Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion Commons™
Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Discipline
-
- Film and Media Studies (6)
- Comparative Methodologies and Theories (4)
- Christianity (2)
- Continental Philosophy (2)
- Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (2)
-
- Philosophy (2)
- Social and Behavioral Sciences (2)
- Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque Art and Architecture (1)
- Ethics and Political Philosophy (1)
- European History (1)
- History (1)
- History of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology (1)
- History of Christianity (1)
- History of Religion (1)
- History of Religions of Eastern Origins (1)
- Psychology (1)
- Social Control, Law, Crime, and Deviance (1)
- Sociology (1)
- Keyword
-
- Girard (2)
- Scapegoating (2)
- Apocalypse (1)
- Campbell (1)
- Catholic Imagination (1)
-
- Children of Men (1)
- Doubles (1)
- Dreams (1)
- Dystopia (1)
- Eliade (1)
- Eschatology (1)
- Hitchcock (1)
- Jung (1)
- Kurosawa (1)
- Magdalene Asylums (1)
- Michelangelo (1)
- Mimetic Desire (1)
- Monstrous-Feminine (1)
- Nuclear disaster (1)
- Pan's Labyrinth (1)
- Papacy (1)
- Pope Julius II (1)
- Predatory Practices by Catholic Nuns (1)
- Profane (1)
- Religion (1)
- Ritual (1)
- Sacred (1)
- Second Vatican Council (1)
- Secularism (1)
- Sistine Chapel (1)
Articles 1 - 9 of 9
Full-Text Articles in Religious Thought, Theology and Philosophy of Religion
Framing Salvation: Biblical Apocalyptic, Cinematic Dystopia, And Contextualizing The Narrative Of Salvation, Caesar A. Montevecchio
Framing Salvation: Biblical Apocalyptic, Cinematic Dystopia, And Contextualizing The Narrative Of Salvation, Caesar A. Montevecchio
Journal of Religion & Film
Christian biblical authors used the apocalyptic genre to help contextualize the meaning of salvation for their audiences. Today, dystopian film can serve a similar function. In each case, the narrative diagnoses a sinister mis-ordering of human civilization and attempts to prescribe ways in which it can be overcome. Just as apocalyptic gave biblical authors the ability to make statements about what salvation was salvation from, dystopian narratives can similarly demonstrate what social conditions today remain in need of remediation. When these dystopian narratives do so by making use of symbols and themes associated with Christian soteriology their diagnoses can become …
The Transformation Of The Pope: The Agony And The Ecstasy (1965) And The Second Vatican Council (1962-65), Jennifer Mara Desilva
The Transformation Of The Pope: The Agony And The Ecstasy (1965) And The Second Vatican Council (1962-65), Jennifer Mara Desilva
Journal of Religion & Film
In 1965 the film The Agony and The Ecstasy (dir. Carol Reed) presented Renaissance artistic culture, Catholic iconography, and the papal court in Rome to a popular, broad, and non-denominational audience. Based on the novel by Irving Stone (1961), the narrative follows Michelangelo and Pope Julius II through the decoration of the Sistine chapel ceiling (1508-12), outlining a relationship between the two protagonists that suggests some spiritual equality. In the same way that the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) strove for spiritual renewal and an emphasis on the wonder of humankind’s relationship with God, The Agony and The Ecstasy portrays the …
"Everything's Going To Be Ok:" Source Code And The Dramas Of Desire, David L. Smith
"Everything's Going To Be Ok:" Source Code And The Dramas Of Desire, David L. Smith
Journal of Religion & Film
Source Code (Duncan Jones, 2011) is a science fiction film concerned with an ambiguity at the heart of religion and its ideas about the meaning of life. It interrogates the kitsch-phrase "everything's going to be OK" to uncover two distinct ideas of heroism, or of how life acquires meaning. One is keyed to narratives of attainment. The other stresses the immediacy or immanence of meaning in our present conditions. The film enacts the tension between these paradigms in ways that parallel cases from Christianity and Buddhism. It explores what remains of religious hope when its literal sense is exposed as …
Hitchcock And The Scapegoat: Violence And Victimization In The Wrong Man, David Humbert
Hitchcock And The Scapegoat: Violence And Victimization In The Wrong Man, David Humbert
Journal of Religion & Film
Alfred Hitchcock’s The Wrong Man tells the story of Emmanuel Balestrero, arrested for a crime committed by his physical double. This paper examines the theme of the scapegoat in the film and argues that it portrays in miniature what theorist René Girard has described as a mimetic crisis. While the plight of the central character is usually portrayed as a product of blind chance, it is instead due to the mimetic fears, desires, and vanities of the members of society that accuse him. The fate of Balestrero reveals the operation of a specific kind of scapegoat mechanism that has its …
The Reenchantment Of Eschatology: Religious Secular Apocalypse In Akira Kurosawa’S Dreams, Justin Heinzekehr
The Reenchantment Of Eschatology: Religious Secular Apocalypse In Akira Kurosawa’S Dreams, Justin Heinzekehr
Journal of Religion & Film
The possibility of nuclear destruction in the modern world has created a secular eschatology which, unlike religious eschatologies, creates nihilism and apathy rather than ultimate meaning. The Japanese film Dreams, by Akira Kurosawa, depicts this secularized eschatology as well as a counter-apocalyptic utopia. However, Kurosawa does not merely repeat the Western visions of nuclear apocalypse, but uses Japanese folk religion as a lens through which this apocalypse can be viewed. By doing so, Kurosawa creates a specifically Eastern response to nuclear destruction: a “religious secular” eschatology. Despite its lack of critical success, Dreams provides a valuable alternative for Western …
The Magdalene Sisters: How To Solve The Problem Of ‘Bad’ Girls, Irena S. M. Makarushka Ph.D.
The Magdalene Sisters: How To Solve The Problem Of ‘Bad’ Girls, Irena S. M. Makarushka Ph.D.
Journal of Religion & Film
This article focuses on Peter Mullan’s The Magdalene Sisters which explores the scope and complex nature of the punishment experienced by the women incarcerated in the Magdalene Asylum near Dublin. The analysis reflects my long-standing interest in religion, film and feminist values as well as my revulsion at the sexual abuse and predatory practices of countless Catholic priests and nuns. It is the same revulsion that drove Mullan to bring the horrors of the Magdalene Asylums out from beneath the culturally sanctioned shadows into plain sight. My analysis focuses not only on women as victims of abuse, but also on …
Irruptions Of The Sacred In A “World Of Shit”: Profanity, Sacred Words, And Cinematic Hierophanies In Stanley Kubrick’S Full Metal Jacket (1987), Joseph E. Bisson
Irruptions Of The Sacred In A “World Of Shit”: Profanity, Sacred Words, And Cinematic Hierophanies In Stanley Kubrick’S Full Metal Jacket (1987), Joseph E. Bisson
Journal of Religion & Film
Full Metal Jacket remains embedded in the consciousness of the popular culture mainly because of its abundance of profane language, violent imagery, and salacious set pieces. The juxtaposition of profane language and imagery with sacred language and religious symbolism reveals that Kubrick’s Vietnam film has powerful religious overtones that comprise an important element of the film’s critique of homo religiosus and the modern human condition. By continually juxtaposing the sacred and profane, Kubrick created “cinematic hierophanies” that advanced a cultural critique that inventively integrated ideas from some of the mid-20th Century’s greatest interpreters of myths -- Carl Jung, Joseph …
There’S No Place Like Home: From Oz To Antichrist, J. Sage Elwell
There’S No Place Like Home: From Oz To Antichrist, J. Sage Elwell
Journal of Religion & Film
This article explores the dialectic of the uncanny in The Wizard of Oz (Victor Flemming, 1939) and Antichrist (Lars von Trier, 2009), treating the latter as a sequel to the former such that we encounter Dorothy first as a young girl and then as a grown woman. I observe that the uncanny entails a repressive and expressive moment that is cinematically rendered in these two films, and drawing on Freud and Žižek, I argue that in Dorothy’s evolution from Oz to Antichrist we see that the witches and wizards and gods and devils of our own minds are known to …
Scapegoats And Redemption On Shutter Island, Cari Myers
Scapegoats And Redemption On Shutter Island, Cari Myers
Journal of Religion & Film
The themes of redemptive violence, scapegoating, and ritual in the films of Martin Scorsese have provided much grist for critical scholarship. While it is going too far to claim that Scorsese is intentionally interpreting Girardian themes (which are themselves borrowed from a rich mythological tradition), the comparisons between the theorist and the director are compelling. My goal here is to establish the primary themes of scapegoating, mimesis, the cycle of violence, and feuding identities that occur in both Girard’s works and Scorsese’s films and pull them forward into a more recent work of Scorsese, Shutter Island.