Studio Stick It To 'Em

Note to Sorkin: We know what you are doing. You think if you create a Christian character, and make her cute and smart, that you are then covered to say every nasty rotten, bigotted thing you want about Christians.

It doesn't. You can't.

For the record, we know what you're doing. It's called...

..to?ken?ism? /?to?k??n?z?m/ Pronunciation[toh-kuh-niz-uhm] –noun
1. the practice or policy of making no more than a token effort or gesture, as in offering opportunities to minorities equal to those of the majority.
2. any legislation, admissions policy, hiring practice, etc., that demonstrates only minimal compliance with rules, laws, or public pressure: Admitting one woman to the men's club was merely tokenism.

Bigotted people do tokenism to cover their asses from charges of being bigotted. Just to say.

And I'd get really mad about it, except that I think the audience is going to reject Studio 60 as just more really lame exercise in Hollywood narcissim.

So, getting mad about the intolerance of "crazy Christians" would be swinging at a pitch in the dirt.

So, we'll just pray for you instead. On some level, it's fascinating how much we Christians are getting to you.

P.S. Some folks are claiming thatthe writing in Studio 60 was remarkably stellarly fantastic the amazing like of which we have never seen before. Yawn. So not true. And here's why.

Bad writing is a writer telling the audience how to feel. In last night's episode, we were supposed to believe that an episode of a SNL clone show that pilloried Christians was somehow brave and daring. See, that's where the writing tripped up. We were being told that savaging Christians for laughs was a rare act of courage, spitting in the eye of the cowering network establishment that dwells in mind-numbing terror of the awesomely powerful group which will foreverafter be known as CHR_STIANS(!) for fear of saying the complete name and bringing down their all-consuming wrath.

In fact, savaging Chr_stians on everything from SNL to Law and Order to the Brooklyn Museum of Art has become commonplace and . So, the show was telling us that a character was being brave, when in fact, he was being trite. This is the definition of bad writing.

If Sorkin et al. really wanted to brave it would have been easily achieved. Have the controversial skit be called, "Crazy Violent Religion of Peace!" or "Melancholic Rich Secular Jews!" or "Nutty Inconsistent Liberals". See, that would have been brave. And shocking.

The joke is, pillorying Chr_stians in this particular moment of history is as close to ostrich head in the sand syndrome as could be imagined. Yeah, let's all rip the Chr_stians for imagined attacks on free speech while the Mulims are coming at us hurling amonium nitrate and literally taking away your right to life. The Chr_stians you hate will certainly be the ones dying to save you.

Sheesh.

Last Chance for Screenwriting Weekend in Nashville!

The Act One Screenwriting Weekend in Nashville is just days away – but it’s not too late to register. If you can’t commit to the entire weekend, be sure to join us for the Friday evening screening and panel discussion – and bring a friend!

The workshop, slated for September 15-16, 2006 at The People’s Church in Franklin, is an intense, practical overview of screenwriting basics, the current film market, and the Christian’s responsibility to positively impact popular culture. Participants will study the craft of screenwriting – from story development and structure to character, dialogue and screenplay format – with two accomplished Hollywood professionals.

Instructor Christopher Riley is an award-winning screenwriter (After The Truth, 25 to Life, Actual Innocence), author (The Hollywood Standard), a ten year veteran of the Warner Bros. script department, and the Director of the Act One: Writing For Hollywood program.

Instructor Dr. Thom Parham is a professor of film at Azusa Pacific University, a producer, and a screenwriter and script consultant whose credits include JAG, Touched By An Angel, Big Brother Jake, and the feature film Jaded.

The seminar begins with a 7 p.m. Friday evening screening and panel discussion with the faculty, open to anyone interested in film and its impact on popular culture. The conference continues Saturday from 8 a.m.-5 p.m. with the intensive screenwriting workshop.

The registration fee (which includes study materials and breakfast and lunch on Saturday) is $175. For more information, or to register, visit the Act One website at www.actoneprogram.com, or call 323-464-0815.

Tickets for the Friday evening session only are $10 and are available at the door.

See Barb in San Antonio

2006 CATHOLIC WOMEN'S CONFERENCE
"COME TO ME"

Organized by
The Pilgrim Center of Hope
A Catholic Evangelization Center for the Archdiocese of San Antonio


The Conference will focus on the Search for Truth of God's plan in the life of ordinary women: a plan that calls on women to reach their full potential according to God's design, a life of happiness and wholeness that can only be discovered in Christ Jesus.

Come and pray and deepened in your faith! The Lord says… "Come to me all you who labor and are burdened and I will refresh you…."
Come to this Catholic Women's Conference!
There will be nationally known speakers, the Rosary, the Mass, Eucharistic Healing Service, , inspirational music variety of vendors, resources & more!

WHEN? September 22, 2006, Friday - September 23, 2006, Saturday

WHERE? Henry B. Gonzales Convention Center Ballroom & Gallery
San Antonio, Texas

SPEAKERS?
- Father John Jesus Maloney, FJ - “Mary, Mother of Mercy”

- Dr. Martha Garza, OB/GYN - “A Professional Woman on the Forgiveness and Mercy of God”

- Mary Jane Fox - “Encountering the Risen Lord, our Healer”

- Gloria Zapiain - “Between the Rock of Peter and a Hard Place - Living the Life of Faith in the New Millennium"

- Barbara Nicolosi - “Signs of Hope from Hollywood” & “What is Beauty? Women- Nurturers of Art”

- Suzanne Baars - “I Will Give Them a New Heart”: Discovering the Divine Plan For Our Emotions”

- Sarah Hart - to lead us in inspirational song, praise and worship.

COST? $45.00 per person includes a Conference Packet and a box lunch on Saturday

Reservations: THE PILGRIM CENTER OF HOPE. 7680 Joe Newton *
San Antonio, TX 78251 (210) 521-3377 * trust@catholic.org

For 9-11

Obviously, I haven't had any time for blogging lately. Thanks to all the kind folks who housed and fed and chauffeured me around on my latest round of trips. Next trip will be to San Antonio at the end of September. Then, I'll be hunkering down to write a screenplay and hopefully get that book done.

Meanwhile, here is something I wrote for the one year anniversary of September 11th.

Thanks to the media, we will spend the next week or so subsumed in images of the horror of that day. It is macabre that Al Quaeda released some media too: a tape of their sick heros in the months before the attack, practicing slitting the throats of unarmed civilians on airplanes. This was their finest hour. There are Islamic people out there who watch this terror practice tape with a sigh of proud nostalgia. "Wow! That was the day!"

Dear God, America, never forget.

---------------------------------------------------------------


Of Horror, Heroes and Saints — Reliving 9-11
9/10/02


I am awakened in the early morning hours by the discordant trill of my cheap bedside phone. By the time I raise the receiver to my ear, I have raced through several emotions.

Fear: “Who would be calling so early? Has something happened to someone in my family?”;

Annoyance: “This better not be a wrong number.”;

Negotiation: “Better a wrong number than bad news.”

And finally amazement: That so many thoughts can crowd the human mind so fast. Then, all of these get jumbled around in suspended animation until the voice on the other end settles things.

“Sorry to wake you. Turn on your TV. There has been a terrible accident in New York.” Susannah, a friend from the office was doing her part to rouse the West Coast. Hanging up, I flip on the television.

If only I could have back a few more of those minutes before horror invaded and changed everything.

It is still early into the horror of 9-11, but I am already afraid of forgetting. The certainty that time deadens every sensation seems itself to be one more blow to add to the terrorist sucker-punch. Then, I am afraid of never forgetting. The thought that civilization could be forever altered by hate is a devastating concession to the negative. Civilizations should be substantially altered by the good – by the inventiveness of the human mind, or by a growth in understanding.

"No One Here Is Working Today."

One of the towers of the World Trade Center billows smoke. Katie and Matt try to make sense of it for me. I’m not sure it’s worth waking up my roommate over. Someone’s stupidity and a lot of people end up dying.

The 1993 WTC bombing flashes through my mind. “What is it with those buildings?” Mental note: Never accept a job in a landmark.

Another plane trolls into the back of the other Tower. I see it before Matt. Because he doesn’t comment, I start to wonder if it really happened. Maybe it is a helicopter circling around. But then Matt starts to stammer. It has happened again. This is no accident.

9-11 has been called this generation’s Pearl Harbor. This comparison has to do with the shock that invaded American society, and then became a battle cry to marshall a nation. The resemblance stops there. How I envy the Greatest Generation their Pearl Harbor. The enemy was known. The task was clear. The end was in sight even by sunset on that first terrible day. America knew victory would be costly, but victory itself was never in doubt.

Still in our pajamas an hour later, my roommate and I watch quietly as both towers tumble down in quick jerks and starts. They look like dominoes. A lesson from childhood invades. As long as they are lined up, every domino will fall down. And the towers do. The perfect symmetry of the astonishing WTC renders its complete collapse a certainty.

I have an appointment this morning to edit together a video of ‘haunting moment’ film clips. I know with certainty that the Towers collapsing will haunt me till the end of my life. Calling to cancel the session, I find strange comfort in the dull grief of the receptionist who takes my message. “No, no one here is working today.” Could anything be so irrelevant as Hollywood? Will I ever again find a movie haunting?

No Lessons Here

My friend Sylvia is a reporter and a friend of NYC’s Chief of Police. He told her months later that they knew by noon of the attack day that there would be no survivors to find in the rubble of the World Trade Center. The post-collapse rescue efforts - collecting blood, gathering EMT's, setting up survivor stations - were a ruse instigated by Mayor Giulani to give the city time to get counselors in place and to let families adjust to the certain loss. I remember that Sylvia, who had lost a network news job in an Insider-like scenario, was as grateful as I for the lie.

I seems to me that 9-11 is better compared to Bull Run, or Gettysburg or any of the bloody battles of the Civil War. The enduring source of dull pain comes from the certainty that the enemy is not fighting for territory, but for ideology. It must have felt very futile to many Americans to fight over an idea like personhood. You can’t change a person’s mind by winning a battle. As long as one person is unconvinced, the evil lurks and has power. The Civil War did not resolve the issue of racism as the evils of Reconstruction and segregation proved. Legally, it took over a hundred years to realize the victory of Appomattox. How long both black and white America will suffer the long-term effects of slavery is anyone’s guess.

“The Pentagon? What is that about?” For the hundredth time this morning I am confused. “Alright, I’ve had enough. What the hell is going on?” I look at my roommate for answers but she has none. Neither does CNN, FOX, MSNBC or any of the networks. Waves of anger shake off the grip of shock. “Who did this? Why don’t they take credit for it?” We keep making trips to the refrigerator like movie fans at an all day horror marathon. Food is comforting.

Theoretically, an ideology could be stamped out by literally wiping out all of its adherents. Hence, the carpet bombing of Afghan mountains. But who are we kidding? Who are the adherents of this kind of hatred against sky-scrapers and airline passengers? My sense is that they are many. I’ve been educated through the years by periodic news footage of Islamic boys dancing and chanting with rage at strange effigies and burning American flags. The impotence of their demonstrations has often struck me as obscene. Naked rage like any human nakedness should not be exposed in the marketplace.

Ideology can only be overcome by conversion. Conversion takes a long time and patience. You only bother to convert someone who is worth it to you. It is so much easier just to kill them. If only we could kill them all. But I am horrified by the thought even as it flashes across my mind. We wouldn’t kill them all even if we could. We are not them.

A reporter interviews a priest in front of the rubble. The priest’s black garb is strangely gray with the pulverized dust of the Towers. There are particles of thousands of people in that dust. After a few preliminary questions, the reporter forgets his training and his humanity spills out at the foot of the rubble mountain. “How could God let this happen, Father?” The priest is moved by the man’s grief and touches his arm. Just then, God interjects. Four firemen carry a wounded man on a stretcher in the background. The priest points at the pile of rubble, “This isn’t God.” He points at the rescuers and their burden, “That is.” The reporter weeps in a strange kind of relief, “Yes. You’re right. Thank you, Father.” I weep too. What has happened here?

I resent every effort to glean lessons from 9-11. We don’t sit at the mouth of hell for instruction. The only lesson is to convict us that there is a mouth of hell and that were it not for the presence of a greater good, we would all be swallowed by the darkness.

What is a hymnal?

Prayer everywhere. Prayer on Capitol Hill. In a display that was unthinkable just a week ago, now Daschel, Kennedy, Lott and Armey linked arm-in-arm sing “God Bless America” on the Capitol steps. The President calls for national prayer services. Thousands of neophyte believers stream into the Church where I work for a time of prayer at noon on the 14th. The minister directs them to sing a song in one of the hymnals. In front of me, a row of leather clad professionals from the studio down the hill look at each other in confusion. “What is a hymnal?” I am weeping again.

Has God abandoned us? The bizarre spectacle of our public officials suddenly leading us all in prayer reveals the truth. We are not used to prayer in public. We have abandoned God. Will He return to us now? Are prayers issued in fear and terror heard? Will God be fooled? Ah, but He knows we are sheep. The Shepherd does not sneer at the sheep who bleat in fear during a storm.

It is finally night and the cameras in NYC relent in their ceaseless combing of Ground Zero. I need to distract myself until morning when we can count on more televised pictures to fill the hours. Walking outside, the loveliness of the warm L.A. evening strikes me as unfair and inappropriate. Just then a police helicopter surges overhead sweeping the street with a bright light. For the next several weeks, the helicopters are constantly overhead. Everyone who works in Hollywood is absolutely sure the industry is on a terrorist hit list somewhere. Lots of people in entertainment are weathering intense survivor guilt. “It’s our fault they hate us.”


The Hour of Heroes and Saints

Our street borders on the usually bustling region of the city known as the Hollywood hamlet. Tonight, there is an eerie stillness. Several pedestrians pass me on the sidewalk. Each time we avert our eyes from each other. We have all been surprised by grief and it is embarrassing to have been caught unawares. We were all buying and selling and going about our business, and meanwhile groups of people have been hating us and in their simmering anger have been plotting our deaths.

I have heard people say that 9-11 shattered our sense of security. Rather, 9-11 shattered our illusion of security. There can be no security in a world in which there is sin.

I reach the corner impressed by the deathly quiet. I turn and face the row of restaurants expecting to see them all empty. But no, the street cafes all overflow with people. Solemn people. Grieving people. Frightened lonely people. Some few speak in hushed voices. As I pass along the sidewalk, hundreds follow me with their eyes. They too are out desperately seeking distraction.

Just up ahead, a young woman appears on the corner holding a lit candle. Must be an actress. Too thin. Too blond. A passing car lays on its horn in a sign of support. Before long, hundreds more stragglers join her vigil. They sing “God Bless America” crying and staring into the passing traffic. More and more cars add their horns to the strange cacophony. Once again I weep. But I am glad too. I suddenly feel close to these strangers.

My whole life I have never been able to bear "God Bless America" without tears. I have always thought it a curious quirk because I am not sentimental. Now, every hymn about God or country brings with it the sensation of holding back waves of emotion. It is so pathetic. “He had compassion on the crowd for they were like sheep without a shepherd.” I am so tired of weeping.

For the fourth time in two days, an Evangelical Protestant friend calls me with a variation on a single question. “What are we to do? What does the Catholic Church say?” I put my own confusion on auto-pilot. Somebody needs what was invested in me years ago. I draw on my Great Books education, once again grateful for my long-suffering professor’s insistence that thirteenth century philosophical principles are eternally relevant. I lay out for them the standards that the Church labels “Double Effect.” They are comforted.

Even in the horrible darkness inflicted by a brutal sucker-punch, Americans are still concerned to do what is right. Very striking in the aftermath is the universal desire of our people to respond with justice to injustice. There are few if any voices of revenge, and these are silenced immediately by the grief that has given to all of us a new gravity. This is not the time for reprisals.

For all her failures, the Church is still regarded as a voice of moral authority. Especially by those outside of her embrace. My non-Catholic friends call me because, as one put it, “I know the Catholic Church must have some teaching for times like this.” And he was right. We are allowed a proportional response. We are allowed to remove instruments of evil from children who would harm others through them, even if some die while we remove those instruments. We are not allowed vindictiveness. We are not allowed hate.

God only permitted this because in the span of eternity, He could handle it. He can weave out of it more good than evil in the long run.

I have had a treasured bookmark since I was in the fourth grade. Mrs. Pierce, my religion teacher gave it to me and I have managed to hang onto it throughout the years. “The hour of crisis is also the hour of heroes and saints.” There were only a handful of evildoers. There are so many hundreds of heroes.


God Bless America

Snapshots I don't want to forget... I want to forget... I am afraid of forgetting...

- The President walks out alone to the mound at Yankee Stadium. Before the eyes of the world, he stands vulnerable. Takes his time, and sights the catcher and pitches a perfect strike to open the World Series…

- The firemen and policemen stay in Tower One even after Tower Two collapsed. They continue to race upward. The gravelly last words of one such hero pours out of a brother’s walkie-talkie, “There are still people up there. We can’t leave them.”

- The passengers on Flight 93 become aware that they are being used as human missiles. They take a vote. To the last Americans. De Toqueville had written two hundred years ago about this strange propensity of Americans, “They think that any problem can be solved if only they get together and take a vote.” They decide to die so that other Americans will be spared.

Freedom makes heroism possible. The essence of heroism is in exercising a choice. The hero’s choice is to prefer another’s life to his own. Aristotle wrote that because the state exists to allow men to become virtuous, freedom with all of its pitfalls must be preferred, because there is no virtue without choice. We had become cynical about our countrymen, but the events of 9-11 have surprised us all. We are still more than decadent. Our instincts are still to save life, to give to those in need, to draw together in times of tragedy, to do the right thing even when those who oppose us operate under no such limits.

One last recollection I know I will never forget.

It is late in September 2001. Fairfax Boulevard is typically frenzied with traffic and pedestrians. Approaching a crowded cross street, I see a plastic car flag flapping through the air, landing in the middle of the intersection. And then a miracle happens. The car ahead of me stops in front of the green light. Hazard lights flash and then a middle-aged woman emerges grim and resolute. She makes her way toward the flag, walking in the center of the intersection. All the cars slide to a stop. Windows are rolled down and a gathering applause fills the air. The woman picks up the flag and pivoting around to all of us, she waves it high in the air. Car horns add quick pulses to the applause as she walks back to her car. As traffic starts up, I am weeping again.

Flags are our new vigil lights. Every flag that waves is suddenly a prayer that America will recall the blessings of God. Freedom, not license. Community not diversity. Prosperity to make virtue possible. Speech to utter the truth. Opportunity to advance human potential and achievement. God bless America. God bless America.

The More Things Change...

Preparing for my talk tonight on Friendship and Creativity. I'm going to use Charles' journey as an artist from Brideshead Revisited to set up some ideas. So, I have been pouring through a volume of the leters of Evelyn Waugh for more insight. I came across the following passage in a letter he wrote in December 1944. It stuck me funny because I have had this same experience many times in these last ten years, and I realized that I have made the mistake of being sillily nostalgic about a time before my own. I thought people were smarter before and that somehow the Sexual Revolution deadened our brains. After all, they had better education back then. And the Church and family were in better shape.

Anyway, here is Waugh on the experience of getting wedged between the artistic sensibilities (which means actually their politics) of pious people. (I also thought it was interesting that the event he describes was going on during WWII. Funny how life goes on regardless.) It's all wrong to think of art this way - as something diverting in a completely manageable way. Again, I don't see "balance" as a holy virtue. It is something that professional religious people encourage to keep the soup kitchens and Mass schedules aright. Has nothing to do with holiness.

"I conducted a meeting for the Catholic Guild of Arts and Crafts where I won their confidence by abuse of Picasso, and then lost it with abuse of Catholic Arts and Crafts...

Then I had an excruciating week-end in a convent in Surrey conducting a "Catholic Booklovers Week-End." The nuns were very attentive with little packets of chocolate and glasses of milk covered with muslin veils and weighted with beads do you know what I mean....The sort of questions are, of course, 'Why does Mr. Greene have such a nasty mind?' and 'Is it not the duty of the artist to consider the average reader?' "
(from Letters of Evelyn Waugh, Letter to Nancy Mitford, Dec. 5, 1955)

P.S. here's a spicy bit about Brideshead from a letter of January 7, 1945:
"Lady Marchmain, no, I am not on her side; but God is, who suffers fools gladly and the book is about God. Does that answer it?"

Oh yeah, I had an epiphany...

...the other day. About Gen X and the Millenials. I was up late watching a documentary on MSNBC about homeless teens in Portland, and I was marveling at their lack of interest in anything that might be a normal human life.

And then it popped into my head: they know it's all over and they are waiting for the call to battle. They are just killing time waiting for something to die for.

It's not that they don't understand modern society. It's that they do.

Pinky Surgery II

I have to have another operation on my pinky tomorrow. Sheesh. I feel silly even saying that. Some people have real stuff. I, have a pinky that has a problematic cyst that a second surgeon will try to fix tomorrow.

It's nothing compared to what other folks have. Although, I remember a nun saying once to me, "It's never the mountain that wears you down, but the pebble in your shoe."

Won't be blogging probably for a few days.

Hear Barb Say Something Different

Tonight, I will be giving a talk to the prayer group Holy Wood of the Cross called "Friendship and Spirituality". This is part one of two talks on friendship, the second part being next Tuesday night and will be on "Friendship and Creativity."

Those who know me well know that friendship is not a new topic for me. I did my undergraduate thesis on the topic, contrasting and comparing Cicero's De Amicitia with Aelred of Rievaulx's Spiritual Friendship. For people serious about their spiritual growth, that latter work is a must read.

We are going to talk tonight about what friendship adds to the spiritual life. And why the kind of friendship that Aristotle and Cicero and Augustine, Aelred and Aquinas wrote about is an almost lost art in the Church.

Next week, we'll talk about how holy friendships help create great art.

The talks will be at 7pm at Family Theater Productions on Sunset Blvd, just west of La Brea. Call Paula for more info: 323-464-0815.

Monster House Great Story

I don't have time to do a full review here as we are in the last weekend of the Writing Program. However, I do want to give a thumbs up to Columbia Pictures' Monster House. It's a very clever story. Really clever.

(I offer it as a beginner's textbook to those who thought that Lady in the Water was a good story. More on this later...)

My only question watching it was whether it is too creepy for the kids for whom animated films about Halloween should be the main audience. I think it would be fine for ten year olds and up. I would be wary of littler kids going - NOTE TO AL: I think it would be too much for Little John.

But it is a good piece of work. Again, a good story. Nothing extra. Great execution.

Little Miss Crass and Vulgar

Sometimes I feel like I was born in the wrong century. I don't tend to think that things that lots of other people today laugh at are funny.

A case in point is the indie movie now in theatrical release called
Little Miss Sunshine. I just listened to fuzzy Gene Shalit give it a rave on Today as being an inspiring, delightful family romp (or words to that effect). This film was all the rage at Sundance this year. I didn't see it there because word was it had gotten picked up for distribution, and so I knew I could catch it later in theaters. But it was the same at Sundance. Folks there kept saying it was a charming, quirky, inspiring comedy.

INSPIRING? INSPIRING?!?!?!

Films like Little Miss Sunshine are inspiring in the way that Roseanne Barr once said her TV show Roseanne was fascinating for people: "Our family is so bad, that it makes people feel better about the hell holes that their families are."

Let's see. Inspiring moments from Little Miss Sunshine...

- the film spends a lot of time setting up the father of the family, played well by Greg Kinnear, as a total assh*le. He spends the whole film talking about the difference between winners and losers, and seems oblivious that he himself is a loser. This fact is obvious to his teenage son who describes living in the house as hell, and has dropped out from any interaction with the hypocritical jerk parents who feed and clothe him.

I don't find ridicule inspiring. I don't find it really humorous. I think it subverts what comedy should be. Comedy should make us feel humble. Ridicule leaves the audience feeling superior.

I don't think post-modernism is an excuse to break the Fourth Commandment. But, I know, lighten up, right?

- This same shaggy-haired teenage son wears a T-shirt that proclaims "Jesus Was Wrong", and makes the film's most profound philosophical speech declaring, "Going to college? F*ck that. Getting a job? F*ck that. Making a living? F*ck that. F*ck it all. F*ck everything."

Somewhere out there, I suppose Nietsche was very inspired. The audience I was with roared in approval. I didn't think it was funny. The moment was played as a profound epiphany. But it isn't really profound, is it? Don't tell the audience. They were ready to elect the character to Congress for speaking the truth. What truth is that?

I find this to be predicable of GenX and the Millenials: They say things alternately banal and profound, but they don't know the difference.

- a grandfather (played by the talented Alan Arkin, who must be really, really desperate for work) who is a cocaine addict and a sex addict. He buys porn and makes the film's most vulgar speech to his grandson, chastising the fifteen year old for not getting lots of sex, and then exhorting him to "have sex with lots of women. Lots of them. Not just one. Gets lots of sex."

Again, the audience was in stitches. Especially when the grandfather noted that in the rest home he used to live in, he got "third degree burns on my Johnson" from all the sex. The more the old man spoke filth, the funnier it got for the audience. But, I didn't think it was funny. I thought it was gross and shameful.

- a seven year old who does a protracted burlesque dance as sexualized as possible. Now, I get that the scene was meant to be satiric commentary on the whole little girl beauty pageant world. I get that. I just hated watching a seven year old do a strip tease. Or, using the film school jargon for which I paid thirty grand, I found the method of filmic satire, more problematic than the social ill it was critiquing.

Again, however, the audience was falling off its seat laughing at this scene. How funny for them to get to watch a seven year old actress mimic an exotic dancer? I didn't think it was funny. I thought it was perverse. I don't care what the filmmaker was trying to do. He doesn't get to use a seven year old to make his frickin' statement!

I would say those three moments are the vulgar lowlights of the film. The rest of it involves a family in which the father is an ambitious jerk. The mother is an impotent whiner. And, OF COURSE, the only really compassionate, intelligent and caring member of the family is the gay uncle Frank, who is recovering from having slit his wrists. (And he is the sane one.)

I found during the movie that the audience was laughing at moments in which the family's shame was particularly exposed. The humor was to point at the people in the family and sneer, "What an assh*le!" or "What a hypocrite!"

I feel absolutely sure that a legion of critics - and certainly Christians! - will passionately defend this film. They will relish its "fresh satiric critique " of post-modernity. They will say things about how wonderful it was for the family to end the film accepting each other in a stirring moment of loyalty and love. They will say that this movie is clearly just not my kind of taste, and that engaging culture means that we shouldn't get stuck on little things like vulgarity, profanity, crassness and the exaltation of meaninglessness.

They will be absurd. Swallowing camels of human degradation and straining out gnats of "niceness".

Pass on Little Miss Sunshine. It won't make you a better person. It won't make you love your neighbors more. It will fill your spirit with cynicism and sneering. Pass. Pass. Pass.

Hear Barb on Lino

Sometime early in the summer, I was interviewed for Lino at large, a radio show for Catholic Gen Xers. Spencer Lewerenz, the co-editor with me of Behind the Screen was also interviewed. Click here to hear the pieces.

Movies About Art?

This fall, I will be teaching a course called Theology for Hollywood at both the Los Angeles Film Study Center, and at Azusa Pacific University. If I think about it, I will post the syllabus as I think it is quite novel and maybe somebody else out there would like to spread the faith.

One of the elements of the course is to have the students watch a movie every week about art, beauty and artists. I need a few more suggestions of movies that would actually have something to say something profound about artists as opposed to saying things that are just raunchy - which most of the movies about artists tend to do.

Here are the ones I am thinking of using. Please let me know if you have any other suggestions. (Again, I need movies that have something to contribute to the discussion of the artist as prophet, or about the suffering of the artist, or about the power and nature of beauty.)

Babette's Feast

8 1/2

Andrei Rublev

Pollock

Barton Fink

Amadeus

Finding Neverland

8 Mile

Bowfinger

Yellow Submarine

Sunset Boulevard

Living in Oblivion

Lost in La Mancha

Basquiat

Buena Vista Social Club

Strictly Ballroom

Mad Hot Ballroom

Billy Elliot

Vincent and Theo

Shine

To KH - So, I'm an SJ. What Are You?

Your Personality Is

Guardian (SJ) You are sensible, down to earth, and goal oriented. Bottom line, you are good at playing by the rules. You tend to be dominant - and you are a natural leader. You are interested in rules and order. Morals are important to you. A hard worker, you give your all at whatever you do. You're very serious, and people often tell you to lighten up. In love, you tend to take things carefully and slowly. At work, you are suited to almost any career - but you excel in leadership positions. With others, you tend to be polite and formal. As far as looks go, you are traditionally attractive. You take good care of yourself. On weekends, you tend to like to do organized activities. In fact, you often organize them!

The Three Question Personality Test

Nashville Screenwriting Seminar

--------------- FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ---------------

ROAD TO HOLLYWOOD STARTS IN NASHVILLE –
SCREENWRITERS’ WORKSHOP, SEPTEMBER 15-16, 2006

Each year, hundreds of aspiring screenwriters flock to Hollywood with scripts in their hands and stars in their eyes. This year, Hollywood is coming to them. Next stop? Nashville, Tennessee.

Act One, Inc., a Los Angeles-based training program for writers and other film industry professionals, presents the Act One Screenwriting Weekend, a conference for professional and aspiring screenwriters. The workshop, slated for September 15-16, 2006 at The People’s Church in Franklin, is an intense, practical overview of screenwriting basics, the current film market, and the Christian’s responsibility to positively impact popular culture.

Participants will study the craft of screenwriting – from story development and structure to character, dialogue and screenplay format – with two accomplished Hollywood professionals.

Christopher Riley is an award-winning screenwriter (After The Truth, 25 to Life, Actual Innocence), author (The Hollywood Standard), a ten year veteran of the Warner Bros. script department, and the Director of the Act One: Writing For Hollywood program. He’ll be joined by Azusa Pacific University professor Dr. Thom Parham, a screenwriter and script consultant whose credits include JAG, Touched By An Angel, Big Brother Jake, and Jaded, the first film release from his fledgling production company, Dos Negros Entertainment.

“Nashville’s vibrant community of artists and entertainers makes it the perfect city for our seminar,” says Conference Coordinator Lauri Evans Deason. “And we’re excited to provide new inspiration and community for local writers who share our common goals of excellence, artistry, professionalism, and spirituality.”

The seminar begins with a 7 p.m. Friday evening screening and panel discussion with the faculty, open to anyone interested in film and its impact on popular culture. The conference continues Saturday from 8 a.m.-5 p.m. with the intensive screenwriting workshop. The registration fee (which includes study materials and breakfast and lunch on Saturday) is $175. Further information and online registration is available through the Act One website at www.actoneprogram.com. Space is limited, and early registration is encouraged.

Tickets for the Friday evening session only are $10 and are available at the door.



MEDIA REQUESTS AND ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Lauri Evans Deason
whats_your_story@hotmail.com
323-898-5528

Back from retreat...

Just came back from three days of retreat at the Sacred Heart Retreat Center administered by the Carmelites of Alhambra. The retreat was Ignatian, conducted by a Jesuit.

It was very good. Although all weekend I kept thinking to myself: "Holiness is not in the distance from our sinful patterns, but rather in the proximity to Jesus." Phew. That felt good.

This is the last week of our summer writing program. We have two huge events this week - the alumni bbq Thursday and the Summer Gala Saturday. Peter Kreeft is the keynote speaker at the gala. If anybody out there wants to go, we have a handful of seats left. For info send a message to becca@actoneprogram.com.

Sunday, the Sixth will be really cool as my friend Congressman Jeff Fortenberry and his wife Celeste will be in town and will be featured in an event at Family Theater on Sunset in Hollywood. Jeff has a Masters in Theology from Steubenville, and is a first term Congressman from Nebraska. He has been particularly targeted by Emily's List as he is a deeply committed Christian. His opponent was a recipient of the Planned Parenthood Award... The event is at 2pm and is titled "A Committed Christian in Public Life." If you are in Southern Cal, do consider coming to Family Theater on Sunday afternoon to meet Jeff and Celeste and hear their story.

From the Mail Bag: "Better than Real"

Dear Barbara,

I have a question about a statement you made in your comments about Superman Returns. You said, "Maybe that is more like real life. Certainly it is. But stories are supposed to be better than real life." I had a discussion with someone about this who says that real life is the best thing there is, so a story should be like real life. I said that I thougth the point was that because our vision is marred by the fall, what we see is less than real life, so that if we are to see life as it really is (in a story), it will appear to us to be better than real life. Is that what you meant, or something different?

R.G.


Dear R.G. -

We say that stories must be "better" than the real as a reaction against a lot of narrative efforts in the modern era, that have been so focussed on realism that they lost the ability to serve the audience in the unique way that stories (i.e. as art) are supposed to. The real is not entertaining to people. If it was, they would sit in their living rooms at night and stare at each other instead of turning on the television.

Stories are constructed and so offer a vision of artificial necessity to an audience that experiences real life as random. That is, the parts in a story are related to the whole in a relationship of necessity. Life isn't random, of course, but our perspective is limited so it often seems to us that there is no cause and effect in our lives. This particularly rankles in the moral area: Some people to bad things, but appear to suffer no ill effects. Or else, Innocent two year olds get terrible diseases. Stories offer a "kharma" that assures the audience that their gut sense that in the end good will triumph is correct.

Stories also offer a clear resolution to an audience in an intimation of an ultimate resolution to our own individual and collective stories. We yearn for resolution (because we were made to end our pilgrimage in God) and stories give us a momentary relief from our yearning in their resolution.

Stories - as with all good art -- also present an artificial harmony to a human society that is inharmonious. In a good story, all of the parts are sifted so that only those are used that will complement the other parts. In a good story there is nothing extra, gratuitous or-vice versa, missing or incomplete. Again, real life is like this, but because of our perspective, we can't see it.

Stories are not objectively "better" than the real. But they are better for the human viewer than the real because they offer God's perspective -- one that is complete, necessary and harmonious.

Hope this helps.

God bless - Barbara

See Barb in Boston?

I have to make a trip to Boston and Maine at the end of August. Anybody want me to give a speech somewhere around there? We are trying to set up a couple events that week maximize the use of time on the trip. If you have a place, or a group, or a millionaire I should meet to talk about Act One, please send our Event Coordinator Becca a message at: becca@actoneprogram.com

Pope Benedict: "Pray for the Peace of Jerusalem."

DAY OF PRAYER AND PENANCE FOR PEACE IN MIDDLE EAST

VATICAN CITY, JUL 20, 2006 (VIS) - Faced with worsening situation in the Middle East, the Holy See Press Office has been directed to communicate the following:

"The Holy Father is following with great concern the destinies of all the peoples involved and has proclaimed this Sunday, July 23, as a special day of prayer and penance, inviting the pastors and faithful of all the particular Churches, and all believers of the world, to implore from God the precious gift of peace.

"In particular, the Supreme Pontiff hopes that prayers will be raised to the Lord for an immediate cease-fire between the sides, for humanitarian corridors to be opened in order to bring help to the suffering peoples, and for reasonable and responsible negotiations to begin to put an end to objective situations of injustice that exist in that region; as already indicated by Pope Benedict XVI at the Angelus last Sunday, July 16.

"In reality, the Lebanese have the right to see the integrity and sovereignty of their country respected, the Israelis the right to live in peace in their State, and the Palestinians have the right to have their own free and sovereign homeland.

"At this sorrowful moment, His Holiness also makes an appeal to charitable organizations to help all the people struck by this pitiless conflict."

Devil Has Some Divine Stuff

When I walked out Lady in the Water, I walked into the last hour of The Devil Wears Prada in the theater next door. At the time, I was just trying to flush my brain of Shyamalan's murky mess, but I'm so glad I did.

This is the best film I have seen this year. I mean for me as an adult move-goer.

Now, maybe it is that the arena of Devil - the fashion world - is the evil twin of Hollywood in which I have set up my tent. But no, there was extra stuff in this for those of us who make our living in pop-culture. For everybody else there is still plenty of charm and heart, and fun. I sat there watching a wonderfully choreographed ending scene of the film thinking, "Huh. This is a haunting moment." And also, "Wow. Every Christian in Hollywood, needs to watch this film weekly just as a gut check."

Devil is an entertaining coming of age film which takes us into a world with which our culture is currently obsessed. As Streep's character evilly notes just after she has completely ratified her life-long choice to descend into hell, "They (meaning the audience) all want to be us."

Meryl Streep is amazing here. Truly. She is the focal point on the screen even when she shares the shot with thirty other folks at a banquet. How does she do that?! She is "evil Emperor" evil as opposed to "Jabba the Hut" evil. My philosopher sister noted once when we were both in highschool watching the Star Wars trilogy unfold for the first time, "The Church can work with Jabba evil, because it is still a reaching for substitutes for beauty. We can do almost nothing with the Evil Emperor evil because it is a love of darkness." Anyway, Streep has to get another Oscar nod here. Even though it is just another day's work for her, nobody else in Hollywood could pull it off as effortlessly as she does. Astounding.

The principal weakness in the film is Anne Hathaway. She was miscast here. Or else, she can't even pretend to hold up her side of the scenes against Streep. The film needed a young actress with REAL acting chops - like Clare Danes or Kirsten Dunst.

The script was heavy-handed at times, and I resented the default living in sin arrangement of the main character, but I really left this film wanting to be a more heroic person. It had me wondering what compromises I have made in my career.

That's good stuff.

Devil Wears Prada was good enough for me to delete the 2005 list of favorite films and start one for 2006. Here in July.

Lady in a Watery Grave of Storytellng

He has lost his mind.

As Mark Shea is fond of saying, "Sin makes you crazy." I don't presume to know the complete condition of Shyamalan's soul, but clearly, egomania has taken hold and so he has lost his grip on reality. In this case, the demanding and wonderful realities of the essentials of narrative filmmaking.

I remembered, somewhere in the first ten minutes of Lady in the Water that I had pledged back in the last ten minutes of The Village that I would never be coaxed to spend any more money buying this director's movies. And then it was just a matter of time before I got the energy to propel myself out of my seat.

I walked out of Lady in the Water about mid-point of the film, when it had become embarrasingly apparent that the filmmaker was splashing around this pathetic unstory, desperately caught in the undertow of his own hype. I left when it was clear that nothing could happen in the remaining hour to salvage the first half's perfect storm of narrative, character and thematic elements from devolving into a level 5 typhoon of cinematic pretension and absurdity.


What was that great insult of the Wizard to Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz? Oh yeah, this film is a "clinking, clanking, collection of calligenous junk!" But maybe I haven't expressed myself strongly enough here...

There is really nothing in Lady for the audience. It is all about Shyamalan in an icky kind of valentine to himself as a writer. He says the kind of things about himself in this film that people should let others say about them. But they will NEVER say them about this guy. You can quote me.

The greatest emotional response the film evoked from me was a monumental chortle when I recalled Robin on Good Monring America yesterday referring to Shyamalan as a "Master of Suspense". HA!

How bad is it?....Hmmmmm.... I'd rather watch a Peter Jackson film fest 20 hour marathon then a half hour of anything Shyamalan has done since Sixth Sense. And those of you who know me, know what I'm saying here...

There is nothing scary in this film. The audience I was with actually laughed at a couple of moments that were supposed to be scary, but were so badly executed that it was a cause of sneering. There is nothing offensive from a moral standpoint - unless one considers, as I do, that bad art is a moral problem. Lady is just really, really, monstrously bad storytelling.

The only thing this movie does is confirm that M. Night is class A, textbook, laughing all the way to the bank, one hit wonder. [read in the little girl whisper they've had on the TV trailers:] Pass. Pass. Passsssssssssssssssssssssssss.