The Struggle to Believe in Modern Cinema
The post-Christian world has fundamentally changed the way that Hollywood interacts with religion. Christianity was once the normative belief system in the United States. The Catholic Legion…
Evangelicals in the Public Square After the Scopes Trial
Fundamentalism is something of a dirty word; equally a badge of pride and a mark of shame, but most definitely a banner that has led many controversial…
Hope and Optimism on the Planet of the Apes
The rebooted Planet of the Apes movies must be among the bleakest and strangest Hollywood blockbusters of the past decade and a half. The three entries before…
Cinema is Reborn with “Dune: Part Two”
Several years ago, Hollywood briefly released a slate of medieval-themed films coming from sizable and talented directors. Films like Green Knight, The Last Duel, Benedetta, and The…
The Existential Foundations for Science Fiction
It is no secret that modern genre of science fiction plays a major role in our culture’s mythological and memetic development. Much ink has been spent on…
Irrational Fear of fhe Self: The Creator and Oikophobia in Science Fiction
Among the more interesting original movies to come out this year was the newest film from Godzilla and Rogue One director Gareth Edwards. It didn’t turn out…
Barbie: A Confused Postmodern Masterpiece
It has been a curious and exciting thing to watch Greta Gerwig’s Barbie turn into one of the largest and most discussed films of the past decade…
Why is the Sound of Freedom so Controversial?
Even amidst major releases like Barbie, Oppenheimer, and Indiana Jones, the most talked about movie of the summer is a low-budget indie actioner that has broken every…
The Washington National Cathedral and Me: Christ on the Altar and Politics at the Nave
There is something amusing about the fact that America’s largest churches are all Episcopalian. Plato, in The Republic, presupposes that the height of society should be its…
Cormac McCarthy’s Coda: The Last Breath Of An Agnostic Materialist
The greatest living author in the United States passed away last month on June 13. Cormac McCarthy died of natural causes at the age of 89, having…
Space Operas and Human Folly—Pandora, Perelandra, and the Fall of Man
I’m old enough to remember when James Cameron’s Avatar was a surprisingly controversial topic of discussion. My Evangelical Tea-Party supporting family regarded the film with relative disdain,…
The Bleak and Empty Heart of Everything Everywhere All At Once
At the heart of Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 masterpiece 2001: A Space Odyssey is a story of transformation. The film is often disregarded by casual moviegoers for its…
Participation with the Divine through Music: Earl Davey’s “The Arts and the Christian Life”
Earl Davey. The Arts and The Christian Life. Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2022. As the late philosopher Roger Scruton writes, “Beauty is a real and…