I don't like going to weddings. Weddings combine all the things an introvert deeply loathes and dreads. First, the massive crowd of strangers. Second, public displays of sentiment, Third idle chit chat at awkward tables filled with people you don't care about, and lastly endless loops of marital cliches and trite jokes from people you wouldn't sit next to at the dentist office. Despite my inner angst against the pageant world of american weddings, I've gone to dozens in the last few years. Extrovert Italian wife trumps introvert mongrel husband every time. Not too long ago I found myself at a wedding with my wife. It was my friend and other than one of the participants I only vaguely new 3 other people. It was hell.
Person after person would sheepishly ask who I was and who I knew. The groom's family and friends assumed I was with the bride and the bride's side assumed I was with the groom. I was nearly paralyzed as I had to sputter out a convoluted tale of why I was there. The only worse experience was the time we went to a family reunion and all my family assumed my wife was their relative and I had married into the family. I wasn't nearly as meaningful in my friends life as the others in attendance. After my fifth explanation of my presence ended abruptly as the listener walked away whilst I was in mid sentence, my mind went to that dark place in all introverts.
I imagined that the next total stranger I spoke with was going to explain to me that they donated a kidney to the groom's ailing WWII war hero grandfather. The veteran who killed Hitler bare handed and who even at 75 still volunteers to safe orphans from wells they've fallen into. I would then explain that I was invited to the wedding years earlier at time when I and my friend were much closer and more idealistic. I'd confess that lately we had drifted a part but that my pal always kept their word and so did I. Thus the only reason I was there was because it was too awkward to uninvite me for them and too awkward for me not to show up.
My wife and I made our way to our seat and found that we were sitting directly across from someone who flat out didn't like me. Of all the neurotic and paranoid scenarios I worked through in the weeks leading up to the wedding I never envisioned this scenario. The threat of socializing with strangers had consumed me. I never imagined I'd be socializing with an acquaintance who had numerous untold judgments about me and my intentions.. This acquaintance happened to be a man so throughly disinterested in me as a person and so disapproving of every thought I could ever think that I began self flagellating before I could pull out my chair. The sheer level of disdain this man has for me is amazing.
We met briefly years ago and I desperately wanted to be liked by him. From the first moments we met in a line he was nasty. The colder and more condescending he was the more self effacing and humorous I tried to be. We ate dinner together once and he spent the entire time chiding me about how arrogant I was. I felt like a coconspirator of my own abuse.
I plastered on my best smile and feigned my best, "How are you buddy?!" Within 15 minutes he was offering unsolicited opinions and wisdom on my life. The more I wanted him to shut up the more I confessed my faults and the more I wanted to slap him the more I got quite. Too afraid to answer honestly and boldly. The more I shrunk the more he pounced. Before the night was over he more than insinuated I harbored lust for the bride. All with my wife next to me.
After the wedding, and a few nights ago, my wife noted how much this man doesn't like me. She also noted how self defeating I was in his presence. In moments like that I let one man's dislike of me and judgements of me define my identity. Maybe I did it because he is a fellow Christian, or because he is a pastor, or because so many people kiss his rear. Nevertheless, I let this man address me with less respect than you would give a child in front of my wife because I wanted to be like and loved.
How much of my life is lived for someone other than the Father? How much was Jesus life lived for the approval and affirmation of others? Even when He got it he seemed disinterested in it. His inner assuredness did not make him arrogant or distanced from others. Rather, it opened him up to love everyone. Even those who hated him He loved because he did not need their affirmation first before he gave them himself. He faced certain rejection and yet remained vulnerable. Jesus is broken bread for a hunger-less world.
I don't like that man. I don't like the way he makes me feel or the way he subtly gets off on pointing out my flawed life, flawed thinking, and flawed faith. I don't like how I take on the flaws he projects even if they aren't there. If I could punch him I might. Worse than my desire for violence however is my lack of love. I don't love him. I don't even want to try and love him. I want him out of my world and never to be seen again. If I knew the love of God like Jesus, I would love myself deeply enough to love this man. My sense of self would be immovable even as my heart remained tender and vulnerable. To love we have to be loved first.
British television has for years gotten something right. They are not afraid of brevity. If a character or story arc is only capable of producing a handful of really good episodes they will often only produce that handful. Often runs of series are separated by nearly a decade. As of late the U.S. is starting to pick up on this trend. AMC has created a niche of highly crafted dramatic series that have a limited number of high quality episodes per season and exceptionally long gaps between those seasons. What does any of that have to do with Schwarzenegger's latest dud? Frankly, "Sabotage" doesn't work as a movie. It is disjointed and episodic. It has the feel of an HBO or AMC miniseries that was converted into a movie once Arnold became attached and it may have worked better in that format.
I honestly think that this hard edged cop action/drama would have worked best in a TV format. Whatever interest the script generates in the characters is always truncated by the need to move the action along. There is something of interest in watching a group of moral adrift ATF agents get picked off one by one by a cartel. Arnold reaches for three dimensional here by playing a morally grey character in a bleak and troubled world. This movie pulls no punches but it also doesn't come together into anything special.
The movie is devoid of any of the usually action picture winks and nods. This is a drama with a thriller plot, horror movie killings, and action stunt sequences. It follows the trend of the last 15 years by making every single character a villain. Like "The Sopranos", "The Wire", "The Shield", and "Mad Men" before it; "Sabotage" doesn't give us a clear cut protagonist to cheer for. It also never gives us character to know amidst the action and blood letting. Before we know the character's names we see them get knocked off in one gruesome death after another. The shock and psychopathy is all meaningless when you don't know or care about the people being butchered. Bodies and characters serve only as props to the violence.
Yet still I think there is something interesting about the drug cartel hunting and chasing down corrupt drug enforcement officers. I think this under utilized cast of good actors, including even Arnold, would be better served in a 45 minute increments and a season or two to tell this story. Then the characters and deaths and tragedies and backstories would have time to steep. I even noted to my wife while watching it, "Here is the midseason finale," and "Here is the season two premiere." Maybe I want this to be a TV series because the aforementioned shows tackled similarly moral ambiguities with greater skill. Some stories are better told on TV and maybe some stories could just be better written.
Bottom Line: Wait for Cable
Director: David Ayer
Writers: Skip Woods, David Ayer
Stars: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sam Worthington, Terrence Howard, Mireille Enos
I didn't know that I cared about Roger Ebert. Not until the day he passed and I began to cry as if I'd lost a loved one. Not until the one year anniversary of his death and I cried even harder. Not until just moments ago when I finished the new documentary "Life Itself". The film is fitted around Ebert's autobiography of the same name, "Life Itself" became something much more than standard biographical fare when Ebert died during production.
The film is unblinking in it's honesty about Ebert. It doesn't paint him as a hero without any serious defect. It brings his ego, his drinking, his obesity, his control issues, his cancer, his disfigurement, his depression, and his death to center screen. Nothing is held back. Roger wanted the movie to be honest and to be real. He liked movies like that and didn't want to make a film he couldn't stand to watch.
"Life Itself" slingshots back and forth from a traditional biography (principally dealing in the past) and traditional documentary (principally dealing with the present). It is hard to watch at times but deeply engaging. My wife, who cares nothing for film critics, was captivated by the story and the sadness.
For me growing older was like a race to catch up to all the fun going on around me in the adult world. I was stuck at the kids table in the cosmos and wanted to speed on toward the adult party. The irony and or tragedy of aging is everyone does it. Although the movies keeps everyone young forever, time does not. The older I got the older the people I thought were cool got to. By the time I was their age their moment had passed and they were now still older than me. The people around us are forever at a distance of time and space from us. We simply can not at any time or place converge with our heroes. They are ever elusively steaming on ahead all the while ever leaving us behind. They venture forth until, like cascading off some precipice, they vanish from life itself.
It is said, "No one should bury their child." But we all bury our fathers and fallen idols. Watching Ebert self medicate with booze, bravado, and occasional cruelty only made the last images of a frail and tiny old man that much more difficult to watch. Roger Ebert was anything but slight or small in his day. His verbiage, his charm, his intelligence, his ego, and his mass were all expansive. He was as big as the movies until he was mortal and wounded. We get to see both.
The movie, like the man, is never totally without humor as well. Further we get plenty of great professional and personal glimpses into the life and legacy of both Ebert and his foil Gene Siskel. The humor and humanity only add to beloved critics mystique. The film is moving and gives some sense to the seemingly senseless grief of millions. Whoever mourned a film critic? In Roger's case, a devoted wife, loving step grandchildren, and masses of adoring fans world wide.
In the history of film reviews this may be the most scatter shot. It fails the test by not dealing with themes and performances. I'm not sure how I can write better about such a surprisingly personal experience for me. I can't be objective. I was blinded by my emotions the whole way through. You see Roger Ebert was the first person I ever heard talk about movies the way I felt abut them. One saturday mid morning on channel 8 Siskel and Ebert appeared. They spoke humorlessly and passionately about things I cared about at 8 years old. Neither time nor death erases that sort of imprint. It will be there forever and as long as it lasts it will bring an ache to my heart. Those voices are quiet now. The party has ended and I never had the chance to talk with those adults I so admired from afar.
Go see this documentary in a big starry skied theatre, if you can find one showing it, or find one at all. Sit in the balcony and watch. Perhaps, like he does every time I sit in a movie house, Roger Ebert will sit down right beside you.
“Idolatry is committed, not merely by setting up false gods, but also by setting up false devils; by making men afraid of war or alcohol, or economic law, when they should be afraid of spiritual corruption and cowardice.”
G.K. Chesterton
Read more at http://www.relevantmagazine.com/culture/15-chesterton-quotes-will-shape-your-faith#olAvMJvYf4BUkCym.99
Godzilla is good. The characters first full on screen appearance gave me goosebumps and I've historically not been a Godzilla fan. The only downside is that the creatures aren't given enough time on screen. Which is both refreshing and frustrating. Refreshing because so many big budget CGI spectacles use special effects to create meaningless noise and confusion. It is frustrating however to not get to see the King of Monsters in full action without cutting away. The film is more concerned about the human story but not necessarily the human people. All the exposition, motivation, and conflict is there but the emotion is missing. We care too little about the people who feel almost real but never actually real. Perhaps just choosing a different male lead would have made a difference. He is tasked with holding all of the stories weight and is simply not up to it. The script offers him very little development. However, the visuals and screenplay do invoke a great many other things. Echoes of environmental crisis and even the Iliad come through.
What we have is a good movie that borders on really good but never great. Still worth your dime. Go see it. Unless you like Michael Bay style action. Finally, the actual monster Godzilla is an incredible design. I wanted to stand up and cheer every time he let out that classic roar!
Some men will spin out a long prayer telling God who and what he is, or they pray out a whole system of divinity. Some people preach, others exhort the people, till everybody wishes they would stop, and God wishes so, too, most undoubtedly.
I like Sly Stallone. I don't like many of the film choices he has made but I think the guy is talented. I think Hollywood always kept him down or in a certain light because he didn't fit the system. They were fine with him grossing a billion dollars in action movies but they never wanted him to really act. He was supposed to be a fluke street punk who got lucky with Rocky. Instead he became an american Icon.
Now there is Grudge Match. Where does this rank in Sly's bad movie history? It's better than Tango and Cash. It's more watchable than Stop of My Mom Will Shoot. It's not as disappointing as Judge Dredd, Bullet to the Head, or any of The Expendables films. By the way, The Expendables is the coolest idea on paper but they've done nothing of value with it. Why can't someone figure that thing out?
Grudge Match did not get the same good will of the people like say, Rocky Balboa got in 2006.However it does have the same plot. Take all the Rocky saga elements and a lot of old gezzer jokes, blend them into mediocrity and you get Grudge Match. The movie is funny in spots and close to funny all over the place. That is the problem. The jokes never really land in the right place and most of the punch lines are predictable. The cast is talented and the potential is there for some laugh out loud moments but the script keeps it mostly vanilla. You know your comedy is in trouble when the two best scenes are from the end credits.
I think the previews made the movie seem like a cynical cash grab from two actors who's best work is behind them. It isn't cynical at all. Yet, nobody asked for a Raging Bull or Rocky mashup parody. Especially 30 years later from the original guys. It's not fun making fun of two great classics. What I can say is that Grudge Match tried. It really did try to tell a funny story. It's best was one note. By the first 20 minutes we get it. The leads are old and Kevin Hart is short and black. So what?
The same premise and same actors with a better script could have made something worth watching. Instead we got an okay movie. Flavorless but non offensive. Why do I feel like this movie will be a hit with the same demo as Last Vegas?
One of the biggest flops of 2013 has made it's way to home video. 47 Ronin currently holds a 13% approval rating from the critics on Rotten Tomatoes. That rating is extremely low and to be honest I don't get it.
Those expecting a 300 style violent samurai epic will be disappointed. Those familiar with the true medieval events and history surrounding the 47 Ronin will be even more disappointed. This film is neither an action spectacle nor an accurate retelling of history. This is a fantasy melodrama with some elaborate action scenes. It is simple and fairly straight forward. It doesn't attempt to frame action sequences like most western movies these days. There is a total lack of noise and confusion here. The characters, the story, the fights, the villains, all of it is minimalistic and clean. We get all the whys and whats instantly.
AS for it's failure, my guess is that this movies was too eastern for the west and to western for the east. It did however hold my attention. Even though I knew how it was going to end. The idea that men would set out on a mission destined for one result simply because of honor is very eastern. In America we play the odds. Honor be damned.
It reminded me a lot of the western melodramas of the early 1990's. Most american westerns were inspired by the numerous samurai films of Japan and vice versa. It also reminded me of a Disney animated film. Strip away the songs and slap stick and you get the basic story. Star crossed lovers, plots, betrayal, magic, and redemption. This is like a myth, a fantasy, or a morality legend told to teach virtues and extol wisdom. This isn't The Matrix were asian culture was stripped of larger themes and slapped into Platonic SCI-FI Manga schlock.
Speaking of Manga this movie is not for the anime and manga crowd. It isn't even for the traditional Samurai film fan. I'm not sure who it's for. Maybe fans of fantasy melodrama or westerns. For instance, fans of the American tragedy Legends of the Fall may like this movie. Speaking of fantasy, did Dances With Wolves represent the true American west?
With the right expectations and right mind set this film is entertaining and deserves well above a 13% approval rating.
Bottom Line: Rent It
In my experience the Holy Spirit refuses to cooperate with cynicism. Cynicism is so the opposite of His personality that He will not share space with it. You can not be cynical and flow in the fullness of the Spirit.
My personal views on seminary have changed a few times over the last 15 years. Most seminarians I knew were not relatable people. A 23 year old with loads of informations, little practical life experience, and a degree can be an obnoxious thing. Even more, they can be dangerous. My exclusive experience with seminarians was negative. They were obsessively embittered toward ideas that diverged from their own. They were Incredible egotistical in their certainty of things scripture is silent about. They believed themselves to more capable than those who came before them. It didn't matter whether these people were conservative or liberal in their theology. Either way they were rude, arrogant, and puffed up. Not unlike most other college kids or even myself at that age. However, their ego was wrapped in the language of God rather than soft sciences.
I know it isn't fair to judge the seminary system based on a few dozen people. However, I did. I saw it as an intellectual pit where you learned systems and formulas and neglected the Spirit and the scripture. To me a seminary was nothing more than a way to mass produce intellectuals who dismissed the power of God and turned whole denominations into cemeteries.
I don't see it like that as much anymore. I think there are a number of reasons why seminaries aren't known for producing fiery men and women of great fruitfulness. I'll list some of my thoughts now.
Either a system is defunct or the expectations placed on that system are inaccurate. For instance, a seminary may be an excellent place in training the mind but not the right system to stoke fire in the heart. A seminary may succeed in training students in good exegesis but fail in making them men and women of the Spirit. You don't expect a manufacturing plant that produces cars to spit out iPads do you? Maybe we are expecting the wrong results. Here is what seminaries can not do.
1. Seminaries Don't Make Converts
A personal conversion/experience/relationship with Christ is not necessary to perform academic functions. If you have the brains, the will, and the money you can get any degree in any field you want. You don't need a born again heart to graduate with honors from a seminary. You can be in a pastorate and not know Christ personally. If someone isn't spiritually alive in Christ and receives formal education only, how can we expect them to be passionate prophetic leaders?
2. Seminary Education Does Not Equate Discipleship
Jesus made disciples to whom He entrusted the mission of making disciples. He did not establish a school of religious thought. Which was in vogue at the time. He could of but he did not. Spiritual formation and Christian maturation occur in the whole of life. Seminaries can feed the mind but they do nothing to grow the spirit, emotional maturity, or character of their students. Discipleship is primarily learning to live a new life in and by the Spirit. One can be a convert and an M.Div or Th.D but not know how to walk in the Spirit. Browse the epistles and find how many commands are given to the saints. Then find how many of those commands are directly or indirectly connected by the apostles to the Holy Spirit and cooperation with Him. The whole of life in Christ is found in the Spirit. An educated leader isn't a spiritually sensitive one by proxy. It take sensitivity to the Spirit to lead, preach, disciple, pray, and it is this lifestyle that we are to model and impart to the next generation. Disciples can get degrees but a degree will never make a disciple.
3. Seminary Doesn't Require a Calling
Ministry is extremely difficult. Many are called but few are chosen. Many believers feel a call to ministry and many see seminary as a way of getting into their calling. Churches that decentralize their ministry and redistribute responsibilities to the congregation tend to see a decline in the number of people who feel called to vocational ministry. The bottom line is: If ministry is seen and done as part of ordinary lay life, the laity will not seek to become clergy. If leaders equip and release their own churches to function, laity is more likely to function at the level they are called to. If clergy is the only route to important ministry than more people will see vocational ministry as their calling. We have people who are ordained simply because ordination is required to do any and all ministry in the body. Ergo, you have a glut of people in official positions who aren't called to that level of ministry. Seminary as a system is not the most effective tool to sort that out. Everyone is educated the same. Call or no call.
4. Seminary Doesn't Negate Personal Choice
One can be taught all the right practices, given all the right tools ,taught all the right doctrine, but if fail to utilize any of it. Esiegesis is easier. Not praying daily and deeply is easier. Copying and pasting sermons, depending on tradition, living carnally, these are all easier than doing the right thing. A degree does not ensure that the student will continue to do the hard work once there is no more grading. Will the congregation confront you lack of prayer and passion? Is it even their place?
Seminary is not a panacea or magic bullet. If core elements of Spiritual formation are not in place, then an education isn't going to make up the slack. Cold hearted intellectualism is more likely to develop within someone who isn't matured in the Spirit. A failure to depend on the Holy Spirit will make it much easier to depend on text books, formularies, and ego.
"Glory is not simply a kind of luminescence, as though the point of salvation were that we would eventually shine like electric lightbulbs. Glory means, among other things, rule and power and authority; as other writers (notably Saint John the Divine) make clear, part of the point of God’s saving his people is that they are destined not merely to enjoy a relaxing endless vacation in a place called heaven, but that they are designed to be God’s stewards, ruling over the whole creation with healing and restorative justice and love."
Many of us treat church life like immature adolescents. From other Christians we want thrills, constant exhilaration and to have our needs met. When Christian brothers and sisters fall short of our expectations, when they are boring and imperfect and fail to meet our needs for strokes, we pout, turn away and isolate ourselves from them. Jesus calls us to mature commitment of love for his people - the very people in our fellowship!
Was never a Sleeping Giant fan but always respected them. A friend played some shows with them and toured with other bands that did as well. Word on the street is that these guys are legit.
"The call of the Gospel is for the church to implement the victory of God in the world. The cross is not just an example to be followed; it is an achievement to be worked out, put into practice."
