Category Archives: film

“People just do the strangest things when they believe they’re entitled. But they do even stranger things when they just plain believe.”

Posted on November 4, 2012 by

Guest post by Anastasia McAteer When I turned on Red State (Smith, 2011), my husband, the author of this blog, warned me: “It’s a horror movie. You might be scared.” I wanted to give it a try anyway, since I … Continue reading →

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“Our lives are not our own. From womb to tomb, we are bound to others, past and present.”

Posted on October 31, 2012 by

The Wachowski’s ambitious film Cloud Atlas (2012) doesn’t achieve everything it aims for, but it does achieve a lot of what it wants.  At least I think it does.  Having read the novel by David Mitchell, I’m a little concerned … Continue reading →

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“Your kids are your legacy.”

Posted on October 12, 2012 by

I’m tempted to interpret Sinister (Derrickson, 2012) as Scott Derrickson’s confession about his family life.  (And I’m not the only one to notice the similarities between Derrickson’s life and the film.)  Sinister is a horror movie about a writer named Elliot … Continue reading →

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“Meeting the Savior and the saints face-to-face, we find ourselves in a relationship of communion.”

Posted on August 26, 2012 by

Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 masterpiece The Passion of Joan of Arc is unlike any other movie you’ve ever seen.  It is often said that the film is made up entirely of close ups.  This is a bit of an exaggeration, … Continue reading →

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“It’s what I choose to believe.”

Posted on June 8, 2012 by

At first, faith doesn’t seem to come off very well in Prometheus (Scott, 2012).  The film portrays faith as merely an arbitrary choice.  If there is no evidence, then how do you know there is a God?  You simply choose … Continue reading →

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“I just keep wishing I could think of a way to show them, that they don’t own me.”

Posted on April 14, 2012 by

This spring two strikingly-similarly themed movies were released within three-weeks of each other.  Joss Whedon’s Cabin in the Woods and Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games both tell the story of teenagers who are trapped in an artificially controlled environment to … Continue reading →

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“The nuns taught us there are two ways through life. The way of Nature and the way of Grace.”

Posted on July 21, 2011 by

Whatever else Terrence Malick‘s film The Tree of Life (Malick, 2011) is about, it is clearly about the struggle between Nature and Grace.  The relationship between Nature and Grace is a standard theme discussed by all great Catholic theologians from Augustine to Aquinas … Continue reading →

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“Why must women bear so much?”

Posted on April 30, 2011 by

Medea (von Trier, 1988) is an interesting film in Lars von Trier‘s body of work for at least two reasons.  First, and most strikingly, it was made before von Trier’s turn to his charactaristic style expressed in the Dogme 95 manifesto. … Continue reading →

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“Well, they treated me pretty badly at first, but then they found out I tried to kill a film critic. You know, in Texas, it’s not even a crime.”

Posted on August 2, 2010 by

This week I’m moving from film industry hub Los Angeles to Houston where I will be a college philosophy professor.  In honor of my move, I’m posting my entry for “5ive Things“, a blog sponsored by L.A.’s wonderful public radio … Continue reading →

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“Dreams feel real while we’re in them. It’s only when we wake up that we realize something was actually strange.”

Posted on July 19, 2010 by

Here are some further thoughts about the aparently happy ending of Inception (Nolan, 2010).  (See my previous post for my initial thoughts.) All of Christopher Nolan’s other films are best understood as film noir, with the possible exception of The … Continue reading →

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