{"id":164,"date":"2011-02-03T05:18:12","date_gmt":"2011-02-03T05:18:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html"},"modified":"2011-02-03T05:18:12","modified_gmt":"2011-02-03T05:18:12","slug":"red-state-targets-a-violently","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html","title":{"rendered":"Faith, religion and the Sundance Film Festival"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sundancing around faith.<\/b> Writing in First Things<\/a>, Anthony Sacramone makes some excellent points about how the presentation of faith and religion has changed over the years.
Citing an article in the LA Times<\/a> about faith-themed movies screened at Robert Redford’s Sundance Film Festival, Sacramone notes how movie makers have gone from giving us faith-inspired movies like 1943’s The Song of Bernadette<\/i><\/a> and 1944’s Academy Award-winning Going My Way<\/i><\/a> to the list of faith-themed (if not inspired) films screened at this year’s Sundance (a name, BTW, which calls to mind Native American religion).
On paper at least, they appear to be the product of a much more cynical age than the one that brought movies like Bernadette <\/i>and characters like Father O’Malley<\/a>. Most of them, that I’m aware of, don’t sound particularly concerned with inspiring audiences to seek solace in religion.<\/p>\n

What do you think?<\/p>\n

Higher Ground<\/i><\/b><\/a> – Based on This Dark World, <\/em>Carolyn Biggs’ memoir of “one woman’s immersion into Fundamentalist faith and her decision, 20 years later, to leave it all behind.”<\/a><\/i>
The Ledge<\/i><\/b><\/a> – described as a ticking-clock thriller about a suicidal man that leads to an exploration of the true meaning and faith and forgiveness. The film, reportedly with “understanding rather than judgment,”<\/i><\/a> warns against ‘”the consequences of a too-literal
\ninterpretation of religious texts.”<\/a><\/i>  I’d actually like to see this one.  
Red State<\/i><\/b><\/a> –  Writer\/director Kevin Smith’s story of a violent and homophobic pastor.
Salvation Boulevard<\/i><\/b><\/a> – A dark comedy starring Pierce Brosnan as televangelist involved in a gun accident. 
Tyrannosaur<\/i><\/b><\/a> – Writer\/director Paddy Considine’s film about an embittered alcoholic man (Peter Mullan) and his relationship with a Christian charity shop worker. Of his film religious theme, Considine says “I do think
\ntoo many people are worried about an existential thought instead of the
\nhere and now. They’re thinking ‘What do I do to get into heaven?’
\ninstead of asking, ‘What can I do to make my life better with my fellow
\nman?'”  <\/i>(Considine actually has a bit of a point there but, on the other hand, positive faith enhances concern for other people. It would be nice to see that more often reflected in current movies.)<\/p>\n

However, if you’re really looking for old-fashioned movies with conservative values, Christian Toto writing for Big Hollywood<\/a> suggests romantic comedies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sundancing around faith. Writing in First Things, Anthony Sacramone makes some excellent points about how the presentation of faith and religion has changed over the years.Citing an article in the LA Times about faith-themed movies screened at Robert Redford’s Sundance Film Festival, Sacramone notes how movie makers have gone from giving us faith-inspired movies like…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":225,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,12,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-catholic-church","category-christianity","category-movies"],"yoast_head":"\nFaith, religion and the Sundance Film Festival - Catholics Media and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Faith, religion and the Sundance Film Festival - Catholics Media and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Sundancing around faith. Writing in First Things, Anthony Sacramone makes some excellent points about how the presentation of faith and religion has changed over the years.Citing an article in the LA Times about faith-themed movies screened at Robert Redford’s Sundance Film Festival, Sacramone notes how movie makers have gone from giving us faith-inspired movies like…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Catholics Media and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-02-03T05:18:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"John W. Kennedy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Faith, religion and the Sundance Film Festival - Catholics Media and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Faith, religion and the Sundance Film Festival - Catholics Media and Culture","og_description":"Sundancing around faith. Writing in First Things, Anthony Sacramone makes some excellent points about how the presentation of faith and religion has changed over the years.Citing an article in the LA Times about faith-themed movies screened at Robert Redford’s Sundance Film Festival, Sacramone notes how movie makers have gone from giving us faith-inspired movies like…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html","og_site_name":"Catholics Media and Culture","article_published_time":"2011-02-03T05:18:12+00:00","author":"John W. Kennedy","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html","name":"Faith, religion and the Sundance Film Festival - Catholics Media and Culture","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/#website"},"datePublished":"2011-02-03T05:18:12+00:00","dateModified":"2011-02-03T05:18:12+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/e5d5ef9caeb6b01bcbf08ca6de6591c2"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/2011\/02\/red-state-targets-a-violently.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Faith, religion and the Sundance Film Festival"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/","name":"Catholics Media and Culture","description":"Catholic Church News and More","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/e5d5ef9caeb6b01bcbf08ca6de6591c2","name":"John W. Kennedy","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/d80\/d801bc09698c0995d9ae402b4b55ab61x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/d80\/d801bc09698c0995d9ae402b4b55ab61x96.jpg","caption":"John W. Kennedy"},"description":"John W. Kennedy is the founder and Dir. of Development of The Creative Universe Entertainment\u2122, a media consultation and development company focusing on the creation, development and support of high-quality mainstream entertainment that upholds positive timeless values, including trust in God. Current projects include \"Bryant Park\" (an uplifting romantic-comedy) and \"Photo Finish\" (an award-winning sci-fi TV pilot). He has written over 100 children's novels based on episodes of the Cartoon Network series \"Ben 10\", \"Ben 10: Alien Force\", \"Ben 10: Ultimate Alien\", \"Ben 10: Omniverse\" and \"Generator Rex\" among others. He also writes Beliefnet\u2019s \"Faith, Media & Culture\" blog. Previously, he has produced successful news and talk programming for CNN, Fox News, Pax TV and SiriusXM. Specialties: Script Writing, Movie\/TV Novelizations & Adaptations, TV Content Creation and Development, Creative Consultation, Producing and Booking News and Talk shows. He can be reached for writing, producing and consulting services at 516-640-1182.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/author\/jkennedy"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/225"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/catholicsmediaandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}