catapult magazine

Well said, Kirstin! I have committed most of my life to the notion that stories are important. I read, I watch movies, I listen to songs and I love the moment when something hits me as true in a way that I can’t express. I think that is one of the greatest gifts God gave us. But, I think for stories to touch us we also need to be able to see them as stories. I think this is part of what Sam is getting at. We can live so deeply within the artiface that we can’t see it as such. Bravo to the call to arms of more and better stories, yet I think we should also be calling ourselves to a more authentic life at the same time. There is a difference.
This really hit me about a year ago when I read something (I think in a book by Jaques Elul, but that might be wrong) that made me realize that when I was in high school, I defined much of my emotional experience through pop songs that I thought summarized it. In fact, I was trading my chance to grapple with the mysteries frustrations and joys of defining a relationship, and instead letting pop mucisians do it for me. I gave up some stories and art that I could have created to listen to their well-worn descriptions of love and believe that they were mine. When I discovered literature in college i found that some of the poets had gotten a bit closer to what I was feeling, but I also discovered that the poetry I read allowed me to reflect on my experience much more than a three minute song did. Likewise I would argue that you can certainly get more reflection out of a novel or a movie than a half-hour of television interspersed with absurd commercials.
Part of the problem, I suppose, is that so much of North American culture is so empty. I guess that makes me love the rare moments of truth and beauty in that culture so much more.

We watch so many movies today and watch TV and so much more. I have noticed that because of this, one of the main ways we relate to people and situations is by using what we have leared through movies and television. Some people do this more than others, I think because they either are exposed to more movies and such, or because they have less other information (ie. books, real experiance) to base what they know on.

I have a friend who can relate everthing, yes I mean everthing, we talk about to one video game or another.

I find this rather scary. I know that what we know is all based on our experiances and what has been relayed to us by others. Movies and Television tell us things about life screened through filters: either the desire to advertise, or the promotion of some other world view, either the author’s or society’s.

What’s really scary is that many of us take this information lock stock and barrel and obsorb it without questioning it’s source or anything.

When is that last time that said or thought, “Oh, I know about that, I saw it on ________” or “Wow, this place looks just like the ______ in ________” or even, “I know about ______ I saw it all on _______ last night.”?

Does this disturb anyone else? Do you find it scary that we fall prey so easily to others idea’s without stopping to think? Does reading this encourage you to think about what we take in, in the future?

Thanks for your time.

excellent points. what scares me about myself is when i see an amazing display of God’s creative brilliance in nature and, in describing it to someone later, say that it was so perfect it looked like a movie or a postcard. when re-creations begin to look more real than the objects or lives themselves, it’s probably time to turn off the “reality concentrate” for a while.

that’s probably the appeal of soap operas and, more recently, prime time dramas—people are inclined to adopt the passion and the beauty and the excitement of pretend lives into their own. while it’s temporarily satisfying, it’s like a drug—you need more before dissatisfaction with your own insignificant life sets in and the more you get, the more you need.

the real magic in turning off the tv for me is when i come back to it, the commercials seems even more absurd. it’s a good feeling.

Let’s just take the idea that “much of what is produced on television and in movies is crap” as a given. But let’s not take as a given the idea that the only way to respond to this stuff as Christians is to “turn it off”. A more radical response, and I think a more necessary one, is to WATCH MORE and WATCH BETTER! There’s good stuff out there too. Find it.

Additionally, I don’t understand how we can make these kinds of separations between reality and movies, as if there is a lived experience outside of story, as if movies aren’t a part of reality. As Christians, we know that our view of the world is informed by a certain story, a certain angle. We compare our “seeing” God’s beautiful creation to scenes in films because that’s what films do so well, they show, they articulate what is a part of our lived experience in a way that helps put us into the story.

I’ll just stop here. This is partly where I was headed with my article on Todd Solondz on this web site. Life already comes to us as a story. It’s just a matter of which story, whose story it will be. If we turn off the stories, we cut ourselves as Christians off from societal dialogue. So TELL MORE STORIES and TELL BETTER STORIES!

YEAH!!!

A call to arms! THAT’S what I was trying to say in the theatre thread.

Ever since Plato started saying that art is imitation, we’ve been stuck with the task of defending art and it’s place in life, rather than letting it be and seeing it as a part of life, or as life itself…

There’s a part of me that longs for the art/life dichotomy to be torn down so we can open up new realms of expression, feeling, experience!! How exciting!!!

Oh, don’t get me wrong. I believe that Christian should actively participate in culture, and actively disern what they watch.

If you mean “watch more [good movies] and watch[ / disern] better” than I wholely argree with you.

I agree with everything you said here. But my purpose was not to dissuade people from being active in culture, but in fact to be more active, in both doing and watching. A call to remember to think when we watch; think about what the message is and why, think how it relates to me, etc.

This may be like preaching to the choir though, since it seems that most, if not all of us on *cino, even by just being here, have already learned this.

While a movie is not reality, it can protray reality very correctly, but remember, reality can also be distorted by it. I assume you mean, by saying movies, mean “good movies”. That don’t distort reality, and if they do, such as fantasy or sci-fi, they do it in such a way that reality is still present in force. Characters are portrayed and act as they would in normal “non-movie” life.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that while we watch, we should be careful to understand that because of the angle, a movie that is not based on a Christian worldview is likely to portay God’s creation in a way that is not Christian (though it may, depending). Should we be seeing through the eyes of others and taking in what they say without quesioning when the creator of the movie doesn’t believe what we do.

On the other hand (I’m sort of switching gears here) Are these “eyes” that we are seeing through always right? I have talked to some doctors about the show ER and asked if the hospitol and the emergency room is portrayed realistically and they have said that though a lot of it is “correct”, most of it is purely for the story and not actually what is goes on.

The same goes for Lawyer shows on TV. I have asked how close they actually are and have heard resounding NO’s, “It is not like that at all.” First of all, none of the lawyers make mistakes and none of them ever miss the big point in which they force the witness to confess by running them around in circles with their clever diction.

Oh, and don’t get me started on the so-called reality shows.

And then there is the constant portrayal of people on TV, and in the movies some what, but is generally better, depending on what you watch.

I hope I made my view more clear.

to clarify my earlier comments, i was not suggesting that we “turn it off” altogether, nor was i suggesting that art is not an integral part of our lives. while i understand, grant, your point that there is no separation between movies and reality, i think there can a separation between movies/tv and truth. i don’t think you would disagree. this is the separation that is dangerous for undiscerning viewers.

as far as turning it off goes…i think we Christians who are concerned with engaging culture (dare i call them Reformed?) can underestimate the power of a temporary separation from something like television in the same way we underestimate the power of a temporary separation from something like food (see the fasting thread). we lose sight of the best that reality has to offer, which is an actual relationship with a living God and instead substitute fancy thoughts and words that we sit in front of a computer forming and editing for hours (myself included). “more” is not worthwhile unless it comes out of a place of silence, of listening to the Holy Spirit. the fact that it’s even possible to give up television/movies/art in order to gain perspective upon returning proves how essential art is. giving up a non-essential is pointless, but temporarily refraining from something that is essential in the long-run helps us gain immediate perspective on the goodness of what it is we’re giving up by allowing us to focus on our spiritual relationship, which is the foundation of all good things. Jesus consistently separated himself from society to converse with the heavenly Father, to experience a concentration of spiritual reality. this did not diminish his relationship with the world, but enhanced it. he prayed about the very world he was temporarily “escaping,” underscoring the importance of that world.

i think the impulse to want to experience something (creation, God) for what it is and was in the beginning without a thousand interpretations, while perhaps impossible, is not as misguided as we make it out to be. there is a richness in that experience as well as in the experience of welcoming the flood of interpretations, the stories that memory inevitably summons.

Reality shows wouldn’t be interesting if they weren’t crafted. There is a temendous amount of nuance in shooting, editing, and scoring an MTV Realworld show. The producers focus on and expose certain parts of the ‘reality’ in the same way a photographer focuses on and exposes certain parts of ‘reality’.

With this in mind its interesting how depressing I found ‘Real World’ when I saw it. All the characters were caught up in their very personal selfish desires. They never seemed to enjoy themselves.

I find it interesting that friends of mine who enjoy reading fiction also enjoy television mini-series’. I think there is a connection there. Both art-forms engage us in lengthy experiences that enable us to really dig deep into the world of these stories.

I agree, reality show are depressing. Because it is only the reality of their sinful unsaved lives, and I would say that they can not really enjoy life because of that.

I enjoy television mini-series, expecially anime.

Yes, now that I think of it there are connections, and sometimes I think that a tv series can be more effective for the artist, that is why film and television are relevent media.

Thanks for the insight, joelspace.