CINEMA PARADISO: So there’s an atheist film festival. Reading about it, I found myself wondering how a movie could really represent one worldview over another. I think what a lot of atheism-vs-theism debates miss (more on this soon) is that you can work with the exact same evidence and come to radically different conclusions about the meaning of that evidence. And since film is such a visual medium, I’m fascinated by the difference between films which present a basically godless world and films which present a basically Christian world. (Only going with Christianity here because it’s what I’m most familiar with, both because I believe it and because I’ve seen more movies which believe it.)

So I’m opening the floor to you guys: Which movies would you screen in an atheist film festival? What about a Christian film festival? Or other religions?

For me, Cube and the Orson Welles adaptation of The Trial would absolutely be a part of the atheist festival. Nobody Knows would also be there, I think. For movies which portray or make real a Christian world–movies in which, while the evidence is still open to interpretation, the obvious interpretation is Christian–I’d say Cavalier’s Therese of course, and Of Gods and Men, and maybe even Donnie Darko. Looking at these lists, I think the distinguishing characteristic is how the movie presents our intense longing for suffering to have meaning: Is this longing simply the most heartbreaking kind of wishful thinking, or does it reflect something real about the world for which we were made, in the same way that thirst implies the existence of water?

I think that’s my most common criterion. What are yours?