Films We Never Got to Review

MINOR REGRETS AT THE END OF A BLOG

When this blog was just beginning, my friend, Tim Stafford, told me he didn't think the blog go last very long. "After all," he asked, "how many movies are there about churches and pastors?"

It's seven years later, and we've looked at a different film every week. There were a few weeks we ran a repeat, but there were quite a few weeks when we discussed more than one movie. That means we’ve looked at more than 350 films, and we still haven’t run out of films to review. I have a list with nearly 300 potential films, and assuming churches keep showing up in new movies -- I think I already have enough to write about for another seven years. But I'm tired and ready to move on to other projects.

You have to pull the plug sometime, but nonetheless, I regret not having a chance to review some great films that had interesting things to say about faith. Some of the films on this list are pretty awful, but still have interesting things to write about. 

Some of the movies on this list are ones I haven't seen, but they might have interesting things to say. 
There are also films that deal with topics that we rarely touched on.

So these are twelve of the films I most regret not getting around to writing about.

12) Fiddler on the Roof (1971)

I've seen this film more than once, and I like it very much. We've looked at musicals (Sound of Music, Cabin in the Sky, Sister Act) but Fiddler would have been the first musical featuring Eastern Orthodox clergy. There haven’t been many films featuring Orthodox clergy -- the only one I can think of is the Mel Brooks comedy, The Twelve Chairs. I could also have written about Andrei Rublev, a painter of icons used for Orthodox worship, or Beyond the Hills about a Romanian Orthodox Covent, but really, I just wish I'd taken the opportunity to drag the priests in Fiddler over the coals for the way they treated Tevye. 

11) The Quick and the Dead (1995) 

I really enjoyed this Sam Rami western, and I would have liked to write about Russell Crowe’s haunted pastor with a history as a desperado. I would have been happy to have an excuse to watch this again. Most of the westerns I’ve written about haven’t been good westerns (we did get to watch the classic High Noon, but most have been along the lines of The Deadly Companions and God’s Gun). It might have also been fun to get to Charleton Heston’s Will Penny in which Donald Pleasence plays a very creepy, evil preacher.

10) The Exorcist 2: The Heretic (1977) 

It really is a shame I couldn't write about this film, since we reviewed the clergy in the original Exorcist. I have read about this film for a long time, starting with Michael Medved’s Golden Turkey Awards (a salute to bad films), but I’ve never seen it. It really is a shame I couldn’t get to Exorcist 2, since we did review the original Exorcist as well as the second sequel. The Heretic stars Richard Burton in a performance legendary for hamminess. Instead, I've settled for the hammy Burton performances in The Sandpiper and The Robe.(FWIW, another bad film I didn’t write about was God’s Not Dead Part IV: We the People. I watched it in the theater, but never got around to writing about it, though we featured the first three God's Not Dead movies.)

9) Lady Godiva of Coventry (1955) - Please don’t assume it is prurient interests that drew me to curiosity about this film (which I’ve never seen). In all the pictures of Maureen O’Hara as the historical streaker, she seems to be surrounded by nuns. All right. I am curious how the filmmakers handled the nudity in studio days with the Hays Code in full effect. (The Song of Bernadette is another faith-centered story from the golden age of Hollywood. It was quite acclaimed. I’ve never seen it, but it looks rather stodgy, and that's kept me from watching it.)

8) The Devils (1971) 

In the blog, we've tried not to shy away from films that are critical of churches and clergy or even the Christian faith. As a result, we’ve looked at films by famous critics of religion like Michael Tolkin and Luis Buñuel. This notorious “historical” work by writer/director Ken Russell (from a story by Aldous Huxley) is one I never got around to watching. It's difficult to find an unedited version of this X-rated film in which Oliver Reed played a priest with unorthodox views on faith and sex whose followers included licentious nuns. But it was not to be.

7) Ganja & Hess (1973) 

Arguably, this blog didn't cover enough vampire blaxsploitation films, and this movie would have helped remedy that oversight. Sadly, this film was also difficult to find in its original form. (Fun fact: Duane Jones's only other starring performance is in Night of the Living Dead.) The Church seems to play an important part in the battle against dark forces, so I do need to get around to watching this sometime even if I don’t have anywhere to write about it.

6) The Miracle Woman (1931)

This is yet another tough film to track down, with one of my favorite directors (Frank Capra), and starring one of my favorite actresses (Barbara Stanwyck). I'm baffled to realize that we haven’t featured any films by Capra or Stanwyck. Though I haven't seen this film, in it, Barbara becomes disillusioned with the Church and takes up a career as a fraudulent evangelist. Pre-Hays Code films like this one had much more freedom to be critical of the Church. I will manage to write about this one someday, even without this blog as a vehicle.

5) Dogma (1999) 

I have seen this Kevin Smith satire of the Roman Catholic Church and angels and demons that was condemned by the Church even before it was released. While I have grave reservations about the theology in the film, at times it's quite funny and would have been interesting to write about.

4) Au Hasard Balthazar (1966) 

Robert Bresson was one of France’s greatest directors, and I was able to review his classic, Diary of a Country Priest. This film contains just a little about church and clergy. Others of his work, such as Angels of Sin (about a convent that rehabilitates convicts) or The Trial of Joan of Arc. Au Hasard Balthazar is Bresson’s only film (and perhaps the only film of any kind) that features the baptism of a donkey.

3) Les Miserables (1935, 1952, 1998, 2012, or any of the other versions)

There are many adaptations of this Victor Hugo film, but I didn’t get to any of them. This is too bad, because Bishop Myriel, who cares for Jean Valjean, is one of the best portrayals of clergy in literature and cinema.

2) The Name of the Rose (1986) 

I’ve read Umberto Eco’s novel, but I’ve never seen this adaptation of the book, and it’s hard to track down. It’s a retelling of a Sherlock Holmes story using Franciscan monks in a medieval abbey. It stars Sean Connery as a friar, William of Baskerville. It also stars Christian Slater and we at Movie Churches do love Christian Slater films (the good and the awful.)

1) Amazing Grace (2006) 

I saw this film and like it very much. Directed by Michael Apted, it tells the true story of William Wilberforce and his campaign against England's slave trade. Wilberforce's pastor was John Newton, the former slave trader and author of the hymn “Amazing Grace.” He definitely would have received our highest Movie Churches rating of Four Steeples.

If only I could have gotten to these dozen films. And maybe, St. Benny the Dip. And…

Movie Churches' Bottom Ten Worst Films

As you read this, remember that any list of worst films doesn't really list the worst films. The worst film ever made was probably a community college film class project in Staten Island or Terre Haute or Fresno. They didn't have any money to make the film, and it was made only to fulfill a general ed requirement. Fortunately, most of us won't ever see the film (unless we happen to be in the same class -- and then we'd have the satisfaction that at least our film wasn't that bad). 

But it’s one thing to make a bad film with little talent and few resources. It's really painful for an audience to watch a bad film made by a studio with millions of dollars and an experienced cast and crew.

It’s also worth noting that some bad films are very entertaining. For instance, Ed Wood’s Plan Nine from Outer Space is often listed as one of the worst films of all time, but it’s quite funny with its wooden performances and cardboard tombstones -- and I’d rather watch it again than many Best Picture Nominees.

There are two things likely to earn a film a place on this list. First, being boring. I’d much rather watch an outrageous film that is poorly acted and written than a “well-made” film in which nothing happens. (I’m not talking about a film like My Dinner with Andre. Sure, all that “happens” in that film is two men having dinner, but so much “happens” in their conversation, and it is quite entertaining.)

The other thing that earns a film a place on this list is the film’s message. Since ultimately this is a blog about faith, there are films that present lies as the truth and hope that is really despair. Those are the worst films in my opinion. 

Anyway, here are films I really couldn't stand -- the worst ten:

10) The Redeemed aka Act of Contrition (2019) 
It seems like I reviewed this film just last week. Because it was just last week I reviewed this film. It was the last film I watched for this blog and one of the worst. Global Genesis Group, producers of many low-budget films, brought us this mess about a member of a mob family trying to reconcile with his family before he dies. Or something like that. It was such a mess of wooden acting, lecturing dialogue, flashbacks, and voice-overs that I couldn’t properly follow the plot. And I didn’t care about the plot. And the clergy in the film were awful.

9) God’s Club (2015)

I’ve watched many Christian films for this blog, and as a rule, they're bad. Frankly, I have some sympathy for the filmmakers. I’ve written a lot of skits and Christmas programs for churches, and it's tough to balance the message with entertainment with realism. Propaganda isn’t necessarily bad, but it is very difficult to do well. If the message is “love your neighbor as yourself,” that’s swell -- but if the message comes out preachy, few will be reached with it. 

The worst are Christian films that don’t even get the message right. God's Club is one of those stories of good Christians versus bad unbelievers. A town that doesn't seem to have a single church, but does have a pretty good sized high school (I don't believe such a town exists in the United States). There's a Christian club at that high school that the bad secularists are trying to destroy. 

Worst of all, the film includes bad theology: according to it, any suicide leads to the lakes of hell. That's not supported by Scripture, and it's damaging to people suffering from mental illness (and their loved ones).

And be wary if Stephen Baldwin is in the cast. If Corbin Bernsen and Lorenzo Lamas are in the cast as well, really, there's no hope.

8) Van Helsing (2004) 

I admit it, I have a fondness for horror films, even poorly made ones. But this big-budget film starring Hugh Jackman has no excuse for being so bad. Universal has a rich heritage with their films about Dracula, Frankenstein’s monster, and the Wolf Man, but this film is a sorry hash. Worst of all (for us here at Movie Churches, anyway) is the character who drinks, curses, and sleeps around but explains, “I’m a friar, not a monk.”

7) The Confessor aka The Good Shepherd (2004) 

Christian Slater made some pretty good films in the 20th century -- we even looked at a couple of them here in Movie Churches (Heathers and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves). But in the 21st century, his films have been, as a rule, direct-to-DVD or streaming and awful. We’ve featured some of his bad films as well as the good ones: The Way of the Wicked, Sacrifice, and worst of all, The Confessor.

In this film, confessions at a Catholic church are tape-recorded and used for blackmail. Of course, there’s murder and fundraising, most of the worst stuff found in the Roman Catholic Church but not, you know, presented in an interesting manner.

6) Robin Hood (2018) 

I just mentioned a Robin Hood film, and we'll look at another version in Movie Churches’ best films. This film, though, tosses the traditions of the character away and makes the film fit the mold of any other modern action film. Plus it goes out of its way to make the church as abhorrent as possible.

5) The Sandpiper (1965) 

Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor made eleven films together, and some of those films were excellent, like The Taming of the Shrew and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? They also made some bad ones. Cleopatra was such a bomb it nearly bankrupted a studio. The Sandpiper was one of the bad ones.

Burton plays an Episcopal priest who runs a parochial school. He’s also married to Eva Marie Saint. But when he meets the beautiful mother of one of his students, he considers leaving his ministry and marriage for the woman. Is there a more difficult question in ministry than blonde or brunette?

4) Shanghai Surprise (1986)

No doubt much of the marketing for Burton and Taylor films was based on their offscreen romance. That was also the marketing hook for this film starring newlyweds Madonna and Sean Penn. It's the only film they made together -- no one wanted another after that. It does make one wonder who thought, “Do you know who would make a great missionary? Madonna!”

3) God’s Not Dead (2014) 

This was the film that let studios know that Christian films could make money. Sure The Passion of the Christ had made millions a decade before, but that was a Mel Gibson film. This film showed that a well-marketed Christian film could make money with no more star power than Duck Dynasty. This might have been fine, but in the cheesy world of Christian film, this piles the cheddar even higher.

There are many things I dislike about the film, but among them is that it sparked getting into an argument with a stranger in the theater. One of the plot lines in the film is about a Muslim father and daughter who are torn apart when the daughter becomes a Christian. As we watched this film in a discount theater, a man nearby scoffed, "That would never happen!"  I responded, "Yes it does." It doesn’t take much googling to find stories about honor killings in the western world, but this movie presents the situation in such a melodramatic way, I could understand the scoffing.

The worst part of the film comes at the end when two pastors pray with a man, who receives Christ as his savior just before he dies from injuries due to an auto accident. After he dies, the pastors celebrate, virtually high-fiving each other for their evangelistic victory. It's one of the more tasteless displays of religiosity I have ever seen.

2) Love Actually (2003) 

Yes, I know many people love this film. It’s a Christmas staple for many. But this film has no idea about what Christmas is all about. I really hate this celebration of debauchery.

1) License to Wed (2007) 

I met Robin Williams one time. I liked him very much. He did a number of great films. This was not one of those films.

The film is about a pastor of a church in an undeterminable denomination who becomes a psychopath in premarital counseling. Watching this film would make any normal person want to stay far, far away from any church or clergy. The whole point of this blog is to demonstrate that the world could use more good churches and good clergy.

And yes, I am ranking William’s Reverend Frank below pastors who were thieves and murderers. This was a miserable film.

For the sake of this blog, I watched these bad films all the way through. Sometimes twice. This blog now is almost done, and I can quit miserable films like that a few minutes in. So can you.

Movie Churches goes REALLY Old School

The Robe (1953)

As we've mentioned a number of times before, we don’t do many Biblical films here at Movie Churches because films such as the 1956 Ten Commandments or any of the versions of Ben Hur don’t have much in the way of church or clergy. (The 1923 version of The Ten Commandments is another story.) Occasionally, though, Sword and Sandal epics set in early AD have one or both of them. One such film is The Robe.

Based on the Reverend Lloyd Douglas’s best-selling novel of the same name, The Robe tells the story of a Roman military tribune, Marcellus (Richard Burton), who participates in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and goes on to become His follower in the early church. Jesus had worn the article of clothing of the title, but Marcellus won it in a game of chance in the shadow of the Cross. The robe plays a role in the tribune’s journey of faith, as does his Christian slave, Demetrius (Victor Mature), and his childhood sweetheart, Diana (Jean Simmons).

The Rev. Douglas seems to have written the novel as a means of sharing his Lutheran faith. 

Producer Frank Ross saw the property's moneymaking potential before the book was published and bought the rights to the novel. He spent a decade bringing it to the screen, and it made him a very wealthy man. 

Screenwriter Albert Maltz saw in the story an opportunity to present his Marxist vision of revolt. Maltz was one of the famed Hollywood Ten who refused to give names to the House Un-American Activities Committee (his name was removed from the credits and not returned for decades). 

It was directed by Henry Koster, a Jew who fled Germany in 1932, who stressed the story’s theme of tolerance.

But when (and if) the film is remembered these days among cineasts, it is chiefly noted for being the first feature film presented in Cinemascope. In the early 1950s, movie studios were in an existential financial struggle with the upstart television industry. Instead of boxy images, Cinemascope's widescreen provided a new vision for storytelling. In an introduction to the DVD version of the film we watched, Martin Scorsese marvels about the movie screen opening wider and wider on his first viewing of the film.

Of course, what we care about here is the presentation of the church and its leadership. Both come out quite positively in the film.

After Demetrius escapes, Marcellus searches for him in the small town of Cana (yes, the place where Jesus turned water into wine at a wedding). He encounters a weaver named Justus (Dean Jagger), a leader of the local church. Justus encourages all the believers to treat the stranger from Rome with generous hospitality. Marcellus attends a worship service that seems to consist entirely of one song about the death and resurrection of Jesus sung by Miriam, a paralytic woman who knew Jesus while He was on earth. 

Marcellus asks the woman why Jesus didn’t heal her and she responds that Jesus healed her spirit, giving her love, joy, and hope in place of bitterness and anger. (Though I certainly believe that God allows people to live with illness, such as Paul’s “thorn in the flesh”, I know of no instance in the Gospels where Jesus didn’t perform physical healing when there was an opportunity to do so.)

Marcellus does eventually find Demetrius, who wins the Roman over to the Christian faith. In fact, Marcellus agrees to join his former slave and Simon, the Big Fisherman (yes, that Simon, the Apostle Peter) on a mission to spread the Gospel of Jesus. Marcellus is betrayed by a former companion, and the Romans capture Demetrius. The former slave is imprisoned and tortured. 

When such things happened in the New Testament account, the Church would gather to worship. On occasion, men like Peter and Paul were supernaturally rescued. At times they weren’t. But in this story, Marcellus plans and executes a bold and violent rescue of his friend. It makes for a good action sequence but raises issues of submission to authority and peaceful non-violence that are not mentioned in any way by the men that join Marcellus on his raid.

Though Demetrius is rescued, he is near death. The Apostle Peter (Michael Rennie) is brought in to care for their friend. Peter’s healing powers don’t live up to their full potential as seen in the book of Acts, though. In Acts 3, a lame man is immediately able to jump to his feet upon the word of Peter. In Acts 9, a good woman returns from death to life at Peter's command. The best Peter can do here is make Demetrius not quite so sick and he still needs to be carried about on a stretcher while he heals. (And he does heal. He becomes well enough to star in a sequel to this film the very next year, Demetrius and the Gladiators.)

The example of love, compassion, tolerance, and humility shown by the community of believers changes not just Marcellus's heart, but also his beloved Diane. While assisting Demetrius to escape from Roman authorities, Marcellus turns himself in to buy time for his friend. At his trial before the Emperor, Caligula (Jay Robinson), the tribune claims that he never flagged in his loyalty to Rome (though he did just break a Roman prisoner free) but he also will never deny Christ. He is sentenced to death. And Diana asks to go with him to death. (Though I wasn’t really sure whether this was due to love for the teachings of Jesus or for her man.)

Though The Robe won only two of the five Oscars it was nominated for (wins for Costumes and Art & Set Direction but not for Best Picture, Actor, or Cinematography) but I’m sure the film's makers would be thrilled to know that the Church and its Leaders earned the highest Movie Church rating of Four Steeples.

Clergy in Crisis: The Sandpiper (1965)

 Richard Burton as an Episcopalian pastor and school principal in 1965's The Sandpiper faces one of the great moral dilemmas: to be true to his wife (Eva Marie Saint) or have an affair with the mother (Elizabeth Taylor) of one of his students.

The film was one of eleven Burton and Taylor made together as they continued to marry, divorce and remarry themselves and others off screen. Directed by the great director of musicals, Vincente Minnelli though it wasn’t a musical, the film introduced the Academy Award winning song, "The Shadow of Your Smile."

I wondered for a bit whether to use this film for Movie Churches since it is about a school principal (or "warden" as he is referred to in the film) rather than a full time pastor. But the Rev. Dr. Edward Hewitt (Burton) is an ordained Episcopalian priest, and he does apparently regularly preach in chapel to the students of his boys' school. More importantly, everyone views him as a minister of the Gospel.

Laura Reynolds (Taylor) thinks of him as a Christian, and that is the very reason she doesn't want her son to attend his school. She calls herself a "naturalist" who doesn't believe in the supernatural. She thinks religion corrupts people's spirits, but a judge rules that her ten year old son must either attend Hewitt's school or reform school, so she consents. He tries to assure her that even though chapel is compulsory, you can't force someone to pray.

Laura had been homeschooling her son, Danny. They've both been memorizing The Canterbury Tales (not a great way to keep one's mind religion free). I find it rather interesting that a half century ago, homeschooling is presented as the province of anti-religious free spirits while in the more recent past, people think of conservative Christians when they think of homeschoolers.

Billy Graham had what proved to be a wise policy of never meeting alone with a woman who was not a family member. The Rev. Dr. Hewitt visits Miss Reynolds (she's never been married, a scandal to all) in her home to report on her son. On his first visit he finds her modeling topless for an artist. He sticks around until after the artist leaves so he can talk to her alone. Not prudent.

Hewitt wants information on Laura’s background, so he asks around in the locker room at the Pebble Beach Country Club. One of the men wonders if Hewitt can handle the sordid details, being a minister and all. The man says he had an affair with Miss Reynolds.

Hewitt continues to visit Reynolds and eventually admits his desire for her. They begin an affair. He lies to his wife, claiming to be off at school fundraising appointments. He tells Laura that his wife is a good woman (and Mrs. Hewitt does seem to be kind, affirming and supportive). He tells Laura that he is a hypocrite (good call).

Laura has an artist friend (Charles Bronson) who calls himself "the village atheist" and enjoys trying to bait the Rev. Dr. into theological arguments. Hewitt responds with the proverb about not answering a fool in his folly. When the atheist finds out about the affair, he mocks the Rev. Dr., who attacks him and tries to choke him to death.

So, in his relationships with two defiant non-Christians, Hewitt tries two different methods of communication. Not surprisingly, neither adultery nor violence leads to conversion.

Laura does attend the last school chapel of the year, a time when parents are invited. In a rambling, pseudo-profound sermon, the Rev. Dr. Hewitt announces his resignation. He doesn't confess his sin, but he tells his wife and lover he is leaving them both. I believe all parties will be better off. The Rev. Dr. Hewitt and his chapel receive One Steeple.