I have gotten some feedback from Christian Entertainment post. I’d like to illustrate what I mean about a toxic culture and screenwriting by giving some examples of ideas I think would make great movies, but would never be made in the current environment.
Writers get ideas from reading and experience. If you read a standard set of liberal texts, you come up with liberal movie ideas, because the texts themselves edit out any foreign ideas. In presidential campaigns, newspapers followed The Narrative, which means that everyone sticks to a certain story and a certain spin. Here is what people don’t seem to understand: all liberal texts, including scholarly ones, follow The Narrative. Since liberals dominate universities, ideas are censored down to liberal ideas. Then if writers follow this narrative, all they can come up with are liberal screenplays.
I have had to acquaint myself with non-standard texts in order to write this blog. These are histories that are not widely known that contain different ideas. They do not follow The Narrative. I had a few of ideas for what I think would be great movies, and I would like to share them with you.
Movie #1. Title: 165 AD
Background:
In 165 AD, the Antonine plague struck the Roman Empire. Historians, writing about it, are not sure what the disease was. The most likely candidates are measles and smallpox. It was known in ancient times that disease was caused by an infectious agent, and that people around the patient could catch the disease. It was also known that if you recovered from the disease you were immune from it. There was no cure.
A Pagan’s gods could not cope with a plague, which came out of nowhere and killed so many. Their response was to shove those who were sick out of the house, so that the sick and dying lined the roadways.
Galen was the greatest medical doctor of ancient times, and he lived through the Antonine plague. We do not know what caused that plague because his description of it is unusually vague. It is known that he left Rome just after the plague struck, and returned only after it subsided. He stayed in the country. Many well-to-do people left the cities and escaped to the country. It is believed that Galen abandoned his patients because he could do nothing for them.
The Christians fought back. Back then, Christians were a small minority, perhaps no more than 1 percent or less of the population. At great risk to themselves, Christians took in the sick, both Christian and Pagan, and gave them love, prayer, food and water. Many Christians died during the plague, or as a bishop at the time described it, many saints fell asleep. However, many of the sick recovered, just by being given care, and some of the Pagans converted to Christianity. Not only did Christians get a reputation for courage and charity, but so many Pagans converted that actual numbers of Christians rose.
The dramatic possibilities for stories involving Christians fighting the plague are almost endless. Not only could the callous disregard for life evidenced by the Pagans by shown in contrast to the Christian regard for all humans, but also the degraded status of slaves and women under Paganism could be shown. Individual stories of Christian courage and sacrifice could be told in a hundred movies without exhausting the possibilities.
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Movie #2, Title: Ancient Christmases
Background:
In 361 AD, Julian the Apostate became emperor of the Roman Empire. He was Pagan, and wanted to fight the spread of Christianity. He wrote:
“I think that when the poor happened to be neglected and overlooked by the priests, the impious Galileans observed this and devoted themselves to benevolence.”
And
“The impious Galileans support not only their poor, but ours as well; everyone can see that our people lack aid from us.”
Around Christmas you will hear complaints from the American Humanist Society and similar outfits about the Christian custom of charity and giving presents to poor children at Christmas. If you ever wondered about where the complaints about Christians ‘pressuring’ children into becoming Christians by giving them presents at Christmas come from, now you know. It has an ancient and dishonorable pedigree.
A movie centered around Christmas and the efforts of Julian to turn back Christianity by matching Christian charity would illustrate how callous Romans were toward the poor, and what a difference Christian charity made.
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Movie #3, Title: First Sunday
Background:
In the growth of the Church, there had to be new churches opening up in areas that had never had a church before, that is areas that were Pagan. That would be the theme of First Sunday. Some of First Sunday’s dialog could be lifted from the Book of Acts and some of Paul’s letters.
I would make one of the themes the difference in the treatment of women in Paganism and Christianity. In Pagan Rome (and ancient Greece), female infanticide was common and the only women allowed in religious rites were whores (remember Paul writing about women coming to Church dressed as whores.). Pagans believed that the gods determined your fate, and if they favored you, then you would be born a man. Women were degraded badly in Ancient Greco-Roman Civilization. In their homes, every surface was decorated with obscene pictures. It was like living in a porn magazine. If you want a definition of toxic masculinity, then really all you need to do is describe an average Roman man. In other words, men acted worse than Harvey Weinstein or Bill Clinton, and it was accepted as normal.
Liberals are trying to revive Greco-Roman sexual mores, and young people, particularly women, need to know what that means. This movie would show them that.
Christians, and in particular Christian women, battled this toxic atmosphere. They flocked to the early Church. There was always an excess of women to men in the Church, which led Paul to write about what to do in case of ‘unequal yoking’, i.e. Pagan men marrying Christian wives. Pagan writers complained bitterly about Pagan women becoming Christians (you know you’re over the target area when you start taking flak). Moreover, since the Church preached against infanticide and abortion, there were always more young women raised by Christian families compared to Pagans, who aborted babies and committed female infanticide (leaving newborn girls outside to die of exposure or be torn apart by dogs). No Pagan families raised more than one daughter.
I would center the action in the young church holding its first services, and the shocking stories of the abused women coming to church so they could worship for the first time in their lives. God finally loved them, as He always had.
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Movie #4, Title: The Unicorn
I write novels, and I have written a first novel called The Unicorn. If I can find an agent I’ll get it published. Naturally, I’d like my novel to become a movie.
I know a number of young people are into superheroes and comic books. I am not sure these are places where Christianity can fit in. I wrote The Unicorn as a response to that trend.
Jackie Harris is a young (12), Christian supergenius. Her nickname is The Unicorn, and this is her introductory novel. Her parents are divorced, and she has a stormy relationship with her father, mostly because her stepmother is abusive toward her. She lives with her mother and has 3 paternal sisters.
She is hired by the Navy to look at a software problem, and is taken to a Naval Base. At the base she is subjected to hazing and has difficulties with her co-workers. She finds the problem – an unknown enemy is waging a cyberwar against the US, and it is up to Jackie to win it.
Along the way, Jackie learns about life and death, responsibility and humility. A sinner, she sometimes violates her Christian values, but in the end learns to uphold them and ask forgiveness.
A hero with good values would be a change of pace from the usual stuff being shoved at our young people. I’m looking for an agent because I don’t really want to self-publish. I’ll report any progress.
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Here are 4 ideas for movies. Comments are appreciated, but all of them must be approved by me, so be constructive and use clean language. What do you think?
