{"id":297,"date":"2009-08-25T00:15:00","date_gmt":"2009-08-25T00:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2009\/08\/opus-dei-coming-to-the-screen-again.html"},"modified":"2009-08-25T00:15:00","modified_gmt":"2009-08-25T00:15:00","slug":"opus-dei-coming-to-the-screen-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2009\/08\/opus-dei-coming-to-the-screen-again.html","title":{"rendered":"Opus Dei coming to the screen — again"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>One of the more colorful — and controversial — stories of the modern Church is being made into a movie. <\/p>\n

It’s the story of the founder of Opus Dei — which figured prominently, of course, in that little movie<\/a> made by Ron Howard a couple years back.<\/p>\n

Let the debates begin.<\/p>\n

From the New York Times<\/a>: <\/p>\n

The film director Roland Joff\u00e9, who has yet to regain the acclaim he won a generation ago for \u201cThe Killing Fields\u201d and \u201cThe Mission,\u201d is shooting a movie in Argentina focused on the founder of Opus Dei, an elite and powerful organization within the Roman Catholic Church.<\/p>\n

The film, \u201cThere Be Dragons,\u201d set during the Spanish Civil War, weaves fictional characters created by Mr. Joff\u00e9 with the story of St. Josemar\u00eda Escriv\u00e1 de Balaguer, the Spaniard who founded Opus Dei and was canonized by the church.<\/p>\n

The project was initiated by a member of Opus Dei, is partly produced and financed by the group\u2019s members and has enlisted an Opus Dei priest to consult on the set. News of the project has set off criticism among some former Opus Dei members that the movie will be little more than propaganda for the organization. But Mr. Joff\u00e9, in the first interview he has given about the film, said that he had been given complete creative control and that Opus Dei never had any influence on the project.<\/p>\n

He ditched the script he was originally given, he said, because he did not want to make what he called a \u201cbiopic\u201d about Escriv\u00e1\u2019s life. But, he added, he was intrigued by Escriv\u00e1\u2019s ideas about the power of forgiveness and the capacity of every human being for sainthood. Opus Dei \u2014 the name is Latin for work of God \u2014 teaches that ordinary work can be a path to sanctity if the believer maintains a demanding regimen of religious practices intended to achieve holiness.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was very interested in the idea of embarking on a piece of work that took religion seriously on its own terms and didn\u2019t play a game where one approached religion denying its validity,\u201d Mr. Joff\u00e9 said.<\/p>\n

When pressed, he called himself a \u201cwobbly agnostic\u201d but added, \u201cI do believe that rigid atheism is a rather intellectually short-sighted position.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Opus Dei members behind the project were delighted to enlist Mr. Joff\u00e9, whose reputation was that of a political leftist who made films that asked profound ethical questions.<\/p>\n

In the 1980s Mr. Joff\u00e9 was nominated for Academy Awards as best director for \u201cThe Killing Fields,\u201d about the genocidal war in Cambodia, and \u201cThe Mission,\u201d about Jesuit missionaries who try to defend a South American tribe from Portuguese slave traders. But his career has sputtered since, with movies like \u201cThe Scarlet Letter\u201d and \u201cCaptivity,\u201d a horror movie, earning him nominations for the Golden Raspberry Awards, which honor the worst of the film industry.<\/p>\n

Mr. Joff\u00e9\u2019s portrayal of Escriv\u00e1\u2019s actions during the 1930s is likely to be provocative, especially in Europe. Some historians have accused Escriv\u00e1 of collaborating with Franco. Mr. Joff\u00e9 said he concluded after doing extensive research that Escriv\u00e1 had been eager to avoid doing anything that would jeopardize the church\u2019s position in Spain.<\/p>\n

\u201cJosemar\u00eda himself left Spain, and basically stayed out, and my sense is that he didn\u2019t agree with and didn\u2019t want to get involved in politics at the time,\u201d he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

You can read more at the Times link.<\/p>\n

PHOTO:<\/b> Charlie Cox, foreground, as the Rev. Josemar\u00eda Escriv\u00e1 de Balaguer, who founded Opus Dei in the 1920s and once took refuge in a mental hospital, in a scene from \u201cThere Be Dragons.\u201d Photo by Michael Lichtenstein.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the more colorful — and controversial — stories of the modern Church is being made into a movie. It’s the story of the founder of Opus Dei — which figured prominently, of course, in that little movie made by Ron Howard a couple years back. Let the debates begin. From the New York…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":365,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-links-r-us","category-media"],"yoast_head":"\nOpus Dei coming to the screen - again - The Deacon's Bench<\/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\/deaconsbench\/2009\/08\/opus-dei-coming-to-the-screen-again.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Opus Dei coming to the screen - again - The Deacon's Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"One of the more colorful — and controversial — stories of the modern Church is being made into a movie. 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