“And the Oscar goes to…”
By Brad Thayer February 14, 2006
On Sunday, March 5th, these are the words thousands are going to hear as Hollywood’s biggest night shines in all it’s pomp and show. Being the movie fan that I am (watching a movie is what I enjoy most when I’m exhausted), I can’t ignore the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ five nominations for Best Picture. These nominations paint a moral picture of our culture, a picture that Christians must view through a biblical lens.
First, you have Ang Lee’s much talked about and debated Brokeback Mountain based on E. Annie Prolux’s story of two cowboys who, as Oprah described it, were on the “down-low before it was called such.” (Rate R)
Second, Bennett Miller’s Capote tells the story of the egoistical, homosexual Trueman Capote and his manipulative use of people to complete, what he believes to be, a revolutionizing work, In Cold Blood, a story of how four family members were brutually murdered. (Rated R)
Third, Paul Haggis’ Crash is several stories of multiple characters covering a two day span in the city of Los Angeles. Crash unashamedly deals with “gritty” issue of urban racism as these multiple characters’ lives “crash” into one another. (Rated R)
Fourth, Steven Spielberg’s political divisive, Munich, isn’t a story about the 1972 abduction and murder of eleven Israeli atheletes, but about Avner’s, one of five men recruited by the Israeli government to revenge one by one those responsilbe for the murder, plummet to the depraved level of his enemies. (Rated R)
Fifth, George Clooney looks back at a time of fearful threats from Communism during the 1950’s, particularly the fears of Senator Joseph McCarthy, in Good Night, and Good Luck. Senator McCarthy campaigned a blacklist of Communist sympathizers and spies believed to be working in the State Department and other US governmental services. Good Night and Good Luck depicts CBC’s broadcast journalist, Edward Murrow who popularized the phrase “good nigt and good luck”, challenging McCarthy’s accusations. (Rated PG)
What a moral landscape these movies paint for the viewer - the acceptance of homosexuality, the surreal portrait of narcissism, the injustice of racism, the despair of revenge, and, positively, the conviction for truthfulness. This is Hollywood’s depiction of serious moral issues, issues that the church has a responsibility to respond to. When Oprah says that the “down-low” is “at least complicated”, the church responds, “No, it’s not simply ‘complicated.’ It’s wrong. It’s sinful.”
On Sunday night, March 5th, when Hollywood is boasting in it’s handling of morality, TABC will be praising God who has revealed his will. We won’t look to Hollywood’s standard of acceptance but to the word of God. Our God has righted all wrongs, reconciled all peoples, and revealed all truth in the person of Jesus Christ!
(I nominate Focus on the Family’s movie review for your “favorites” list!)