One of the book\u2019s most memorable bits \u2014 a scene that expanded my mind when I read it as a boy, and still shapes my thinking today \u2014 involves an explanation of space-time and the idea of a tesseract: a folding (or wrinkling) of space-time via a fifth dimension to travel instantly between vastly distant locations. (\u201cThe shortest distance between two points is not a straight line.\u201d)<\/p>\n
A version of this scene was shot for the film, with Meg herself presenting the principle in class (complete with a plastic model of an ant taking the place of the imaginary ant in the book\u2019s in-text illustrations). A scene like this could have showcased the side of Meg the filmmakers want viewers to see: brainy and academically capable.<\/p>\n
Alas, it seems this was too cerebral or something, and was cut. Now the idea of a tesseract is given a rushed explanation in a scene with Mr. and Mrs. Murray, and the key visual is only glimpsed in a computer animation in the background. How can filmmakers inspire young viewers if they\u2019re afraid to ask anything of them?<\/p>\n
The finished film tries to highlight Meg\u2019s gifts in a ridiculous invented action scene evocative of a young-adult apocalyptic survival movie. \u201cIt\u2019s a physics thing,\u201d she says modestly, but the stunt they\u2019ve just tried is the sort of thing that only works in video games and movies that are too much like video games.<\/p>\n
The need to present an affirmative image extends to Meg\u2019s parents. I appreciate the warmly rendered early scenes with the Murrays all together before Mr. Murray\u2019s disappearance. Yet for all her father\u2019s apologies to Meg for having left her and the family, the film doesn\u2019t dare to touch on\u00a0Meg\u2019s deep disappointment on being reunited with her father and discovering that he isn\u2019t the all-powerful figure capable of setting all to rights that she\u2019d built him up to be in her mind.<\/p>\n
Kaling\u2019s Mrs. Who still speaks in quotations, although her frequent biblical references have all been excised, and there are fewer classical and historical references and more Outkast and Lin-Manuel Miranda. She doesn\u2019t come across as someone who has trouble verbalizing; she just says quotes for no reason.<\/p>\n
The dropping of the Biblical references is not incidental. When Mrs. Who quotes 1 John \u2014 \u201cThe light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not\u201d\u00a0\u2014 that has thematic significance: The darkness, the Dark Thing, is strong, but light is stronger; this is not a dualistic, Manichaean story.<\/p>\n
The movie\u2019s tagline \u2014 \u201cThe only thing faster than light is the darkness\u201d \u2014 seems to reverse this: Darkness has a natural advantage. The line doesn\u2019t appear in the book, and I doubt L\u2019Engle would approve. (That the movie conflates the darkness \u2014 the Dark Thing \u2014 with\u00a0It<\/em>, which is merely a local manifestation of darkness on Camazotz, is just one more disconnect.) Compared to this, Disney\u2019s Narnia films retained far more of the Christian milieu of Lewis\u2019 stories.<\/p>\nThe aversion to religion is nowhere more evident than in the rousing enumeration of the Earth\u2019s great fighters against the darkness. In the book, Jesus is given the first place, though there are others: artists and scientists (Leonardo, Shakespeare, Bach, Curie, Einstein) as well as Christian and non-Christian religious figures (Buddha and St. Francis as well as Gandhi).<\/p>\n
The movie relegates all this to an afterthought, adding some racial diversity to the list (Nelson Mandela, Maya Angelou) and dropping\u00a0all<\/em>\u00a0the religious figures, definitely including Jesus.<\/p>\n\u201cTomorrow there\u2019ll be more of us,\u201d smiles Mrs. Who benignly, quoting\u00a0Hamilton<\/em>. Tomorrow-land, according to Disney, may be a utopia with all kinds of diversity, but it seems there\u2019s only room for one gospel.<\/p><\/blockquote>\nIt would be nice if there could be some kind of diversity training for Hollywood, so that the folks there could learn how to at least imaginatively enter into the world of Christian believers rather than just blindly pave it over with the spiritual goop of Affirmations, Feels and Intuitions that tends to be what passes for \u201cspirituality\u201d these days.<\/p>\n
On the other hand, given the grotesque witness of what currently passes for Christianity in the US today, one can scarcely blame non-Christians in Hollywood for not wanting to dive into the septic tank on the off chance that they may find a diamond.<\/p>\n
But it is heartbreaking that L\u2019Engle\u2019s Christianity, which is not hard to find or understand, was not merely ignored, but buried.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Deacon Steven Greydanus does the autopsy: One of the book\u2019s most memorable bits \u2014 a scene that expanded my mind when I read it as a boy, and still shapes my thinking today \u2014 involves an explanation of space-time and the idea of a tesseract: a folding (or wrinkling) of space-time via a fifth dimension […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[27],"class_list":["post-102752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-at-the-movies"],"yoast_head":"\n
Bummer. Looks like "A Wrinkle in Time" is pretty bad<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Deacon Steven Greydanus does the autopsy: One of the book\u2019s most memorable bits \u2014 a scene that expanded my mind when I read it as a boy, and still shapes\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/2018\/03\/bummer-looks-like-wrinkle-time-pretty-bad.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Bummer. 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