With the Supreme Court’s ruling on both DOMA and California’s Proposition 8 last week, many people across the country are celebrating new rights and benefits or are looking forward to a future in which they can share in them. Of course, the SCOTUS decision doesn’t definitively end every conversation about and argument over gay marriage and gay rights as ongoing articles and blog posts evidence. As we continue to move towards a more just and equal society, documentary films have... Read more
The oft-used phrase, “I’ve never seen anything like it,” is often critical hyperbole. I can assure you, however, that you’ve never seen anything like The Act of Killing. (more…) Read more
One of my favorite pop culture scholars, Tony Mills, wanted to weigh on in the new Superman movie, Man of Steel. I wanted to vent about it too and thought it would be fitting for another Pop Theology conversation. Feel free to weigh in with your own reactions. (more…) Read more
I come to review an artist even our unflappable president referred to as a “jackass.” Although I have severe doubts about some of our president’s national security policies, I must agree with his assessment of Kanye West. Let me start this review with the necessary disclaimer—all too necessary with many of the biggest acts in hip-hop. I said the same thing when I reviewed Eminem’s Recovery in 2010, and I’ll say the same thing with Kanye West. Yet again, the... Read more
“My hope for the church is for it to become Gospel-saturated and focused on the fact that Jesus is the Hero of our story, not us. He is Superman; we are Lois Lane…” — Rev. Matt Cannon, Lee Village Baptist Church, Harriman, TN. Answer to “What is your hope for the Church?” comment section on Christianity Today.com. Rev. Cannon’s comment is surely one of the stranger interpretations of the “Church as Bride of Christ” metaphor in Ephesians 5. But the... Read more
The moment word broke of the new Superman film, Man of Steel, directed by Zack Snyder, the comparisons between Superman and Jesus were bound to happen. Snyder himself has mentioned it: “I think the relationship between Jesus and Superman is not a thing we invented in this film, it is a thing that has been talked about since the creation of Superman. And in a weird way, probably was talked about more when Superman was created than it is now.... Read more
Ryan: You’d think after blogging for six years we’d know, but it seems like new possibilities for this medium develop all the time. The basic scoop is that Pop Theology examines the intersections of pop culture, religion, theology, and spirituality. The site emerges from the progressive Christian perspective of its editors, but people of any religious affiliation, or none at all, are welcome to read, comment, and join the conversation. Richard: “Conversation” is an important word here. You’ll find one... Read more
Prior to gay liberation, gay people, unable to come out, had little choice but to build magnificent closets. Mad King Ludwig built fairy-tale castles across Bavaria that became the prototypes for Disney theme parks. Michelangelo created the Sistine Chapel, a riotous orgy of male nudity under which which dozens of gay popes have been crowned by thousands of gay cardinals. The garden-variety queen built his castles in the air, with florid camp references made in gay bars, movie theaters, and... Read more
Continuing the bromance that is PopTheology.com, Ryan and I do a dialogue review for Star Trek: Into Darkness. Ryan: I think we’ve got a modern day Shakespeare on our hands with J. J. Abrams. Elizabethan parlance lent an artistry to The Bard’s plays that Abrams lacks (and we’ll never have again), but Shakespeare was also a popular entertainer. There are none better than Abrams today, who packages rich, emotional, ethical, philosophical, and political themes in wildly entertaining films. Can you... Read more
In preparation for an upcoming film producers’ program, I’ve got a laundry list of films to watch and books to read. One of those books, Ron Austin‘s In a New Light: Spirituality and the Media Arts, just happens to be one of the better reflections on the relationship between film and religion I’ve ever read. (more…) Read more
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