Last night, I went with a friend to go see Golden Compass. She had known that I had tried a couple of times to see it, and my schedule had collapsed and didn’t allow it. She had said she had no desire to see it, and then, last night, changed her mind and asked me to go. I was mildly surprised and deeply pleased because part of the reason she had not wanted to see the film was because she had been urged at church to not view it. (Her faith and religious perceptions in the world are deeply different than my own.)
So we went. And I watched her during the film, off and on, and we had a great conversation after the film. She enjoyed the film, and is looking forward to the sequel. And I was delighted that she ventured to see a film that her community of faith had suggested she boycott.
Like so many films of this type, it is messianic. Like Dune, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Dark Crystal, et al, the film and its sequels are about the hero’s journey, the ‘messiah’ who will come and organize and lead people in a struggle against organized evil. And like the above films, organized evil is headquartered in foreboding citadels that are meant to tower over innocence, dwarfing it, frightening it, subduing it. In every case, it is one of the oldest stories told. Some birth is foretold, some ‘savoir or messiah’ is expected, the writings, the prophecies, the seers…they all tell the same story…”there will come amongst you…”
The hero is reluctant, and a non-believer of the anointed role, but regardless of belief, they will be tested, in strength, insight, wisdom and courage. Jesus, in the Garden of Gethsemane before being crucified, in despair in his journey, prays…”Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me…“ They will be tested to determine true of heart, and whether true of heart can endure the travail of the journey. It’s a journey told in all languages, all cultural systems, and in part, grows from the human desire for leadership and authority to help lift the burden of their lives, especially from that which seems to emerge from outside and organized sources.
The film was good in many ways, in simple story telling. It wasn’t a great film, just a fun one, a good one. And I left thinking about…how do we reach a point in our human lives where we think boycotting fantasy films of a hero’s journey somehow protects our children? As one blogger put it on here, she didn’t want it poisoning her child’s mind.
Poison?
Many of the religious conservatives, of whatever faith, see the book author’s anti-religious views as being somehow dangerous to kids. I’m sure the author probably agrees with the subtitle of Christopher Hitchen’s latest book, “God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything”. But the fantasy stand-in for religion is the Magisterium, which represents organized religion and its need to have people not question, to follow, and to be punished for free thinking, even killed. Think of Gallileo’s persecution by the Vatican, and his recent pardon in the last decade. Think of burning witches, who were women who would not stop asking questions and who failed to follow the clerics of Puritanism and Catholicism and others to the letter of what they said which was the truth of their gods, the law of their gods. Think of Teilhard de Chardin and the censorship of his writings on evolution and science by the Church, until the Jesuit died. Over and over…organized religions around the world work to silence those who question the tenets of faith, the structures of belief, the logical inconsistencies with the offered explanations of religious leaders. Traditionally, they killed the heretics, or locked them away in towers and dungeons.
And in 2008, we still stumble around…scaring children into thinking that free thinking on their part will lead them to eternal damnation, hell’s fire, or whatever the thing is that a faithful might fear. The children must be protected from using the brain that was gifted them by a loving, magnanimous and obviously fickle self-admiring god (“love me, worship me, or I’ll burn yer ass, over and over, for eternity!”), and instead trained into not having…’impure, questioning, thoughts.’
How do we still believe this is useful, and wanted by a god, in the same era where we have mapped the genetic code and are listening to the universe hundreds of light years away? How do we equate a loving being, with one who would have us not think, question, listen to, query? How do we do that? How does fear still organize so much of human behavior into…behaving?
Every conservative system of thought steeps itself in fear, because going forward into the unknown is experienced as so threatening, that one wishes to stay back, to conserve, to keep things as they are, or were, because they worked okay…then. Doesn’t matter if its religion or politics. The NeoCons are only successful because so much of America is first tuned in by their religious communities to believe in evil boogiemen, and then seek any authority who knows better than the self, on how to deal with it. So believe in boogiemen (Satan) and believe in authority. And how does one question omniscient beings? I mean…can there be a greater authority?
My friend and I had a great conversation about the film, and the religious community who wanted people to boycott the film. She didn’t feel poisoned. And she could see how the film was like so many messianic films…just archetypal. I was really glad she saw the film simply as a small victory in the struggle to free a species brain…
But I still don’t get it…how in 2008…we’re still so afraid of boogie____?
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TroutFishing
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Jan 13 @ 3:12PM
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I found the star in this picture far too calm for a young girl -
for instance - one of the mechanical bugs escapes yet she
goes back out on deck in the dark - and Harry Potter in the
last one of the series just released to dvd to be breathing
heavily in fear far too much for the 4th adventure. But that's
just me - your results may vary.
I also heard a lot of anti-religious rumblings about this film,
yet it was a fantasy - and that means fiction - I did not SEE
anything overtly anti in the film.
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Sheryll861
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Jan 13 @ 3:29PM
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kjac
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Jan 13 @ 4:06PM
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Many of the religious conservatives, of whatever faith, see the book author’s anti-religious views as being somehow dangerous to kids.
Which is why I'm buying the dvd each for my sister, my parents, my brother, and myself. Just to spite anyone who would whine about crap like that.
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observed50
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Jan 13 @ 4:30PM
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Trout> I understand your point on the girl. I thought, as per usual in films, she had a love for forbidden rooms, a love for coming right into the midst of deep threat...and not flinching. I wondered if she was a sociopath...feeling nothing...but she did cry for the bear. So maybe she was on meth? 
Sheryll> Yeah... but I mean really...when you get done laughing...how did you REALLY feel about it...Sheryll...can you hear me? Are you almost done laughing? Oh, never mind! 
Kjac> There is that energy in us that makes us want to share with others, or 'evangelize' the experiences we have that we find useful, meaningful. My dad, a long-time deeply religious man, international layleader in one of the mainline denominations, read Hitchen's book before I did, and loved it so much he went out and bought a copy for his own library. This is a man who use to have us sit as a family and watch Billy Graham Crusades. He's now 80 years old, and he meets with a group from his church, all retired, who have migrated in their thinking from standardized believers, into what they now see themselves as 'humanists.' As a son of such a person of faith, I find the transition to be profound. He talks of it as liberating.
He's not afraid of boogie anymore! 
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Sheryll861
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Jan 13 @ 5:17PM
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Okay........ I did not see the movie, don't care one way or the other about it.
But I did think your blog was long and boring..... sorry, but you made it public.......
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MsLani
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Jan 13 @ 6:09PM
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Haven't seen the film but read the book years ago and enjoyed it tremendously.
I heard and read many peoples feelings about the film being anti-religion but I never really got that sense from the book.
I think folks just need something to complain about. Or something to fear.
I have to say that I tried to read the second and third books but found them not half as interesting as the first.
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