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Behind the Screen: Hollywood Insiders on Faith, Film, and Culture
Spencer Lewerenz and Barbara Nicolosi (Editors)
2005, BakerBooks, 216 pages
Reviewed by Kent d Curry
January 23, 2006

“Perhaps it’s time to see Hollywood less like Sodom and more like Nineveh.”

– Karen and Jim Covell¹

This book swarms with thought-provoking quotes and fascinating information, but they all originate from this one insight—Hollywood isn’t Sodom, but Nineveh. After all, God Himself destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, yet He found appalling Nineveh worth saving once they heard the prophet’s message and repented. If that’s true, then the wholesale condemnations from pulpits and radio ministries must cease and missionary training must begin.

Except in some ways, from brave folks across numerous Christian denominations, that has already occurred. The Jonahs have already established a beachhead in our modern-day Nineveh.

This book is their letter to the rest of us.

Letter from Nineveh
Since 1999, Act One, a non-profit, non-denominational program designed to train artists-apostles for Hollywood, has been offering month-long screenwriting programs to Christian creatives.

Behind the Screen: Hollywood Insiders on Faith, Film, and Culture is their faculty sharing thoughts, instructions, history, and dreams with the greater public, an open deposition, if you will, on the state of Christians, their faith, and their art within the TV and film business. It is as much a critique of Hollywood as it is of a reluctant Christianity to engage it. Or, as the editor’s state, “…if we are to transform Hollywood, we must first transform ourselves.” ²

Despite the covering everything from the hard work necessary to catch a break to basic screenwriting skills to basic Christian survival skills to how to use $10 billion wisely from a host of screenwriters, producers, academics, and directors, the book overall tone reflects a teacher’s humility—knowledgeable,  clear, perceptive, while still sometimes exasperated at a student’s inability to grasp the basics.

There are also similar points interlaced throughout these differing offerings:

No Christian denominations is grasping the Nineveh paradigm—No religious organization seems to see Hollywood as a mission field. None seem to be progressive enough to grapple with the current realities of modern media in a victorious manner.

Christians need to understand art better—The essayists understand most Christian’s discomfort with art (in the high, classic sense), and labor to explain the friction it creates just by existing. Whether we call them movies or film, make-believe or filth, it is still an art form that we must acknowledge. Because most Christians don’t understand art, they neither make good films (Exhibit A: The Left Behind series), nor understand the hard work it takes to even attempt to create them. Without that dedication to quality, there is no impact.

Only mature Christians need arrive—There are too many temptations, too many compromising situations, and too much rejection for the naïve soul who just want to be the next Spielberg or Branjelina.  (Yet that’s no different than most mission fields, except for the one-in-a-billion chance at celebrity and riches that Hollywood offers instead of, say, the nomadic tribes of the Sahara desert.) Make sure you are called to Hollywood by God first, then start your training immediately.

Protest effectively—Several essayists point out that protesting a movie or TV show via boycotts, demonstrations, and/or form letters is worthless, but sending letters to the producers and or studios about your concerns over content almost always yields positive results. Even more importantly, send letters praising them for what you like in a show. You’re more likely to see more of it that way.

Challenging Questions
There are any number of provocative treatises worth dissecting in a review like this, from director Scott Derrickson investigating “What is the duty of a Christian in Hollywood?” by guiding his readers through his own ideological, Pilgrim’s Progress-type journey from the Village of Passive Consumers to the Battalion of Value Changers and on until becoming a member of the Quality Club, to “The Hollywood Divide” detailing two storytelling tendencies in drama, one that Christians implicitly understand and the other that makes us uncomfortable, and how to handle that discomfort, to Janet Schott Batchelor offering three good reasons to come to Hollywood, but five reasons not to come, to Ralph Winter’s accessible “A Hollywood Survival Guide” (takeaway quote: “In this industry, being married is a choice we have to make every day.”), yet instead I want to focus on one key aspect of Thom Parham’s “Why Do Heathens Make the Best Christian Films?”

After opening with an effective Christian-themed film and listing successes and failures, he drops this little bombshell:

Jesus began many of his parables with the phrase, “The kingdom of God is like ...” Jesus’s parables allowed his audience to understand heavenly principles in earthly terms. He would even respond to questions with parables—instead of stating the answer outright, he would allow his audience to make the connections themselves. Jesus also knew that the things of heaven are too large to be fully grasped by the human mind. They are mysteries, in the classic sense of the word, and can only be hinted at through symbols and metaphors.

Christian filmmakers seem to dislike mystery. Rather than using Jesus’s construct, “The kingdom of God is like ... ,” their films often proclaim, “The kingdom of God is.” Nothing is left to the imagination. Audiences are not allowed to make their own connections; they are told what to think.

. . . As long as people of faith are more concerned with messages than metaphors, they are doomed to make bad films.³

Of course, this doesn’t just apply to film but Christian fiction and drama and just about anything that isn’t preaching. Ambiguities create discussion, pondering, and a deeper look into any work of art. As satisfying as neat conclusions can be, too often they’re soon filed under “forgettable.”  It is the unknown that stays continues to fascinate us.

Yet, as humans, we’re uncomfortable with “mystery.” Receiving the Holy Spirit makes it little better. We promote the concept of an infinite God with unknowable ways, then work very hard to put Him in a small, controllable box. Mystery seems to connote doubt and fear, both unacceptable within the church body, but understandable to any individual. Mystery is the gifts of the spirit, the scary next step we’re supposed to access in America, but too often project onto missionaries in foreign fields. Mystery is what makes a mere story art and the best art immortal. Mystery is as essential to the Christian walk as it is to the immortal dramas from past centuries. It’s time we accepted that. Then we need to live it.

Understanding The Mission Field
Every essayist isn’t riveting, of course; there’s some fluff (does novelist James Scott Bell listing his favorite movies matter?) and some disingenuous scolding (Craig Detweiler believes Christians mishandled the entire Passion of the Christ anti-Semitism charges because we made no efforts to understand Hollywood’s Jewish background. What he doesn’t explain is how we could’ve built those bridges between communities when we were just reacting to their overreaction of The Passion), but the substantial essays far overshadow the  weak efforts, making for grand reading and honest soul-searching.

At no point do the essayists justify the industry’s excesses and sins, rather accepting the reality of their barren mission field and trying to plant good seeds. After all, if Hollywood is the mission field of Nineveh and not the earthly Hell of Sodom—wouldn’t we be treating its people and its end-products a bit differently?

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© 2005 Kent d Curry

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Kent d Curry is an executive editor of ninetyandnine.com.

Footnotes
1. Page 84
2. Page 11
3. Pages 58-59