5 Reasons Religious Movies are A Living Hell to Watch
*Mild irreverence warning, but God has a sense of humor, so I can too*
Risen, a film about William Shakespeare and Draco Malfoy searching for Christ's body after her rises from the dead, opens this weekend, It only sounds slightly similar to a fan fiction I wrote while feverishly ill, and loaded on Nyquil. (in my version it's Tolstoy, not Shakespeare.)
The Bible has been called "The Greatest Story Ever Told" by countless people who haven't seen Die Hard. So why are there so many terrible movies based on it? Over two billion people consider themselves Christian, and yet the biggest Bible movie of all time, The Passion of the Christ, made just a little more than a movie based on Abba. Are we all just Godless heathens, who want to stew in the filth of Hollywood? No. Because most of those movies stink, and there are a few reasons why.
1. The Audience is Built In
Honestly, that's probably the entire reason these movies keep getting made. Remember those two billion people I mentioned earlier? If half of them bought tickets, Risen would be like four Avatars standing on each others shoulders. Realistically, the overall gross will be somewhere in the 20 Million range if I had to guess. But because Jesus is so tangentially related to the plot, Christians everywhere will feel a slight twinge of guilt for missing this, and saving their money for Batman V. Superman next month.
And they should feel guilty, right? They don't pray to Batman. Sundays aren't spent attending mass in the Churches of Saint Deadpool. Obviously the guilt they feel is a sincere reaction to their sinful neglect of God's directorial efforts. Executive Producer Jesus Christ is so desperate to spread the news about his films, the trailers to each of these movies remind churches they can buy "group tickets" to bring their entire congregation. Except Jesus Christ isn't an executive producer.
The money made off Risen, just like Heaven is for Real, or Exodus: Gods and Kings, or any other movie, doesn't go to the church. It goes to studios, directors, producers, and actors who made the movie. Just like any other movie. Often times, most of the people involved have no affiliation with Christianity. They're just in it for the paycheck and they know it's going to clear.
With certain exceptions for Biblical epics (Gods and Kings, Noah) most "christian" movies have the budget equivalent of Hollywood digging through it's sofa cushions. Five million dollars seems like a lot to an individual, but when a movie is going to make ten from a built in audience, it's a pretty simple decision.
2. Entertainment is Irrelevant
You know that really sexist trope that women get fat after they get married? Hilariously misogynistic, I know. But the idea behind it is once she's "guaranteed" a man, she stops trying (because that's the only thing a woman contributes). Studios are sexist caricatures of women.
Let's look at it this way. The Transformers movies are also terrible things, right? Transformers 1 was the "best" (if you can use that word) of them, and they got continually worse as time went on. What happened? They got bigger budgets, special effects got better, and they had tons of feedback from very vocal fans letting them know their movie "sux". Simply put: they stopped trying. They knew if they made a 3 hour long series of flashing lights, through an underwear model in, and played Linkin Park at the end, they all went home several million dollars richer.
If biblical movies follow this trend, they're not going to improve; they're going to get worse. Much worse. Transformers leaned into their base, their Mountain-Dew fueled, 14 year old boy base. Plenty of other people see Transformers, but the highly caffeinated pre-teens are the ones who love them. So get ready for a lot more pandering.
There's already plenty pandering to begin with. In the trailer for "Heaven is For Real" Greg Kinnear encourages his daughter to punch people who imply his son is lying. That's not a Christian message, Jesus didn't say "Let he who is without sin, give that kid a broken nose". That's a deep-south, Trump supporter message. That's base pandering. Make no mistake, these movies are not representative of the Christian community. It's representative of the politicized-conservative Christian community. These are the people who will sit in a theater for 2 hours hearing things they agree with. Which is the facts are made up and the plot doesn't matter.
3. Deus Ex Machina is a Requirement
This is the key difference between what makes a good religion and what makes a good story. If you're going to worship a god (Christian or otherwise) ideally that god is a few things. Number 1: Powerful. God has to be able to do something of consequence. Number 2: Active. God has to directly impact the lives of his followers. Let's contrast that with a good protagonist. A protagonist should be relatable, and struggle to overcome the obstacles in the story. God screws both of those things up... if he's on the protagonists side.
If the main character of a story is inherently holy, with no flaws, or humanizing features, they become a boring, unrelatable character. It's the struggle writers have had with Superman for the better part of the last 100 years. But people are excited for the new superman movie... because Batman's going to punch him in the face. The only time a god-like figure works in a narrative is when they're the villain. Watching a man struggle against an overwhelmingly powerful force is exciting. It's why last summer's San Andreas wasn't a fifteen minute long movie where we root for the earthquake.
One could argue lot of biblical heroes aren't God, they're prophets. Daniel, David, Samuel, all normal men given extraordinary challenges. But they're still religious stories. Therefore, their stories aren't about them, they're about God. Which is why they all end with "Then God solved the problem with _________". Acts 1 and 2 of the stories are all solid, but since the point is "God is powerful and cares about humans" they all have an ending which reflects it.
The proper story term for this is Deus Ex Machina, or God From the Machine. It's name derives from Greece, where plays would end with a machine lowering actors onto the stage. The actors played gods, and would basically be like, "Nope. We're done. Everythings fine now. Go home" instead of allowing the play to have a satisfying climax. Greeks began to hate this trope, and would even storm the stage in some recorded cases. This all happened around 400 B.C., but writers still fail to learn the lesson. Endings are hard.
4. The Best Bible Stories Won't Be Movies
The Bible consists of 66 Books, some of which have multiple generations of kings, prophets, plagues and wars. Still, we've seen one movie about Noah, three about Moses, and a Christ movie for each disciple. Why haven't the other stories gotten their turn on screen? Well, they're not really appropriate for the typical "religious film" audience.
David and Goliath. It's a trope used over and over again, and is a perfect example of small hero vs. big villain. How is there not a movie? Maybe because David's three favorite things are (in order) God, babes, and bloody violence.
The Goliath story starts with David killing a freaking bear. It's like the Revenant, but Leo wins. Then is like, "Cool. Back to sheep stuff." He also chops off Goliath's head after he kills him. Add in some voyeurism, an affair with a married woman, getting that lady's husband killed, and end the story with a still-birth, and you've got yourself a David movie.
There's a reason "going Old Testament" on someone is a threat. A lot of God's prophets were also his generals, and occasionally assassins. In the book of Judges, Ehud, a judge (spoilers) tells a king he has "a message from God" and then stabs him. It goes into detail about how the king was so fat, his stomach wrapped around the blade handle.. That's not even a full chapter, it's like two paragraphs.
But that's not the movie fans of "Heaven is For Real" are looking for, and studios know it. Despite the amount of blood and babes in the good book, every exec knows if you want money, you make a Jesus movie. Just change the perspective a little and you can call it "fresh". I'm not making this up, there's a movie coming out in April about Jesus as a teenager. There are two biblical stories of child/teen Jesus, one in which Mary forgets him at the temple, and one where he turns water into wine at a party. The former ends with Jesus being a preaching prodigy and the latter ends... well he just does it and then the story moves on. Personally, I'd rather see Judge Ehud: Filetter of Fatties.
5. There Are Great Biblical Movies, They're Just Not Literal
So what's a christian cinephile to do then? There's no good movies with biblical messages, and movies are the best way to spend 2 hours with your family without having to talk to them. Except that almost every movie is still a religious movie, in some way.
The Greatest Story Ever Told is also one of the oldest and most influential. Biblical themes show up in so many movies, it would be impossible to list them all. Death and Resurrection is a large element in Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and the Matrix, Every sports movie ever made is basically just David and Goliath (without the decapitation). Even godless heathen Tony Stark gives Jonah a shout-out in the Avengers. God is in everything, if you're willing to look hard enough.
Which brings me to my biggest problem with religious movies. They pander so hard to such a specific section of the religious community. It brings to mind a much more interesting Jesus story, in which he basically goes full-mosh pit on people selling "official God merchandise" at a temple. The story is by far the angriest Jesus ever gets, and what is it that sets him off? People profiteering off of religious enthusiasm. Feel free to keep seeing these movies, but only if you enjoy them, but be wary about anyone trying to charge money for your soul. Typically, Jesus wasn't the one who did that.
