1st Edition

The Religion and Film Reader

Edited By Jolyon Mitchell, S. Brent Plate Copyright 2007
    496 Pages
    by Routledge

    496 Pages
    by Routledge

    Edited by leading experts in the field, The Film and Religion Reader brings together the key writings in this exciting and dynamic discipline. In over sixty interviews, essays and reviews from numerous directors, film critics and scholars, this eagerly anticipated anthology offers the most complete survey of this emerging field to date.

    Film is now widely studied and researched in theology and religious studies departments, The Film and Religion Reader is therefore ideal for students and researchers, introduced and organized into the following thematic and chronological sections, each with an introduction by the editors:

    • the dawn of cinema: adherents and detractors
    • the birth of film theory: realism, formalism, and religious vision
    • directors and critics: global perspectives – African and Middle-Eastern perspectives; Asian and Australisian perspectives; European perspectives; South and North American perspectives
    • theological and Biblical approaches to analysing film
    • recent reflections on the relation between religion and film.

    This Reader brings together a huge amount of material in a student-friendly format and will be an invaluable resource for courses within both theology and religious studies.

    Jolyon Mitchell and S. Brent Plate, Introduction [appx 15-20pp]

    Section 1. Early Responses to Film

    [This section will include a 5-7pp Introduction + 45pp. of excerpts]

    i. Advocates: Celebrating Film {1-2 pp. each}

    1. Rev. Herbert Jump, "The Religious Possibilities of the Motion Picture" (1911)

    2. George Anderson, "The Case for Motion Pictures, Parts I and II," Congregationalist and Christian World (1909)

    3. Rev. Dr. Percy Stickney Grant, "If Christ Went to the Movies," Photoplay Magazine (1920)

    4. Jean Voltaire Smith, "Our Need for More Films" (1922)

    ii. Polemicists: Rejecting Film {1-2 pp. each}

    1. Tamar Lane, "What's Wrong with the Movies" (1923)

    2. R.G. Burnett and E.D. Martell, "The Devil's Camera" (1932)

    3. John Rice, "What is Wrong with the Movies" (1938)

    4. A.W. Tozer, "The Menace of the Religious Movie" (1950)

    5. Pope Pius XI, Vigilanti cura (1936)

    iii. Critics: Theorising Film {5-7 pp each}

    1. Andre Bazin, "Cinema and Theology: The Case of Heaven over the Marshes" (1957)

    2. Jean Epstein, "Cine-mystique" (1926)

    3. Maya Deren, "Notes on Ritual and Ordeal" (1965)

    4. Antonin Artaud, from "Sorcery and the Cinema" (1927)

    5. Stan Brakhage, from "Metaphors on Vision" (1963)

    Section 2. Directors: Film Makers on their Craft and its Relation to Religion

    [This section will include an 5-7pp Introduction + 85pp. of excerpts]

    i. European Voices {3-5pp each}

    1. Ingmar Bergman, on The Seventh Seal, from The Seventh Seal script introduction

    2. Luc Bresson, on religion in his films

    3. Carl Th. Dreyer, from Film Makers on Film Making

    4. Krzystof Kieslowski, on The Decalogue from Kieslowski on Kieslowski

    5. Andrey Tarkovsky, on Andrey Rublyov, from Sculpting Time

    6. Lars von Trier, from Trier on von Trier

    ii. World Voices {3-5pp each}

    1. Im Kwon-Taek, "Im Kwon-Taek" in Im Kwon-Taek: Filmemacher Aus Korea (Munich Film Festival, 1990)

    2. Abbas Kiarostami, from Abbas Kiarostami

    3. Ousmane Sembene, on "The power of female solidarity: An interview with Ousmane Sembene"

    4. Satyajit Ray, from Our Films, Their Films

    5. Akira Kurosawa, interview from Film Makers on Film Making

    6. Deepa Mehta, on Fire and Earth

    iii. North American Voices {3-5pp each}

    1. Woody Allen, from Woody Allen on Woody Allen

    2. Spike Lee, from Inner Views

    3. Nathaniel Dorsky, "Sacred Speed" interview with Scott MacDonald (Film Quarterly)

    4. Julie Dash, from Daughters of the Dust

    5. George Lucas, with Bill Moyers interview

    6. David Lynch, from Lynch on Lynch

    7. Martin Scorsese, from Martin Scorsese: Interviews

    8. Paul Schrader, from Transcendental Style on Film

    9. Stephen Speilberg, from Stephen Spielberg: Interviews

    Section 3. Films and Audiences: Methods of Analysis

    [This section will include an 5-7pp Introduction + 140pp of excerpts]

    i. Cultural and Social Contexts [5-7pp each]

    1. J. Hoberman and Jonathan Rosenbaum, from Midnight Movies

    2. Margaret R. Miles, from Seeing and Believing

    3. Paul Nathanson, from Over the Rainbow: Wizard of Oz as Secular Myth in America

    4. Eric W. Rothenbuhler, from Ritual Communication

    5. Patrick Kinkade and Michael Katovich, "Toward a Sociology of Cult Films: Reading Rocky Horror"

    ii. Biblical Connections [5-7pp each]

    1. Robert Jewett, The Interpretative Arch, from St Paul goes to the Movies

    2. Larry Kreitzer, The Triadic Approach, from The New Testament in Fiction and Film

    3. Cheryl Exum, from Plotted, Shot, and Painted

    4. Jennifer Koosed and Tod Linafelt, "How the West Was Not One: Delilah Deconstructs the Western"

    5. Adele Reinhartz, The Illustrative Method, from Scripture on the Silver Screen

    6. Erin Runions, from How Hysterical: Identification and Resistance in the Bible and Film

    iii. Theological Approaches

    1. Roy Anker, from Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies

    2. Robert Johnston, from Reel Spirituality

    3. Gerard Loughlin, from Alien Sex: The Body and Desire in Cinema and Theology

    4. Clive Marsh, from from Cinema and Sentiment

    5. John R. May, from New Image of Religious Film

    6. Christopher Deacy, from Screen Christologies or Faith in Film

    7. Jolyon Mitchell, 'Film and Theology' in The Modern Theologians

    8. Theresa Sanders, from Celluloid Saints: Images of Sanctity in Film

    iv. Religious Studies Perspectives

    1. Francisca Cho, "The Art of Presence: Buddhism and Korean film"

    2. S. Brent Plate, "The Re-Creation of the World: Filming Faith"

    3. W. Richard Comstock, "Myth and Contemporary Cinema"

    4. Michael Bird, "Film as Hierophany," in Religion in Film

    5. Ernest Ferlita and John R May, from Film odyssey: the art of film as search for meaning

    6. John C. Lyden, from Film as Religion

    7. Judith Wiesenfeld, "Projecting Blackness: African-American Religion in the Hollywood Imagination"

    Annotated Bibliography (if space allows) – Steve Nolan, Jolyon Mitchell and Brent Plate

    Biography

    Jolyon Mitchell is senior lecturer at New College, Edinburgh University. His previous publications include Visually Speaking, Mediating Religion, and Media Violence and Christian Ethics. S. Brent Plate is Associate Professor of Religion and the Visual Arts at Texas Christian University. His recent publications include Blasphemy: Art that Offends, Walter Benjamin, Religion and Aesthetics and Representing Religion in World Cinema.

     

    'This is a genuinely useful addition to the maturing literature on religion and film. The imaginative selection of readings makes this book an invaluable resource that will broaden and deepen the insights of students and researchers in this field. This will undoubtedly become a key text for any serious course exploring the various ways in which religion and film intersect.'Gordon Lynch, Professor of Sociology of Religion, Birkbeck, University of London, UK

    '[There is a lot to think about here], and it is just a micro-sample of all that is to be found in this milestone collection.' – Project Muse (Scholarly Journals Online)

    'Jolyon Mitchell and S. Brent Plate ... consistently stress the historical depth, the geographical spread and the sheer critical complexity that marks reflection on the relationship between religion and film. ... In conclusion, this is a highly intelligent and thought-provoking collection of work exploring the relationship between religion and film ...[T]his eclecticism is also one of the volume's main strengths for it constantly throws up new and challenging ways of thinking about religion and film, and for this reason alone, I would warmly recommend this book to scholars seeking a way into this field or looking for a course reader for their students.' – David Murphy, University of Stirling, Literature and Theology, 23(2)