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Journal of Religion & Film

Articles 91 - 120 of 142

Full-Text Articles in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies

Markie In Milwaukee, William L. Blizek Jan 2019

Markie In Milwaukee, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Markie in Milwaukee (2019) directed by Matt Kliegman.

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‘Love-Jihad’ And Bollywood: Constructing Muslims As ‘Other’, Nadira Khatun Dec 2018

‘Love-Jihad’ And Bollywood: Constructing Muslims As ‘Other’, Nadira Khatun

Journal of Religion & Film

In the postcolonial nation state that is India, cinema has become an important tool for propagating the idea of nationalism. In recent times, one of the most controversial components of Hindu nationalism has been the hate campaign against what is termed as ‘love-jihad’, which is deployed as a weapon to mobilize, polarize, and communalize citizens. The Indian Hindi-language film industry, popularly known as Bollywood, has also become a controversial site. In this paper, I argue that if ‘Indian nationalism’ is to be represented as ‘Hindu nationalism’ and ‘Indian culture’ as ‘Hindu culture,’ it logically follows that this majoritarian construction needs …

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‘I Am That Very Witch’: On The Witch, Feminism, And Not Surviving Patriarchy, Laurel Zwissler Dec 2018

‘I Am That Very Witch’: On The Witch, Feminism, And Not Surviving Patriarchy, Laurel Zwissler

Journal of Religion & Film

While contemporary discussions about witchcraft include reinterpretations and feminist reclamations, early modern accusations contained no such complexity. It is this historical witch as misogynist nightmare that the film, The Witch: A New England Folktale (2015), expresses so effectively. Within the film, the very patriarchal structures that decry witchcraft – the Puritan church from which the family exiles itself, the male headship to which the parents so desperately cling, the insistence, in the face of repeated failure, on the viability of the isolated nuclear family unit – are the same structures that inevitably foreclose the options of the lead character, Thomasin.

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A Journey Into The Heart Of God: Darren Aronofsky’S Noah (2014) As A Subversive Kabbalistic Text, Lindsay Macumber, Magi Abdul-Masih Dec 2018

A Journey Into The Heart Of God: Darren Aronofsky’S Noah (2014) As A Subversive Kabbalistic Text, Lindsay Macumber, Magi Abdul-Masih

Journal of Religion & Film

The title of this paper reflects our interpretation of this film as a subversive mystical text, from within the Jewish tradition of Kabbalah. This interpretation is itself the product of a long journey of thinking about, and wrestling with this film in various ways. In this paper, we will outline this journey, concentrating on our first impressions of the film, some notable shifts in our thinking on this film that alerted us to the connection between the film and Jewish mysticism, and some concluding remarks about the implications of this reading.

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Representations Of Nineteenth Century Mormonism In A Mormon Maid: A Cinematic Analysis, Elisabeth Weagel Dec 2018

Representations Of Nineteenth Century Mormonism In A Mormon Maid: A Cinematic Analysis, Elisabeth Weagel

Journal of Religion & Film

During the first quarter of the 20th century there was a trend in Hollywood to make films about Mormons. Practices such as polygamy created just the kind of sensationalism that attracted filmmakers (even Thomas Edison contributed with his 1902 film A Trip to Salt Lake). Many of these were B-pictures, but the 1917 film A Mormon Maid stands out because it was produced by a major production company (Paramount) and was backed by top director Cecil B. DeMille. It is often given passing reference, but very little genuine scholarship has been done on the film. A hundred years …

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Ask The Beasts Of The Southern Wild: Exploring Human Identity As Beast, Being And Beholder In Ask The Beasts: Darwin And The God Of Love And Beasts Of The Southern Wild, Stephanie Cherpak Clary Dec 2018

Ask The Beasts Of The Southern Wild: Exploring Human Identity As Beast, Being And Beholder In Ask The Beasts: Darwin And The God Of Love And Beasts Of The Southern Wild, Stephanie Cherpak Clary

Journal of Religion & Film

Anthropocentrism and hierarchical dualism together encourage a dangerous anthropology where human primacy among creation and the prioritization of certain humans leads to destruction for all. During a time when suffering caused by climate change continues to intensify, it is increasingly important to find compelling ways to share the stories of those who suffer most. I will explore how Beasts of the Southern Wild (Zeitlin, 2012) contextualizes the ecofeminist theology found in Johnson’s Ask the Beasts: Darwin and the God of Love (2014), specifically the idea of humans identifying as beasts, beings and beholders. Furthermore, I will discuss how the representation …

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Novitiate, Joshua Canzona Apr 2018

Novitiate, Joshua Canzona

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Novitiate (2017) directed by Maggie Betts.

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Thelma, Kevin V. Dodd Apr 2018

Thelma, Kevin V. Dodd

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Thelma (2017) directed by Joachim Trier.

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Beast, Rubina Ramji Feb 2018

Beast, Rubina Ramji

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Beast (2018), directed by Michael Pearce.

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Women Are Speaking Up At Sundance, Rubina Ramji Feb 2018

Women Are Speaking Up At Sundance, Rubina Ramji

Journal of Religion & Film

Women speak up at Sundance 2018.

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Quiet Heroes, William L. Blizek Jan 2018

Quiet Heroes, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Quiet Heroes (2018), directed by Jenny Mackenzie, Jared Ruga, and Amanda Stoddard.

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Puzzle, John C. Lyden Jan 2018

Puzzle, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Puzzle (2018), directed by Marc Turtletaub.

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The Miseducation Of Cameron Post, John C. Lyden Jan 2018

The Miseducation Of Cameron Post, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of The Miseducation of Cameron Post (2018), directed by Desiree Akhavan.

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Half The Picture, John C. Lyden Jan 2018

Half The Picture, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Half the Picture (2018), directed by Amy Adrion.

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Believer, John C. Lyden Jan 2018

Believer, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Believer (2018), directed by Don Argott.

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The Shape Of Water, Ken Derry Dec 2017

The Shape Of Water, Ken Derry

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of The Shape of Water (2017), directed by Guillermo del Toro.

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Revenge, Tony Michael Oct 2017

Revenge, Tony Michael

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Revenge (2017), directed by Coralie Fargeat.

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Two-Spirit Mexica Youth And Transgender Mixtec/Muxe Media: La Mission (2009), Two Spirit: Injunuity (2013), And Libertad (2015), Gabriel S. Estrada Apr 2017

Two-Spirit Mexica Youth And Transgender Mixtec/Muxe Media: La Mission (2009), Two Spirit: Injunuity (2013), And Libertad (2015), Gabriel S. Estrada

Journal of Religion & Film

Independent directors Peter Bratt, Adrian Baker, and Avila-Hanna create differing trans-border queer Indigenous media that resist Eurocentric cic-heteropatriarchy. While Bratt’s feature-length narrative film La Mission (2009) features a masculine Mexica gay teenager who survives fused homophobic and trans*-phobic violence, Baker’s short animation Two Spirit: Injunuity (2013) makes stronger trans* and two-spirit Mexica youth identity affirmations. Avila-Hanna’s short documentary Libertad (2015) offers the clearest transgender narrative of the three films as it focuses on a California transgender Mixtec immigrant activist who is coming of age as a woman with the aid of hormones and gender affirming surgery. This article’s trans*- and …

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Hidden Figures, Carol Miles Apr 2017

Hidden Figures, Carol Miles

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Hidden Figures (2016), directed by Theodore Melfi.

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I Love Dick, William L. Blizek Feb 2017

I Love Dick, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of I Love Dick (2017), directed by Jill Soloway.

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Interview With Jessie Auritt, Director Of Supergirl, William L. Blizek Jan 2017

Interview With Jessie Auritt, Director Of Supergirl, William L. Blizek

Journal of Religion & Film

This is an interview with Jessie Auritt, the director of Supergirl (2017), conducted by Bill Blizek.

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I Dream In Another Language, John C. Lyden Jan 2017

I Dream In Another Language, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of I Dream in Another Language (2017), directed by Ernesto Contreras.

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The Wound, John C. Lyden Jan 2017

The Wound, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of The Wound (2016), directed by John Trengove.

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Colossal, John C. Lyden Jan 2017

Colossal, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Colossal (2017) directed by Nacho Vigalondo.

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Before I Fall, John C. Lyden Jan 2017

Before I Fall, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Before I Fall (2017), directed by Ry Russo-Young.

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Bearing Witness: The Sight Of A Sacrifice In Cristian Mungiu's Beyond The Hills, Megan Girdwood Oct 2016

Bearing Witness: The Sight Of A Sacrifice In Cristian Mungiu's Beyond The Hills, Megan Girdwood

Journal of Religion & Film

Drawing on the theories of sacrifice advanced by Sigmund Freud (1913) and René Girard (1972; 1982), this article interprets the exorcism depicted by Romanian director Cristian Mungiu in Beyond the Hills (2012) as a sacrifice. Explicating Girard’s defence of Freud, I use his framing of sacrifice as a function of religion to reassess scholarship addressing the parallels between liturgical and cinematic forms of representation. If, as some scholars propose, the practices of the cinema-goer and the worshipper mirror each other, then the sacrificial witness portrayed by Mungiu constitutes a third pillar in this discourse. I argue that Mungiu dramatizes the …

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“He Who Kills The Body, Kills The Soul That Inhabits It”: Feminist Filmmaking, Religion, And Spiritual Identification In Vision, Carl Laamanen Apr 2016

“He Who Kills The Body, Kills The Soul That Inhabits It”: Feminist Filmmaking, Religion, And Spiritual Identification In Vision, Carl Laamanen

Journal of Religion & Film

In this article, I argue that the 2009 film, Vision: From the Life of Hildegard of Bingen, presents an example of feminist filmmaking that seeks to draw viewers into spiritual identification with the protagonist, 12th-century mystic Hildegard, through its narrative and formal techniques, encouraging the audience to share in Hildegard’s visionary experiences. The film does so in an explicitly feminist way, drawing upon unconventional visual and sonic aesthetics to highlight the power and authority of Hildegard’s spiritual experiences. In particular, Vision’s use of music and sound points toward a conception of feminine spirituality that values the …

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Seeing The Light, Hearing The Call: Women Religious As Spectators And Subjects Of Popular Nun Films, Maureen A. Sabine Professor Apr 2016

Seeing The Light, Hearing The Call: Women Religious As Spectators And Subjects Of Popular Nun Films, Maureen A. Sabine Professor

Journal of Religion & Film

Though popular films like The Bells of St. Mary’s (1945), Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), The Nun’s Story (1959), and The Sound of Music (1965) have routinely been criticized for circulating polarized stereotypes about nuns, convent memoirs indicate that some women felt the stirrings of a religious vocation from watching these movies. This article arose out of interest in whether other women heard God’s call through nun films, and is based on a survey of 86 sisters from 28 different communities who had entered the convent between 1947 and 2007, and were prepared to discuss what they saw in these …

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Hollywood Biblical Epics: Camp Spectacle And Queer Style From The Silent Era To The Modern Day, Kent L. Brintnall Apr 2016

Hollywood Biblical Epics: Camp Spectacle And Queer Style From The Silent Era To The Modern Day, Kent L. Brintnall

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Richard Lindsay, Hollywood Biblical Epics: Camp Spectacle and Queer Style from the Silent Era to the Modern Day (Denver, CO: Praeger, 2015).

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Silver Screen Buddha: Buddhism In Asian And Western Film, Ronald S. Green Oct 2015

Silver Screen Buddha: Buddhism In Asian And Western Film, Ronald S. Green

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a book review of Silver Screen Buddha, Buddhism in Asian and Western Film by Sharon A. Suh.

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