ln63fac@sdcc7.UUCP (Rick Frey) (11/07/85)
Rich, (and Paul) Once again I'm going to try to claim my irony and discuss both Time Bandits and Life of Brian. While I agree with you basically about Life of Brian, There's still alot of stuff that works both ways as is the nature of criticizing something. Often times you can hang yourself. (Me asking if I can at least have the scene with the 'God' character telling about evil be ironic against what Terry Gilliam intended). > I don't think so. The point of the scene was to satirize the ridiculous > pompous notions of god-hood that people have. And it did so admirably, > making the magnificent god figure into a stuffy bureaucrat who isn't even > sure of the rules or the reasons why. ("I think it has something to do with > free will...") This is where I disagree. In the scene, 'God' is responding to the kid/star of the movie who has asked why there is evil. In no way is 'God' unsure of his answer. He is condescending, conceited and patronizing, but not unsure. He might not understand, but that would be reading alot in there. But in no way is he unsure of the rule. I'm claiming back the irony because according to Christianity, that is exactly why there is evil in the world; because God allowed us to choose (accepting the Christian model for a moment) and the result of that choice was evil. Terry Gilliam might have wanted to satarize God, and he did a great job of it in a lot of ways, but since you feel it was pure sarcasm, he then stumbled across the truth inadvertently and tried to satarize it. It's really tough to satarize the truth. > And interestingly enough, that's the way so many Christians > seem to view god, a bureaucrat more interested in failure to live strictly > by the letter of the law than the needs of people. Unfortunately you're pretty correct on that. Many Christians do see God in that way. But what does this have to do with the way God is (assuming His existence is not defined by what people think of Him)? You also asked me what I thought about Life of Brian, hinting that I was a real bonehead if I missed (or rationalized away) the satire of religion. Even I could see what was up with Monty Python's description of how Messiah figures get 'created', and while I disagree with it, it was an excellently leveled criticism. I just disagree with it. What I got out of Life of Brian (aside from some of the funniest scenes and greatest lines of movie history) was what any businessmen or honest scientist can always get out of criticism, a chance to see something from the sceptics or from the disbeliever's side. And that's great to see to whatever extent possible, how the other side sees things. This movie put into pictures what alot of people would like to believe about people and superstition around the time of Christ. And since I'm not any type of expert about 1st century Roman life, I can't say anything against it. But it never hurts to hear a good criticism. The last point I'd like to try to make is the issue of a statement you made earlier. The Life of Brian, while it attempts to criticize Christianity, in many ways ends up criticizing people more than religion. A fundamental tenet of Christianity is that it is objectively true and that Christ, God, the people of the Bible really existed. The fact that people followed Brian because he stepped on people's toes who had kept vow's of silence for 15 years shows how eager to follow people can be, but it only implies that that's how it must have been with Christ. They give a great scenario for how gullible and eager people are to be led and told what to do, but that has little to do with Christ's actual claims and the supposed fact that He was raised from the dead. They picked on something that can be picked on (today as well as back then), but by no means did they do anything other than poke fun at 1st cenury mentality and leave it for you to assume that Christ and Brian are one in the same. A conclusion, you could probably guess, I don't agree with. Rick Frey p.s. Rich, I do plan to get back to your other posting, but it was lengthy enough and needed enough thought to take longer than the time I had this weekend (I got to it Saturday afternoon) and unfortunately I'm an over- worked student, so it will have to wait till next weekend. Sorry about that.
mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) (11/11/85)
In article <2084@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes: >>> I don't think so. The point of the scene was to satirize the ridiculous >>> pompous notions of god-hood that people have. And it did so admirably, >>> making the magnificent god figure into a stuffy bureaucrat who isn't even >>> sure of the rules or the reasons why. ("I think it has something to do >>> with free will...") [ROSEN] I found it very funny myself, because it was (for me) a satire on silly notions of God as a gentleman. Can you imagine the TB god speaking to Job out of a whirlwind? >Which is why Gilliam's satire was so brilliant: he wasn't satirizing "the >truth" at all. The point he makes rehashes that standard Christian line that >you utter. Where do you think that came from, a box of cornflakes? Overuse >of hallucinogens? It was quite deliberate that Gilliam has god say "I think >it has something to do with free will", because THAT is your standard line! >And god himself doesn't exactly recall the real reason!! But he remembers >the gist... Angain, that's just the point. Where the hell did this "God is a gentleman" nonsense come from? God most certainly is NOT a gentleman (even Paul the Maltheist would agree to that :-) and the that portrayal of Him in the movie was as much a satire on bourgeous illusions about God (a popular target of MP) as of anything else. >One thing I've never seen is a proof that it WASN'T that way with Jesus. >It's well over a google times more reasonable to believe that Jesus was just >one more of the same breed who had good public relations men than to believe >what you do. And that, quite simply, is the basis for the far more rational >notion of non-belief. No one is going to present a *proof*, in case you haven't caught on yet. Go ahead and worship high reason, for all I care. Now, aren't we taking this a bit too seriously? I mean, this is Monty Python we're talking about. Their object is to be entertaining, after all. One might as well argue that they did _Brian_ the way they did because they knew all the smug people like Rich with their highbrow disdain for Christianity would eat it up. That's a silly reason too. Did you ever consider that they did it because it was funny? Charley Wingate