Film and Media Studies Commons^™

Stellar, Ken Derry

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Stellar (2022), directed by Darlene Naponse.

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, Ken Derry

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022), directed by Rian Johnson.

Benedetta, Richard S. Ascough

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Benedetta (2021), directed by Paul Verhoeven.

Drive My Car, Frederick Ruf

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Drive My Car (2021), directed by Ryusuke Hamaguchi.

Nightmare Alley, Emily Jane Pascoe

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Nightmare Alley (2021), directed by Guillermo del Toro.

Bombay Cinema’S Islamicate Histories, Amanda Lanzillo

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Ira Bhaskar and Richard Allen, eds., Bombay Cinema’s Islamicate Histories (Intellect Ltd, 2022).

Biblical Boogeymen, Holy Ghosts, And The New Demonology: A Review Of Three Recent Books On Religion And Horror, Brian Collins

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review essay on three books: Brandon R. Grafius, Reading the Bible with Horror (Rowman & Littlefield, 2019); Brandon R. Grafius and John Morehead, eds., Theology and Horror: Explorations of the Dark Religious Imagination (Fortress Academic/Lexington, 2021); and Steve A. Wiggins, Nightmares with the Bible: The Good Book and Cinematic Demons (Fortress Academic/Lexington, 2020).

Madhuri Dixit, Abir Bazaz

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Nandana Bose, Madhuri Dixit (Bloomsbury, 2019).

Religious Hegemony And "Muslim" Horror Movies, Shaheed N. Mohammed

Journal of Religion & Film

The present paper examines horror films originating in Muslim contexts and available on U.S. streaming services. Using Gramsci's concept of hegemony, the paper examines how such films negotiate and articulate with the dominant Hollywood mainstream horror genre with particular attention to the hegemonic power of the mainstream with its Christian iconography and assumptions.

Employing A Chinese Ghost Story To Teach The Syncretism Of Chinese Religions, Gloria I-Ling Chien

Journal of Religion & Film

Upon its release in 1987, the Hong Kong blockbuster A Chinese Ghost Story resulted in sequels, adaptations, and two remakes in 2011 and 2020. Despite its popularity, only a few critics have noticed its eclectic representations of Chinese religions, nor has there been any evaluation of its pedagogical potential. This article details how the author employs this 1987 work to teach the syncretism of Chinese religions in an undergraduate course “Asian Religions in Film.” By decoding the embedded concepts, the meanings and history behind “the Jade Garland talisman,” the inclusion of the Diamond Sutra for exorcistic efficacy, and the portrayal …

Life In The Multiverse: Bringing Chaos Out Of Order?, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This paper was given as the opening keynote address at the International Conference on Religion and Film at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, on June 8, 2022, and is here presented in that form.

My thanks go to those who organized the conference for Vrije Universiteit, notably Professor Johan Roeland and Miranda van Holland.

New Approaches To Islam In Film, Sophia Rose Arjana

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Kristian Petersen, ed., New Approaches to Islam in Film (New York: Routledge, 2021).

Giving The Devil His Due: Satan And Cinema, Brandon R. Grafius

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock and Regina M. Hansen, eds., Giving the Devil His Due: Satan and Cinema (New York: Fordham University Press, 2021).

Deities & Devotees: Cinema, Religion, And Politics In South India, Rebecca Peters

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Uma Maheswari Bhrugubanda, Deities & Devotees: Cinema, Religion, and Politics in South India (Oxford University Press, 2019).

Bollywood Horrors: Religion, Violence And Cinematic Fears In India, Sen Meheli

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Ellen Goldberg, Aditi Sen, and Brian Collins, eds., Bollywood Horrors: Religion, Violence and Cinematic Fears in India (Bloomsbury Academic, 2021).

Refocus: The Films Of Paul Schrader, Elijah Siegler

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Michelle E. Moore and Brian Brems, editors, ReFocus: The Films of Paul Schrader (Edinburgh University Press: 2020).

Religion And Film: Representation, Experience, Meaning, Sérgio Dias Branco

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Stefanie Knauss, Religion and Film: Representation, Experience, Meaning (Brill, 2020).

Indonesian Cinema After The New Order: Going Mainstream, Ahmad Nuril Huda

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Thomas Barker, Indonesian Cinema after the New Order: Going Mainstream (Hong Kong University Press, 2020).

The Bible As Relic, Fetish Or Talisman In Nollywood Films: A Semiotic Perspective, Floribert Patrick C. Endong

Journal of Religion & Film

Many Nollywood Christian films tap into a plurality of myths and idiosyncrasies prevailing in Nigeria in particular and the Christendom in general. Some of these myths and idiosyncrasies revolve around the perceived magical powers of the Bible, particularly the Holy Book’s ability to neutralize or prevent the designs of paranormal and satanic entities. In line with such Christian myths, many Nollywood Christianity-based films deploy various typologies of artifacts, signs and special effects to represent the Bible as an object which is more than a mere carrier of holy scriptures and the voice of God. In this paper, attention is given …

Transforming Leviathan: Job, Hobbes, Zvyagintsev And Philosophical Progression, Graham C. Goff

Journal of Religion & Film

The allegory of Leviathan, the biblical serpent of the seas, has undergone numerous distinct and even antithetical conceptions since its origin in the book of Job. Most prominently, Leviathan was the namesake of Thomas Hobbes’s 1651 political treatise and Andrey Zvyagintsev’s 2014 film of the same name, a damning indictment of Russian corruption. These three iterations underscore the societal transition from the recognition of power as being derived from God to the secularization of power in Hobbes’s philosophy, to the negation of the legitimacy of divine and secular institutional power, in Zvyagintsev’s controversial film. This examination of Leviathan’s three unique …

Seeing And Interpreting Visions Of The Next Age In Interstellar, Nancy Wright

Journal of Religion & Film

Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar (2014) uses multiple styles of cinematography – documentary, painterly and expressionistic – to guide interpretation of its apocalyptic review of history. Within the prologue and epilogue of the science fiction film, clips from interviews originally filmed for Ken Burns’s The Dust Bowl (2012) invite questions about how to interpret documentary, revisionist and eschatological reviews of history. Cinematography functions as a self-reflexive cue to spectators within and outside the mise-en-scène to engage in eschatological interpretation. The representation of spectatorship and vision reveals the challenge of interpreting prophetic visions of the last things and the next age, which are …

Gender, Race, And Religion In An African Enlightenment, Jonathan D. Lyonhart

Journal of Religion & Film

Black Panther (2018) not only heralded a new future for representation in big-budget films but also gave an alternative vision of the past, one which recasts the Enlightenment within an African context. By going through its technological enlightenment in isolation from Western ideals and dominance, Wakanda opens a space for reflecting on alternate ways progress can—and still might—unfold. More specifically, this alternative history creates room for reimagining how modernity—with its myriad social, scientific, and religious paradigm shifts—could have negotiated questions of race, and, in turn, how race could have informed and redirected some of the lesser impulses of modernity. Similar …

Oldboy's Apples, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a review of the short film, Oldboy's Apples (2022), directed by Brad Hock.

Huella, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Huella (2022), directed by Gabriela Ortega.

The Cow Who Sang A Song Into The Future, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of The Cow Who Sang a Song into the Future (2022), directed by Francesca Alegría.

Introduction To Slamdance 2022, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is the Introduction to the Slamdance Film Festival 2022.

Forget Me Not, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Forget Me Not (2021), directed by Olivier Bernier.

Ultrainocencia, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Ultrainocencia (2020), directed by Manuel Ariza.

A Table Is As Good As Nine Lives, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a review of the short film, A Table Is as Good as Nine Lives (2022), directed by Christina Leonardi.

Walls Cannot Keep Us From Flying, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Walls Cannot Keep Us from Flying (2022), directed by Jonathan Haff Mehring.