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Disney’s A Christmas Carol (2009)
It’s almost a shock to hear the words “Christ the Savior is born” in a big-budget Hollywood movie today, even a time-honored period piece like A Christmas Carol. Only five years ago, Zemekis’ own The Polar Express rang with “Silver Bells” and “Deck the Halls,” but not so much as a “rum pa pum pum” from the stable at Bethlehem (not even at Santa’s North Pole home, where everyone celebrates Christmas).
Disney’s new Cinderella and the problem of parents in Hollywood fairy tales and family films
There are good reasons for introducing parent-child conflict into family films, depriving child protagonists of a parental safety net, depicting single-parent households, etc. There’s no good reason positive depictions of healthy, intact families in family films should be an endangered species.
District 9 (2009)
C. S. Lewis’s bleak prediction about human mistreatment of extraterrestrial creatures was framed in terms of human spacefarers encountering alien life on distant worlds, but the gist of his thesis is eminently applicable to the scenario proposed in District 9, a caustic and gory but sharply made sci-fi fable with a pungent South African flavor.
Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood (2002)
Despite being more of the "Yo" than "Ya" persuasion, I think I’m pretty receptive toward what are commonly called "chick flicks." After all, my wife and I enjoy the same "guy movies"; why shouldn’t we enjoy the same romances and other female-targeted films?
Do atheists and agnostics make the best religious films?
One of the noblest functions of art is the invitation to empathy: an invitation extended not only to the audience, but also to the artist.
Doctor Strange (2016)
The paradox of contemporary Hollywood blockbusters is that in our time virtually anything conceivable, no matter how wild and out there, can be put on the screen, but it almost never is.
Doctor Strange and Hacksaw Ridge: Breaking rules and the greater good
In each of their latest films, the battle against a threatening power raises questions about which principles the protagonist should or shouldn’t compromise in order to protect his world — questions that aren’t necessarily clearly answered by the end of the film.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
I’m thinking of a moment in the original movie in which Stephen looks skeptically at a deeply corrupted individual nattering about the greater good and retorts, “No. I mean, come on — look at your face.” Nobody says that in the sequel, but they should.
Does the priest in Calvary recommend mortal sin?
Calvary is full of depraved, troubled characters, and in trying to minister to them Fr. Lavelle sometimes gets his hands dirty. Does he cross moral lines?
![A Dog’s Journey [video]](/uploads/articles/dogsjourney.jpeg)
A Dog’s Journey [video] (2019)
Who is the target audience for Precious Moments from hell, or at least from a bad country song?
Dogma (1999)
Like the creators of Dogma, I feel the need to begin with a disclaimer of my own. This review is an exercise in film criticism and commentary informed by Christian faith. It is neither an anti-Dogma activist polemic nor a pro-Dogma apologetical treatise. I come not to praise Kevin Smith, nor to bury him, but to critique his work.
Dogma in Dogma: A Theological Guide
From a religious point of view, Kevin Smith’s Dogma comes a lot closer to making sense if you just accept one premise: The angels in it — fallen and otherwise — are all really bad at theology.
Don Q Son of Zorro (1925)
Don Q Son of Zorro, named one of the year’s ten best films by The New York Times, actually outdoes its predecessor, with a stronger and more sophisticated plot, better pacing, more interesting and complex characterizations, grander production values and set design, and more consistent action.
Don’t Count Out Babies!
Defying early box-office nay-sayers, Focus Features’ life-affirming documentary Babies opened over Mother’s Day weekend with significantly better ticket sales than originally estimated, thanks to what the website Box Office Mojo is calling (in the idiom of the movie beat) “a huge Mother’s Day bump.”
Don’t Have a Cow, Man!
A reader raises interesting questions relating to chastity, modesty and raising children in a note about the movie Babies, now in theaters.
Don’t read reviews of Pixar’s Brave!
Reviews from the Hollywood trade journals (Variety, the Hollywood Reporter, etc.) and perhaps other sources are starting to appear … and they all freely reveal a key second-act plot twist that I went into Brave not knowing. And I’m sure that more reviews, as they come out, will do the same.
Don’t Get Left Behind
Still others, trying to strike a happy medium, opt for a tolerant ecumenical openness to various interpretations. "Pray for ’pre’ but prepare for ’post,’ " advised Fundamentalist singer Keith Green when asked about his views on the timing of the rapture and the tribulation. Many likewise feel that the interpretation of end-times prophecy is an inessential matter regarding which Christians may legitimately hold different views. (Incidentally, if you’re already having trouble with terms like "pre" and "post," try this summary to get up to speed.)
The down-to-earth comic genius of Harold Lloyd
Due to the vagaries of history, Lloyd is less well-known today than Chaplin or Keaton, but his legacy lives on. If you’ve seen Back to the Future (1985), Bringing Up Baby (1938), any of Jackie Chan’s movies, or any incarnation of Superman or Harry Potter, or you’ve experienced Lloyd’s influence.
Dr. Seuss’s Horton Hears a Who! (2008)
One book can’t contain Horton’s dogged heroics! / His stoical pluck shows up all other stoics! / And it gets even better! I’m pleased to relate / That Horton’s the very best Blue Sky to date.
Dragonfly (2002)
Dragonfly is a ghost story of sorts, but it isn’t a horror film (though it occasionally thinks it is). The ghost seems to be the late wife of Dr. Joe Darrow (Kevin Costner); and who would be frightened of his own best beloved, even if she happened to be a ghost?
Recent
- Crisis of meaning, part 3: What lies beyond the Spider-Verse?
- Crisis of meaning, part 2: The lie at the end of the MCU multiverse
- Crisis of Meaning on Infinite Earths, part 1: The multiverse and superhero movies
- Two things I wish George Miller had done differently in Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
- Furiosa tells the story of a world (almost) without hope
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