Film and Faith: Modern Cinema and the Struggle to Believe explores religious themes in contemporary film with a focus on recent depictions of religion's continuing manifestations in a secularizing age. The contributors are students of philosophy, political theory, and theology; examine religious and philosophical ideas in commercially and artistically important modern films. They offer a scholarly yet accessible considerations of contemporary films exploring the problem of faith in the modern world. The approach is balanced: sympathetic but not uncritical, reflecting a complexity in the minds of the contributors themselves. While they are religious believers, nonetheless established scholars trained in mainstream academic disciplines. The chapters cover cinema that are important in different ways, and that represent different genres: from the art films of Terrence Malick to the more conventional but serious dramas of the Coen brothers and Frank Capra, to popular action blockbusters like the Dark Knight and the Marvel films. Drawing on these cinematic works, the authors explore religious themes that remain salient even in a time when religion seems to be in decline: themes such as sin and judgment, the experience of grace and reconciliation, and confrontation with radical evil.
Carson Holloway is professor of Political Science at the University of Nebraska at Omaha Micah Watson is is Paul Henry professor of Christianity and Politics at Calvin University
Part I: Sin and Alienation in a Fallen World Chapter 1: "Fantasies of Fallen Man": Reading Robert Eggers's The Northman in Light of J. R. R. Tolkien's Catholic Aesthetics, J. Columcille Dever Chapter 2: Gran Torino: The Sins of Walt Kowalski, Matthew J. Franck Chapter 3: Flying the Faithless Skies: Up in the Air, Susan McWilliams Barndt Part II: The Workings of Grace in a Fallen World Chapter 4: God, Man, and George Bailey: The Theological Anthropology of It's a Wonderful Life, Francis J. Beckwith Chapter 5: Gravity and Gratitude, Christopher Tollefsen Chapter 6: Receptivity to Grace and the Affirmation of Life: Reflections on Babette's Feast, Kirstin Carlson and David McPherson Chapter 7: Terrence Malick's Knight of Cups: A Pilgrim's Progress, R. Michael Olson Part III: Faith and the Confrontation with Radical Evil Chapter 8: Radical Evil and Redemption in the Dark Knight Trilogy, Micah Watson Chapter 9: Thanos, Thor, and Theodicy: The Problem of Evil in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Jordan J. Ballor Chapter 10: Tradition, Demonic Evil, and Despair in No Country for Old Men, Carson Holloway Chapter 11: Malick on Martyrdom: A Hidden Life, Jennifer A. Frey
"This is a great volume of essays that work both as solid primers into major themes related to faith, and as lucid excursions into specific films. This volume is fascinating, readable, and provocative. Highly recommended." -- Khalil M. Habib, Hillsdale College "The authors of this fine collection of essays remind us that real art, even highly commercialized art like film, is meant to help us better see reality, including the reality of ourselves as humans in a fallen world hungrily longing for mercy and grace. This book provides a great service, not only in helping us better appreciate movies we have seen, but in preparing us to be more thoughtful movie goers in the future." -- Jerome Foss, Saint Vincent College
