Contents
What's in the Book
Chapter 1: Sometimes You Have to Die Before You Can be Reborn – Confessions of a Film Geek
Chapter 2: The Rise of the VCR Generation
SECTION ONE ~ Standards of Indecency:
Welcome to Our Culture
Chapter 3: Keeping an Eye on What You Watch
- A Worldview to Call Your Own?
Chapter 4: Befoul Western Civilization Once, Shame on You—Befoul
It Twice, Shame on Me
- Movies are Intentional
- Product Placement
- Sidebar**: Learning by Rote
Chapter 5: Agenda, Inc.
- Case Study No. 1: After the Ball
- Case Study No. 2: Happy Feet
- Case Study No. 3: What the #$*! Do We Know?
- Case Study No. 4: “You are the thought leaders”
- Agenda and the Church
- Sidebar**: Attacks on Catholics—Just Because I Don’t Follow You Doesn’t Mean I Won’t Back You Up
Chapter 6: Hollywood’s Lowercase God
- Sidebar**: Horror Films and The Death of God Image
- A Useless Figurehead
- Relevance and Relationship
- Sidebar**: The Use of the Cross and the Christ-Pose in Film—Getting to the Crux of When Others Use the Crucifixion
- Anchors Aweigh Achieves Unmoored Morality
Chapter 7: The Disposable Paradise*
- McMovies—To Turn a Buck
- Smart Movies—Social Engineering
- Cinematic Art, or Toys?
- Wrecking the Culture for Fun and Profit
- A Cinematic Simulacrum: The Disposable Paradise*
- What is “Hollywood”?
- Sidebar**: The Jerk and the Filmmaker’s Worldview
Chapter 8: Have I Ever Told You How Awesome I Am?
- The Gods of Celebrity
Chapter 9: The Hays Code: Back in the Days When Hollywood Cared What We Thought
- The Early Years
- The Production Code
- The ABCs: Argument, Breathing Room, and Creative Expression
Chapter 10: The Ratings System: Making the Irresponsible Seem Responsible Since 1968
- What Do the Ratings Really Mean?
- Context Counts
Chapter 11: Christians and the Culture: Backseat Driving on the Road to Hell
- Examining Our Reflection
Chapter 12: Since We’re Lost, You May as Well Let Me Drive
SECTION TWO ~ The Structure of Film:
Seeing What’s Right in Front of You
Chapter 13: What Are Films?
- Uncle Bud’s Fish Tale
Chapter 14: The Story We Tell Ourselves
- The Great Story
- The Four-Act Structure*
Chapter 15: Many Heroes—One Man
- Traits of the Hero
Chapter 16: The Villain—The Hero Lost
- The Fallen Hero
- Traits of the Villain
- Sidebar**: Monologuing
Chapter 17: The Mentor
- Traits of the Mentor
Chapter 18: The Secondary Antagonist*
- The Golem
- Traits of the Secondary Antagonist*
Chapter 19: Archetypes
- The Herald
- Female Archetypes
- Other Archetypes
Chapter 20: The Great Story
- The Great Story Within the Four-Act Structure*
- The Great Story in Detail
Chapter 21: The Hero Revealed
- Lord Raglan’s Thesis, Heroic Traits, and … Who is He?
- Dundes, Raglan, and Price
- Jesus Christ and the Heroic Traits
- A Fictionalized Christ?
Chapter 22: The Great Story is the Greatest Story Ever Told
- Developing a Christian Cinematic Worldview
- Your Assignment, Should You Choose to Accept It
SECTION THREE ~ Watching Film:
The Right Way to Sit There and Do Something
Chapter 23: Changing the World from Your Recliner
Chapter 24: Does this Hollywood Blockbuster Make Me Look Fat?
- You Are What You See
- What Do We Call Clean?
Chapter 25: Does God Call for Us to Become Ned Flanders?
Chapter 26: Purpose, Truth, and Content
- Purpose ~ Why Was the Film Made?
— Case Study: Avatar
- Truth ~ What Does the Film Say?
— Case Study: The Matrix
- Content ~ How Does the Film Say It?
— Hollywood Creeps Created Ratings Creep
Chapter 27: Morality Points*
Chapter 28: Freedom of Choice Means the Freedom to be an Idiot
Chapter 29: Less Christian Art, More Christian Artists
- To Bear His Name
Chapter 30: Practice Extreme Moderation
- To Discern Beauty Among the Squalor
- The Freedom of the Faithful
- Food Sacrificed to Idols
Chapter 31: Onward Christian Audiences
Chapter 32: I Screwed Up. Now What?
Chapter 33: Honor Christ in What You See
- Advice from a Former Corpse
Appendix A**: The Structure of Pulp Fiction
Appendix B**: The Structure of The Lord of the Rings Film Trilogy
Acknowledgments**
* – indicates an original concept
** – available only in the print edition.