divine.
[7] A brief book can hardly prove whether
the authors' optimism concerning the presence of the religious
imagination in Hollywood film is fully warranted or not. However,
Bergesen and Greeley offer valuable clues as to how we can
conduct our own search and make up our minds for ourselves.
Christopher Garbowski
Maria Curie-Sklodowska University
Lublin, Poland
jacek@klio.umcs.lublin.pl
