“Raunch” comedy has become a genre all its own, with a life of its own. But after you do the scatological language, the juvenile sexual histrionics, the casual nudity, and the even-more-casual drugs, then what? Is it time now to have an actual story?
This movie is “Lawrence of Arabia” meets “Raiders of the Lost Ark”, or, if you prefer, Ishmael takes Abraham’s blessing from Isaac, but it looks more like Aladdin with a magic knife instead of a magic carpet.
At one level, leaving letters from the lovelorn stuck in the wall of a courtyard in Verona, Italy, which is supposed to represent the fictional balcony in Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet,” is beyond pitiful.
Yes, “Death At A Funeral” is a literal re-make of a British film released only three years ago. But as one local promoter put it, “No, it’s not the same movie, because now you have black people on the screen.”
by Brian McLaren HarperOne. San Francisco. 320 pages.
reviewed by Jan Edmiston
Brian McLaren first came on my radar in 2004 when Time magazine named him “One of the 25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America.” James Dobson and Rick Warren were familiar names and faces. But Brian McLaren was not only an unfamiliar name; his message sounded very different from his fellow “Influential Evangelicals.”
by Kimberly Bracken Long Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2009. 130 pp. $19.95
reviewed by Ronald P. Byars
Whether it is playing the piano or soccer, doing so with a measure of grace requires both coaching and practice, and that is equally true for skills such as preaching, reading Scripture aloud, or presiding in worship. Few find leadership in worship comes naturally, but it can be learned.
by Lillian Daniel and Martin B. Copenhaver Eerdmans, 2009, Pb., 235 pp.
reviewed by Stephen r. Montgomery
Ever since Barbara Brown Taylor wrote her critically acclaimed book Leaving Church, I have been waiting for someone with equal eloquence and theological depth to respond with reflections on why, given all the shortcomings and problems of churches, one would choose to stay in church.
by Bill Tammeus and Rabbi Jacques Cukierkorn University of Missouri Press, Columbia Missouri, 2009.
reviewed by Leslianne Braunstein
I saw the movie, Schindler’s List in 1993. I thought Oskar Schindler was incredibly brave and appropriately recognized by the State of Israel as one of the Righteous Among the Nations – a non-Jew who risked his life to save Jews from Nazi extermination.
This book can be read in an afternoon; but for the attentive reader who practices what it teaches, the insights will last a lifetime. The premise of the book is simple: “the church both yearns for and resists effective leadership, particularly transformational leadership.”
Farrar, Straus and Giroux. (2009). 208 pages. By C.E. Morgan.
A finely written novel that portrays the deepest connections of love, land, grief, friendship, marriage, and faith. The author deftly and accurately renders the language and culture of those who tend the land. Theological and pastoral insights are subtly woven into the narrative. An extraordinary story by a skilled young writer.
You know all those movies where immediately upon death, there’s a really bright light, and you get to go to a place that’s colorful and fantastic, with phenomenal visuals?
If you’re looking at movie choices that seem so deadly serious (“The Hurt Locker”) or take themselves so seriously (“Avatar”) or are serious downers (“Precious”), and you’re looking for something lighthearted and mindless, maybe some adult humor without descending into a raunchfest (“The Hot Tub Time Machine”), then “The Bounty Hunter” might be for you.
Hiccup (the voice of Jay Baruchel) is a bright, skinny, sensitive little Viking lad who just doesn’t seem to fit in with the big, burly, warrior clan where his father, Stoick (the voice of Gerard Butler) is the chief.
Tim Burton’s treatment of “Alice In Wonderland” is just as whimsical as you’d expect, with his trademark dark humor accompanying it, and with the CGI (computer-generated imagery) of Wonderland thrown with 3-D, it’s a feast for the eyes, as well.
“The White Ribbon” is released in the U.S. already having received a Golden Globe nomination for best Foreign Film. It’s a tormented, tormenting kind of movie that will likely struggle to find an audience here, except among the most adventurous of moviegoers.
