Image and Imagination: A Critical Evaluation of Film 1

"L'imagination est l'œil de l'âme." — Joseph Joubert1

Film is an exceptionally powerful medium, through which viewers can be engaged and their imaginations illumined with new perspectives on the world. In part recognising the remarkable power that film possesses, some critics of film have argued that the nature of the medium is not compatible with a Christian message, and consequently have advocated the removal of a major part of contemporary life from Christian influence. Yet such criticism of the medium of film must be rejected as self-contradictory and incompatible with Biblical theology. A better approach to film is to enlist its aid in training our imaginations to see the world through Biblical eyes.

Embracing the image

It cannot be denied that certain films are intentionally hostile to Christianity, whether blatantly2 or subtly.3 Yet that fact does not impugn the medium of film in general. It no more militates against watching films than the existence of certain books suggests that one should not read at all. 

The argument against film therefore must be directed against the medium of film itself.

The dangers of film

The obvious difference between a film and a book is that a film has a visual element. So much of the argument against film has been argument against image. Images, it is argued, are incapable of portraying certain truths, whether absolute or propositional,4 spiritual5 or temporal.6 There is something in the nature of the image that is therefore dangerous. Because they cannot be judged to be false7 (or indeed, may have no truth value8), frequent exposure to images can poison9 the viewer, either persuading him that image rather than content is what matters10 or blurring the boundary between image and reality.11 In either case, what is portrayed through image gains an undue prominence over reality. An invented account of the world12 becomes almost as influential as knowledge gained from the actual world. Theologically it must be wrong, argue critics, for the Image to displace the Word in revealing truth. Is it any accident that theological error tends to go along with ‘the abundance of images’?13 Surely God reveals himself in propositions14 and therefore our primary way of learning about the world must also be through word, even if complemented by the image. Arguably, therefore reliance on the image to define reality15 is subversive of the Christian view of the world.

For example, take the case of The Sea Inside, a film dealing with the issue of euthanasia. The film is not heavy-handed. Yet it is not any the less clear what the right answer is in the film’s terms. As one critic observes, “The Sea Inside tenders no facile explanations or resolutions, but makes us feel the answers in our hearts.”16 Or take Vera Drake, whose eponymous charwoman helps the poor to obtain abortions. It is again a film that doesn’t seem to have an agenda. Ebert describes it as “not so much pro or anti-abortion as it is opposed to laws which do little to eliminate abortion but much to make it dangerous for poor people.”17 Vera Drake appears objective, because it does not argue that abortion is morally justified. Yet that very objectivity enables Vera Drake to make a pragmatic (and subjective) argument in favour of abortion.18 Both Vera Drake and The Sea Inside argue for particular values, and both films are able to do so by creating worlds within which their conclusions are clearly justified.19

The result of such scepticism of film, if unmoderated, is the complete withdrawal of Christians from watching and creating film20; if moderated, scepticism leads to the creation of an alternative Christian film industry21 or possibly an uncomfortable compromise that leaves Christians watching film but suspicious of its influence.22 

Responding to criticism

To some extent the critique of the medium of film is to be welcomed. For example, it must be admitted that the medium of film is able to reach the individual to some extent without being mediated by the individual’s propositional beliefs.23 This must be especially true where film is neither seen as a subversive medium nor as biased in favour of a given perspective on life.24 So warning Christians about the dangers of film can be helpful. Yet despite limited justification for a Christian scepticism of film, criticism of the medium of film is self-contradictory as well as theologically misguided. 

First, criticism of film as image does not do justice to the nature of film. The attempt to place film in antithesis to word is clearly wrong. For a start, critics claim that the images contained within film are meaningless when contrasted with words. For example, Ellul commented that image cannot convey duration.25 But neither can a bare word26 convey meaning. Words acquire meaning only in the context of other words27 just as images acquire meaning in the context of other images.28 The brain in assembling either images or words attributes meaning to them.29 So images in film (as opposed, perhaps, to the pictures a photographer might take) are capable of conveying meaning in the same sense that words are. Indeed, film is arguably more analogous to language30 than opposed to it.

Furthermore, words actually have a significant place in film.31 Most films have a script, which forms the framework around which the film is built and defines the verbal content of the film. In a sense, the skeleton of a film is the word.32 So film per se is not in opposition to word.

Indeed, it can profitably be said that purported criticism of film as image is in reality criticism of film as story. The fact that film is visual does not mean that it cannot portray argument. Films are clearly capable of truth claims.33 Nor would critics deny the fact (as much of their criticism is based on the falsehood of what film allegedly claims). Criticism of the non-propositional nature of film ultimately arises from the fact that film portrays a story34 and presents its truth claims in the context of that story. In other words, criticism of film is at its root criticism of story. Unfortunately for the coherency of the critical argument against the medium of film, story is by no means limited to film. Indeed, many of the oldest stories are told in words, including those in the Bible. Nor is film uniquely able to blur the edges between reality and creative account of reality. Books are as able as films to blur the edges of story and reality, or to construct worlds which intentionally differ in perspective from the world as perceived by the reader.35

Furthermore, the basic premise that story is unable to convey claims about reality is clearly incorrect.36 Indeed, not only do stories “[transmit] values and beliefs,”37 but they must do so.38 Nor are such story-mediated claims about reality foreign to Christianity. Much of God’s revelation to his people is in the form of divine words,39 but much is also in the form of divine acts,40 which suggests that words do not go far enough.41

Second, criticism of film as image is theologically misguided. Although Christians have rightly rejected attempts to create images of God,42 the Bible itself embraces the idea of the image. That man is not to create images of God43 is deliberately placed in opposition to the affirmation that man is made in the image of God,44 that Jesus is the perfect image of God,45 and that man is to be brought into a closer likeness to that image.46 In other words, the problem is not with the concept of an image. Indeed, Biblical language consistently seeks not only to convey propositional truth but to evoke images in the mind of the reader. Take for example Jesus’ parables, which have characteristics that suggest they are intended to evoke vivid images as well as concepts.47 Or take other parts of the Bible, such as the Song of Solomon, that evoke all the senses,48) including sight.49 Indeed, it is not surprising that the Bible should recognise and use the power of imagery given that man as created by God sees the world in images.

Ultimately, criticism of film as image must fall short both in terms of the argument’s internal coherence and its theological soundness. Lacking a coherent argument against the medium itself, therefore, the medium of film should not be viewed with suspicion.

Baptising the Imagination

Although the medium of film can be embraced, it remains to consider what the criteria for the acceptability of individual films should be, both as an aspirational value for Christian filmmakers and as a critical framework for the analysis of film by the Christian. Arguably the lens through which film can be examined best is its transformative influence on the imagination of its viewers.

The importance of imagination

Imagination is often thought of as the gift of the poet or the inventor. In a specialised sense that may be right; certainly the poet or the inventor have finely developed senses of imagination. But imagination is something everyone has to some extent; imagination is that faculty in us that “[helps] explain what we’re all about” from the evidence of our senses.50 It is the consequence of possessing what Peck and Strohmer call ‘wisdom’; it is the way one “[sees] life.”51 It is implied for Kierkegaard’s subjective thinker52 and implied by the nature of God’s revelation.53 Imagination is the faculty that enables us to see objective reality in profoundly, subjectively, human terms. It is a window into reality that lets us see isolated events in what we regard as the bigger picture.54

For a Christian, therefore, imagination must be incredibly important. It is the faculty that he must use to see the world as God’s creation, his food as God’s gift, his salvation as God’s grace. Therefore it is inextricably tied up with his worship of God.55 But imagination is also integral to obeying God; it is imagination that the Christian must draw on in order to persevere in the face of difficulty.56

For the non-Christian, imagination serves similar functions. Imagination answers questions about life and death, loyalty and friendship, truth and beauty. Yet the Bible characterises imagination negatively when it directs worship away from God.57 If the subjective picture of the world that imagination produces has no place for God, then the “imagination of the heart”58 cannot be seen positively.59

Imagination must therefore be recognised as crucial to the Christian life, yet profoundly unhelpful if not illuminated by Biblical teaching.

The sanctification of imagination

It is perhaps no surprise that film is able to portray imagination as well as kindle an answering fire in the imaginations of its viewers. Film addresses, increasingly intentionally,60 the same questions about life that imagination does.61 What is more, film is able to serve as a substitute imagination,62 portraying in colour and sound how the facts of reality could fit together. In other words, a film offers a possible reality to its audience, one that will be accepted at least partially by how attractive it is.63

Although Christians want, rightly, to emphasise that their beliefs are not merely æsthetically attractive but true as well, they should embrace the opportunities offered by film as a shaper of imagination. First, film offers the opportunity to viewers64 to selectively fire their imaginations with metaphor and imagery that help them “in [their] understanding and communication of the gospel.”65 Given that film is such a powerful medium in shaping imaginations, Christians should be asking themselves how the film’s vision of reality66 comports with the Bible’s.67 To the extent that their imagery is Biblical in outlook, examples from film can be used as illustrations of gospel truths. Take for example Babette’s Feast, which concerned the gift of a 10,000-franc feast to the inhabitants of a remote village in Denmark.68 The gift was the product of the French chef Babette’s love for the townsfolk who had taken her in. Her gift is reminiscent, observes Anker, of the woman who poured perfume on Jesus’ feet.69 Portraying costly love and recognition of what really matters,70 Babette’s Feast therefore is able to serve as an illustration of Biblical love.71 For the Christian, such a film can be profoundly moving, sparking reflection on his love for God and stoking his imagination.72 More, it can provide a partial “common discourse”73 to speak with other viewers of the film about the Bible.

Second, film offers talented Christian filmmakers the opportunity to portray Biblical truths in a way that inspires the imagination.74 Christianity is attractive because it is uniquely able to explain the world. So producers of art who understand the gospel75 should therefore have an advantage in telling coherent stories. Yet many Christians’ emphasis on using film as effectively gospel-preaching pulpits76 means that they have abandoned the effort to engage the imaginations of their viewers. Paradoxically, it is once one has spoken to the imagination that one can best speak to the mind and heart.77

Lewis often spoke of one of George MacDonald’s books78 having baptised his imagination,79 not in converting him to Christianity but in giving him his first taste of what goodness80 might look like. Similarly, Lesslie Newbigin wrote that for someone to come to believe in the God of the Bible, there first needed to be “a conversion of the mind…[leading to] a new vision of how things are.”81 That must surely be one of the aims of Christian filmmakers: to show the world illumined by Christian light. Nor is this an improbable goal, given past opportunities provided by the film industry.82 Filmmaking, therefore, is a remarkable and realistic opportunity for talented Christians to lay Bibles open everywhere.83

Ultimately, the medium of film is not to be rejected on the self-contradictory and theologically incorrect critique of film as image, which unintentionally ends up damning much of the written word as well as God’s revelation throughout history. Film, on the contrary, is to be embraced as a means of illuminating and renewing the Christian imagination and of inviting others to see the world in the light of Biblical truth.

 

Bibliography
 

Anker, Roy M. Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004

Avis, Paul. God and the Creative Imagination: Metaphor, Symbol and Myth in Religion and Theology. London: Routledge, 1999

Berardinelli, James. “The Sea Inside: A Film Review.” No pages. Cited 9 December 2006. Online http://www.reelviews.net/movies/s/sea_inside.html

Bergman, Ingmar. Four Screenplays of Ingmar Bergman. Translated by Lars Maimstrom and David Kushner. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1960

Blake, William. Blake: Complete Writings. Edited by Geoffrey Keynes. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972

Coffey, John. “Engaging With Cinema.” No pages. Cited 6 December 2006. Online http://www.jubilee-centre.org/online_documents/Engagingwithcinema.htm

Dawson, Christopher. Progress and Religion: An Historical Inquiry. 1931. Peru, Il.: Sherwood Sugden & Co., 1991

Drane, John. Cultural Change and Biblical Faith: The Future of the Church. Biblical and Missiological Essays for the New Century. Carlisle: Paternoster Press, 2000

Ebert, Roger. “Vera Drake.” No pages. Cited 9 December 2006. Online http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041021/REVIEWS/40921004/1023

Ellul, Jacques. The Humiliation of the Word. Translated by Joyce Main Hanks. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985

Fiddes, Paul S. “Introduction: The Making of a Christian Mind.” Pp. 1-24 in Faith in the Centre: Christianity and Culture. Edited by Paul S. Fiddes. Regent’s Study Guides 9. Oxford: Regent’s Park College, 2001

Forbes, Cheryl. Imagination: Embracing a Theology of Wonder. The Greenbelt Files. Portland, Or.: Multnomah Press, 1986

Frame, John. “Should Christians Go to Movies?” No pages. Cited 6 December 2006. Online http://www.frame-poythress.org/frame_books/TATM/chapter1.htm

Godawa, Brian. Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom & Discernment. Downers Grove, Il.: InterVarsity Press, 2002

Godmilow, Jill and Ann-Louise Shapiro. “How Real is the Reality in Documentary Film?” History and Theory 36 (December 1997): 80-101

Grenier, Richard. Capturing the Culture: Film, Art, and Politics. Washington, Dc.: Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1991

Jeremias, Joachim. The Parables of Jesus. London: SCM, 1972

Joubert, Joseph. Pensées, Essais, Maximes et Correspondance. Edited by Paul Raynal. Paris: Le Normant, 1850

Kerr, Paul. “F for Fake? Friction Over Faction.” Pp. 74-87 in Understanding Television. Edited by Andrew Goodwin and Garry Whannel. London: Routledge, 1990

Kierkegaard, Søren. Concluding Unscientific Postscript to the “Philosophical Fragments.” Translated by David F. Swenson. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1941

Kreider, Alan. “Christ, Culture, and Truth-Telling.” Pp. 27-60 in Faith in the Centre: Christianity and Culture. Edited by Paul S. Fiddes. Regent’s Study Guides 9. Oxford: Regent’s Park College, 2001

Lewis, C. S. Fern Seeds and Elephants: And Other Essays on Christianity. Glasgow: Collins, 1981

Lewis, C. S. Preface to George Macdonald: An Anthology. New York: Macmillan, 1948

Lewis, C. S. Surprised by Joy. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1955

MacDonald, George. Phantastes: A Færie Romance for Men and Women. London: Smith, Elder and Co., 1858

McIntyre, John. Faith Theology and Imagination. Edinburgh: The Handsel Press, 1987

Medved, Michael. Hollywood vs. America. New York: HarperPerennial, 1993

Myers, Kenneth A. All God’s Children and Blue Suede Shoes: Christians and Popular Culture. Wheaton, Il.: Crossway Books: 1989

Newbigin, Lesslie. Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture. London: SPCK, 1990

Peck, John and Charles Strohmer. Uncommon Sense: God’s Wisdom For Our Complex and Changing World. London: SPCK, 2001

Philo, Greg. Seeing and Believing: The Influence of Television. London: Routledge, 1990

Postman, Neil. Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business. London: Methuen, 1987

Rivera, Roberto. “Elves, Wookies and Fanboys: Star Wars and Our Need for Stories.” No pages. Cited 07 December 2006. Online http://www.boundless.org/1999/features/a0000134.html

Schaeffer, Francis A. Escape From Reason. London: Inter-Varsity Fellowship, 1968

Stackhouse, Max L. “Contextualization, Contextuality, and Contextualism.” Pp. 3-13 in One Faith, Many Cultures: Inculturation, Indigenization, and Contextualization. Edited by Ruy O. Costa. The Boston Theological Institute Annual Volume 2. Maryknoll, Ny.: 1988

Staub, Dick. Too Christian, Too Pagan: How to Love the World Without Falling For It. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 2000

Tillich, Paul. Theology of Culture. Edited by Robert C. Kimball. New York: Oxford University Press, 1964

Turnau, Theodore A., III. “Reflecting Theologically on Popular Culture as Meaningful: The Role of Sin, Grace, and General Revelation.” Calvin Theological Journal 37 (2002): 270-296

Veith, Gene Edward Jr. Postmodern Times: A Christian Guide to Contemporary Thought and Culture. Wheaton, Il.: Crossway Books, 1994

Vibert, Simon. The Church in the Age of the Image: Dare We Still Preach? Orthos 12. Hartford: Fellowship of Word and Spirit, 1993

Walsh, Chad. C.S. Lewis: Apostle to the Skeptics. London: Macmillan, 1949

Wells, David F. Above All Earthly Pow’rs: Christ in a Postmodern World. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005

Whitman, Walt. Leaves of Grass. Edited by Jerome Loving. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998

Williams, Bernard. Report of the Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship. London: HMSO, 1979

Wilson, Paul Scott. Imagination of the Heart: New Understandings in Preaching. Nashville, Tn.: Abingdon Press, 1989

 

 

Footnotes


  1. Joseph Joubert, Pensées, Essais, Maximes et Correspondance (ed. Paul Raynal; Paris: Le Normant, 1850), 158. ↑
  2. Take for example the 1991 film At Play in the Fields of the Lord. “A particularly heavy-handed episode involves the adorable nine-year-old son of one of the missionaries (Aidan Quinn) contracting jungle fever after he’s bitten by a mosquito. As the child lies dying, he pathetically asks his father, ‘Why did God create mosquitoes?’ When the little boy finally expires, the senior missionary (John Lithgow) briskly announces, ‘Well, the Lord has taken him,’ to which the child’s father angrily responds, ‘The Lord hasn’t taken him! Death has taken him! I don’t want to worship a God who would do something like this!’” – Michael Medved, Hollywood vs. America (New York: HarperPerennial, 1993), 59. ↑
  3. The subtle approach being the more dangerous one: cf. Francis A. Schaeffer, Escape From Reason (London: Inter-Varsity Fellowship, 1968), 71. ↑
  4. Kenneth A. Myers, All God’s Children and Blue Suede Shoes: Christians and Popular Culture (Wheaton, Il.: Crossway Books: 1989), 164. ↑
  5. "Television is this-world oriented and restricted to time, and has no capacity to focus our gaze on eternity." – Simon Vibert, The Church in the Age of the Image: Dare We Still Preach? (Orthos 12; Hartford: Fellowship of Word and Spirit, 1993), 6. ↑
  6. Jacques Ellul, The Humiliation of the Word (trans. Joyce Main Hanks; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985), 9. ↑
  7. Myers, All God’s Children, 162. ↑
  8. Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (London: Methuen, 1987), 51. ↑
  9. Ellul, The Humiliation of the Word, 119. ↑
  10. One example of the preference for image over content is mentioned by David Wells: “In 2001, for example, CNN touted the advent of its new anchorman, Aaron Brown, with the words, ‘News delivered in a rare voice. A human voice.’ What is important here? The news or the person through whom it comes?” – David F. Wells, Above All Earthly Pow’rs: Christ in a Postmodern World (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 47. ↑
  11. Ellul, The Humiliation of the Word, 119 and Gene Edward Veith, Jr., Postmodern Times: A Christian Guide to Contemporary Thought and Culture (Wheaton, Il.: Crossway Books, 1994), 126. Note also that an analogous view is endorsed by the Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship: “This being so, we are more impressed by the consideration that the extreme vividness and immediacy of film may make it harder rather than easier for some who are attracted to sadistic material to tell the difference between fantasy and reality.” – Bernard Williams, Report of the Committee on Obscenity and Film Censorship (London: HMSO, 1979), 145. ↑
  12. "Most moviemakers set out to convince viewers that the stories they etch with light ‘show’ in some way what the world is, or what it could or should be." – Roy M. Anker, Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004), 4. Note that the tendency of filmmakers to create accounts of the world can be seen to be descended their rejection of a creative God, as Tillich presciently observed: Paul Tillich, Theology of Culture (ed. Robert C. Kimball; New York: Oxford University Press, 1964), 44. ↑
  13. Ellul, The Humiliation of the Word, 184. ↑
  14. Myers, All God’s Children, 170. ↑
  15. Myers, All God’s Children, 160-161. ↑
  16. James Berardinelli, “The Sea Inside: A Film Review,” n.p. [cited 9 December 2006]. Online http://www.reelviews.net/movies/s/sea_inside.html. ↑
  17. Roger Ebert, “Vera Drake,” n.p. [cited 9 December 2006]. Online http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20041021/REVIEWS/40921004/1023. ↑
  18. Which Ebert notices enough to observe, “No matter what the law says, then or now, in England or America, if you can afford a plane ticket and the medical bill you will always be able to obtain a competent abortion, so laws essentially make it illegal to be poor and seek an abortion.” – Ebert, “Vera Drake,” n.p. ↑
  19. Note that such argument is also common in television drama: Veith, Postmodern Times, 122-123. ↑
  20. John Peck and Charles Strohmer, Uncommon Sense: God’s Wisdom For Our Complex and Changing World (London: SPCK, 2001), 12. ↑
  21. Aptly described by Myers as being of the world but not in the world: Myers, All God’s Children, 18. ↑
  22. Myers, All God’s Children, 180. ↑
  23. Philo's research into the persuasive power of television is suggestive here: Greg Philo, Seeing and Believing: The Influence of Television (London: Routledge, 1990), 149. ↑
  24. Paul Kerr, "F for Fake? Friction Over Faction" in Understanding Television (ed. Andrew Goodwin and Garry Whannel; London: Routledge, 1990), 84. ↑
  25. Ellul, The Humiliation of the Word, 9. ↑
  26. viz. a ἅπαξ λεγόμενον. ↑
  27. pace Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death, 51. ↑
  28. By themselves, images would be barely eidólons: Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (ed. Jerome Loving; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), 12. ↑
  29. Note that this is a descriptive point, not a philosophical observation. ↑
  30. Dick Staub, Too Christian, Too Pagan: How to Love the World Without Falling For It (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 2000), 149. ↑
  31. This is unsurprising as being both audible and visual, film is perceived with the same senses as spoken and written word. ↑
  32. “Just as literature underlies drama, it underlies the electronic media.” – Veith, Postmodern Times, 121. ↑
  33. Jill Godmilow and Ann-Louise Shapiro, “How Real is the Reality in Documentary Film?” History and Theory 36:4 (Dec. 1997): 81. ↑
  34. “Images can present a story, but not an argument.” – Myers, All God’s Children, 163. ↑
  35. Possibly, for example, Genesis 1-3, which deliberately challenge pagan views of the creation of the world. ↑
  36. We must therefore reject the argument that film (or, in fact, television) is merely a temporary diversion, although particular films may at times function that way; for an example of the argument, see Myers, All God’s Children, 168. ↑
  37. Roberto Rivera, “Elves, Wookies and Fanboys: Star Wars and Our Need for Stories,” n.p. [cited 07 December 2006]. Online http://www.boundless.org/1999/features/a0000134.html. ↑
  38. Brian Godawa, Hollywood Worldviews: Watching Films with Wisdom & Discernment (Downers Grove, Il.: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 25. ↑
  39. Such as the Ten Words of Exodus 20.1-17. ↑
  40. Such as much of the Exodus story, including the salvation of Israel from Egypt which forms the background to the Ten Words in Exodus 20. The relationship between God’s revelation through action and is revelation through word is in fact suggested by the dual meaning of the Hebrew word דבר, which means both ‘word’ and ‘act.’ ↑
  41. Cheryl Forbes, Imagination: Embracing a Theology of Wonder (The Greenbelt Files; Portland, Or.: Multnomah Press, 1986), 184. ↑
  42. Anker, Catching Light, 7-8. ↑
  43. e.g. Exodus 20.4, Leviticus 26.1, Romans 1.23 ↑
  44. Adam, in Genesis 1.26-27; the image is faithfully passed on to Seth (and by implication to the rest of humanity) in Genesis 5.3. ↑
  45. Colossians 1.15 ↑
  46. Romans 8.29, 2 Corinthians 3.18, Colossians 3.9-10 ↑
  47. Joachim Jeremias, The Parables of Jesus (London: SCM, 1972), 11. ↑
  48. Song of Solomon 1.12-14 (smell), 5.5 (touch), 8.2 (taste), 2.8-9 (sound ↑
  49. To take but one example, Song of Solomon 3.6. ↑
  50. Forbes, Imagination, 181. ↑
  51. Peck and Strohmer, Uncommon Sense, 50. ↑
  52. “While abstract thought seeks to understand the concrete abstractly, the subjective thinker has conversely to understand the abstract concretely.” – Søren Kierkegaard, Concluding Unscientific Postscript to the “Philosophical Fragments” (trans. David F. Swenson; Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1941), 315. ↑
  53. Paul Avis, God and the Creative Imagination: Metaphor, Symbol and Myth in Religion and Theology (London: Routledge, 1999), 3. ↑
  54. Note the similarity with Blake’s apocalyptic conception of imagination in his A Vision of the Last Judgement: “Vision or Imagination is a Representation of what Eternally Exists, Really & Unchangeably.” – William Blake, Blake: Complete Writings (ed. Geoffrey Keynes; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972), 604. ↑
  55. Forbes, Imagination, 184-185. ↑
  56. “Imagination helps a person persevere and stay committed.” – Forbes, Imagination, 151. ↑
  57. For example, imagination is condemned when it is the origin of idolatry and false prophecy: Isaiah 65.2, 66.18, Ezekiel 13.2, 13.17. ↑
  58. Originally from Genesis 6.5, but cf. its treatment in Paul Scott Wilson, Imagination of the Heart: New Understandings in Preaching (Nashville, Tn.: Abingdon Press, 1989), 18. ↑
  59. Although the desire for spiritual meaning is a genuinely good thing, when it is satisfied by conceptions of God that are not of the same piece as the God of the Bible, they cannot be regarded favourably. ↑
  60. Richard Grenier, Capturing the Culture: Film, Art, and Politics (Washington, Dc.: Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1991), 5. ↑
  61. John Drane, Cultural Change and Biblical Faith: The Future of the Church. Biblical and Missiological Essays for the New Century (Carlisle: Paternoster Press, 2000), 154. Also see Anker, Catching Light, 5. ↑
  62. “When we experience a film, we consciously prime ourselves for illusion. Putting aside will and intellect, we make way for it in our imagination.” – Ingmar Bergman, Four Screenplays of Ingmar Bergman (trans. Lars Maimstrom and David Kushner; New York: Simon and Schuster, 1960), xviii. ↑
  63. Philo observes that the scope of this proferred reality extends to the realm of personal political views, which are often defended on their rationality: Philo, Seeing and Believing, 205. ↑
  64. Note that not all Christians need to watch films; film is an opportunity rather than a mandate. Cf. John Frame, “Should Christians Go to Movies?” n.p. [cited 6 December 2006]. Online http://www.frame-poythress.org/frame_books/TATM/chapter1.htm. ↑
  65. Staub, Too Christian, Too Pagan, 146. ↑
  66. Anker, Catching Light, 4. ↑
  67. Staub, Too Christian, Too Pagan, 145. ↑
  68. Anker, Catching Light, 191. ↑
  69. Anker, Catching Light, 212. ↑
  70. In the case of the film, the simple Danish village and the delicate friendships that have grown up there are worth far more to Babette than the career she could have again in Paris. ↑
  71. Max L. Stackhouse, “Contextualization, Contextuality, and Contextualism,” in One Faith, Many Cultures: Inculturation, Indigenization, and Contextualization (ed. Ruy O. Costa; The Boston Theological Institute Annual Volume 2; Maryknoll, Ny.: 1988), 5. ↑
  72. In the language of Peck and Strohmer such a film provides an opportunity for Christian wisdom to be absorbed by the watcher: Peck and Strohmer, Uncommon Sense, 63. Similarly, it could well challenge distorted understandings of Christian doctrine: Wilson, Imagination of the Heart, 42. ↑
  73. Paul S. Fiddes, “Introduction: The Making of a Christian Mind,” in Faith in the Centre: Christianity and Culture (ed.Paul S. Fiddes; Regent’s Study Guides 9; Oxford: Regent’s Park College, 2001), 18. ↑
  74. “…we should take courage to tell the Christian story, and the complex of stories that make up the Christian heritage. We need to recapture the art of story-telling using the forms and media of our culture” – Fiddes, “Introduction,” 20. ↑
  75. Staub, Too Christian, Too Pagan, 155. ↑
  76. Creating films that “degenerate into dialogue full of simplistic jargon”: Staub, Too Christian, Too Pagan, 155. ↑
  77. Rivera, “Elves, Wookies and Fanboys,” n.p. ↑
  78. The remarkable book Phantastes. – George MacDonald, Phantastes: A Færie Romance for Men and Women (London: Smith, Elder and Co., 1858). ↑
  79. Chad Walsh, C.S. Lewis: Apostle to the Skeptics (London: Macmillan, 1949), 135. ↑
  80. “The quality which had enchanted me in his imaginative works turned out to be the quality of the real universe, the divine, magical, terrifying and ecstatic reality in which we all live. I should have been shocked in my teens if anyone had told me that what I learned to love in Phantastes was goodness.” – C. S. Lewis, Preface to George Macdonald: An Anthology (New York: Macmillan, 1948), 21. ↑
  81. Lesslie Newbigin, Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture (London: SPCK, 1990), 64. ↑
  82. The film industry has in the past provided opportunities to Christians to influence films that treat of an explicitly Christian subject: Staub, Too Christian, Too Pagan, 149. ↑
  83. “A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading. There are traps everywhere—’Bibles laid open, millions of surprises,’ as Herbert says, ‘Fine nets and stratagems.’ God is, if I may say it, very unscrupulous.” – C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1955), 191. ↑