“However, we find in drama today, and for my purpose specifically in film, two significant changes that were somewhat rare in our culture fifty years ago. First, the ethics of the hero’s action is now morally relativistic. And second, spectacle, or what Aristotle called ‘scenic effects,’ has upstaged all other dramatic elements” (Arthur Hunt, The …
The Great Eye Machines
“The visual element of romanticism is highly significant because it would later find its way into the great eye machines of the twentieth century—cinema and television. It would also lay the foundation for existentialism, the forerunner of postmodernism” (Arthur Hunt, The Vanishing Word, p. 120).
The Word vs. Special Effects
“While the Renaissance careened after the image, the Reformation became a predominately word-based movement . . . the real religious fervor and intellectual power pulled to the north, so that England, Scandinavia, and Germany became the realm of the word, and the south returned to spectacle” (Arthur Hunt, The Vanishing Word, p. 78).
Sounds, Sights, and Usually Some Skin
“Images have a way of evoking an emotional response. Pictures have a way of pushing rational discourse—linear logic—into the background. The chief aim of television is to sell products and entertain audiences. Television seeks emotional gratification. As a visual medium, television programming is designed to be amusing. Substance gives way to sounds and sights. Hard …
Why Essentialism is Essential
“The first major point in our look at the roots of postmodernism is the rejection of essentialism, which takes several forms in different postmodern thinkers. In general, essentialism is the idea that things have real qualities, independent of our knowing them” (Millard Erickson, The Postmodern World, p. 36).
One Follows His Reasoning
“If I had to choose an image to sum up our times, I would not choose from among the usual ones, such as the Nuclear Age, the Technological Society, the Age of Anxiety, the Computer Generation, the Affluent Society, or the Space Era. I would call it the Age of Noise” (Michael D. O’Brian, A …
Not Preachy
“On one level these novels [Narnia stories] are tremendous adventures, and on another they are rich theological treatises that teach truth without failing into the tedious habit of preaching to children. The search for truth is simply part of the excitement” (Michael D. O’Brian, A Landscape With Dragons, p. 125).
The Rebirth of Christian Story
“Because the Holy Spirit is always pouring out life upon God’s people, we must never succumb to the temptation to think that the false culture has won. Despite its apparent powers, its noise, and its glamour, it is a moribund system that has not much longer to live . . . A regeneration of Christian …
No Kidding
“Films, videos, and commercial television have come close to replacing the Church, the arts, and the university as the primary shaper of the modern sense of reality” (Michael D. O’Brian, A Landscape With Dragons, p. 61).
Why the Serpent Does Not Symbolize Honesty
“The meanings of symbols are not merely the capricious choices of a limited culture. We cannot arbitrarily rearrange them like so much furniture in the living room of the psyche. To tamper with these fundamental types is spiritually and psychologically dangerous because they are keystones in the very structure of the mind” (Michael D. O’Brian, …