Christians in Hollywood
Christians in Hollywood – by Nick White
It’s a familiar story – you’ve had a difficult day, it seems as if the whole world is against you and you need to unwind. You decide to relax in front of the TV and watch a film. During the film a character enters a scene. This character is a mean-spirited, smug, self-righteous, judgmental stereotype of a Christian. You go to bed feeling worse than ever and wonder what people think of you.
The portrayal of Christians through Hollywood and the rest of the film industry is a curious mix. Before the end of the 60’s, believers were shown in a relatively favourable light. In more recent years there have been both positive and negative Christian characters on the screen. However, there is still a dearth of Christian heroes and heroines.
In 1938 a film called Angels with Dirty Faces came out. It was a success with cinema goers and featured a New York thug turned priest named Jerry Connolly. He isn’t the hero (that is James Cagney), but he is a main character and is presented as a tough, loving believer concerned about the problems in his community.
Believers were treated kindly in Bible adaptations (via the disciples). Even some of the main characters were Christians in these earlier films. In the film version of Les Miserables (1952), for example, Jean Valjean has a conversion experience and defies all Christian stereotype with his benevolence.
Then, a year later in The Robe Richard Burton’s Marcellus Gallio is the slave who accepts Christ. And once again he is the hero of the film.
Moving on to the classic film On the Waterfront (1954), dock worker Terry Malloy (played by Marlon Brando) finds support in a waterfront priest named Father Barry against a corrupt union leadership.
But there were also some Christian villains around. Night of the Hunter (1955) heralded the arrival of ‘the evil preacher’. Harry Powell (played by Robert Mitchum) is a Bible-quoting baddie with a disturbing personality. Villainous preachers like this were to appear in many later films. In fact Christian leaders were to get most of the flak.
Another largely positive portrayal comes from the film Elmer Gantry (1960). This movie features Sister Sharon Falconer (Jean Simmons), a revivalist who is the film’s heroine. She is not even shown as particularly naive. She is likable, with a lively, passionate faith.
Before the end of the 1960’s Christians didn’t get too bad a press through Hollywood. An entire glut of films seemed to feature largely positive Christian characters. But during that period, the National Council of Churches abandoned their Hollywood offices because of financial problems. Some say this even resulted in the decline of good morals in movies.
Sam Engel, one-time head of 20th Century Fox once commented on this and said: “If you take the salt from the meat, the meat’s going to rot.”
It would be unfair to suggest that this was the only reason for a decline in positive Christian characters. But the fact is that many of the older films showed Christians in a kinder light than today.
The British film The Wicker Man (1973) does have a Christian hero (in policeman Neil Howie (Edward Woodward)). But he is shown as totally naive to the conspiracy all around him. Horror films usually revel in the idea of the Christian villain.
Horror writer Stephen King loves his evil believers. In Carrie (1976), Carrie’s mother Margaret is devoutly Catholic and seriously deranged. Salems Lot (1979) has a clergyman who doesn’t have true faith and therefore is killed by a vampire. Even The Shawshank Redemption (1994) has a cruel prison warden who is a twisted parody of a believer.
Maybe Tarantino’s From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) could be said to have a different kind of Christian in the lapsed pastor ‘Jacob’. And in The Omen films (beginning from 1976) at least the Christians were the goodies.
Bucking this trend, and perhaps simply because they are based on real people, biopics of believers are often positive.
The Hiding Place (1975) is not a mainstream film but it shows Corrie Ten Boom as having an active faith (something which is often played down in mainstream movies).
Many Christians love the film Chariots of Fire (1981) in which Olympic runner Eric Liddell (Ian Charleson) is the hero who makes a stand for what he believes in. “When I run I feel His pleasure,” he says memorably.
Shadowlands (1993) caused controversy for apparently showing C.S.Lewis almost losing his faith entirely. But on the whole it is a realistic love story in which C.S. Lewis is literally surprised by Joy.
And Johnny Cash in Walk the Line (2005) defies all Christian stereotype through his music. He even dresses well.
There are a few other films with positive Christian characters. But there are also a lot of films in which believers become clichés and are not very realistic.
Turning Christians into figures of fun is something we are used to by now. The Life of Brian ((1979) has no Christian characters in it but Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life (1983) shows stereotypical Catholics and Protestants. The Catholics have far too many children and the Protestants over the road look down on them judgmentally.
The Simpsons Movie (2007) features the nightmarishly clichéd Ned Flanders. A badly dressed cartoon character who is surely a figure of ridicule.
The Christian hypocrite is a particular favourite of Hollywood. Doubt (2008) has a character named Father Flynn as a villain (but, to be fair, Sister Aloysius (Meryl Streep) is a nun who exposes his hypocrisy).
The Da Vinci Code (2006) has yet another baddie in ‘Silas’, a monk who is violent and self flagellating. The Catholic group, Opus Dei (along with many others) were not happy with this film. On their website, the real Opus Dei say: “We want to point out that The Da Vinci Code’s depiction of Opus Dei is inaccurate, both in the overall impression and in many details.”
The Vatican commented on Dan Brown’s sequel Angels and Demons (2009). In the Vatican’s newspaper ‘L’Osservatore Romano’, there was a review of the film. It said the film was full of stereotypical characters but conceded: “The theme is always the same: a sect versus the church. This time the church is on the side of the good guys.”
Director Ron Howard defended his movie: “In Angels and Demons; Professor Robert Langdon teams up with the Catholic Church to thwart a vicious attack against the Vatican. What exactly, is anti-Catholic about that?”
In this film the church is under attack from a secret society called the illuminati. Ewan McGregor’s character ‘The Camerlengo’ appears at first to be softly-spoken, thoughtful and even heroic. But it turns out he is in fact anachronistic, anti-science and murderous. The Swiss Guard come out of it looking good though.
There are numerous other films in which Christian characters are shown negatively. These days there are a lack of realistic heroes and heroines who are also believers. And positive story characters can do wonders for any minority.
But as ‘The Camerlengo’ from Angels and Demons says:
“Our church is at war. We are under attack from an old enemy.”
And yes, you may get the feeling that it isn’t just the Illuminati.
Nick White is a freelance journalist based in the UK who specialises in writing on politics and Christianity. His website is www.nick-c-white.co.uk
Tags: Media