Customer Reviews

Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies

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CATCHING LIGHT beautifully explores the capacity of film to articulate human experience. This is done through the Christian perspective but does not, as many Christian interpretations do, simplify its films. Anker touches on all the grey areas--the intoxicating darkness and the radiant light that seems to shroud all of human experience.

This book plunges in deep and is by no means a mere overview. If one desires brevity, resort to minimalistic news reviews. CATCHING LIGHT carries readers along with the interpretation, avoiding the bombast of so many film reviewers.

A must read to all who enjoy meditating and thinking deeply about film, limited not to Christians, but all who actively partake in life and the it contemporary reflections.

Professor Anker has written a classic book about how some of the film classics deal with the classic search for God. Hence, it deserves a "Triple Crown" among books on this subject. I have used it to liven up my ethics classes at the Bristol,TN, campus of the National College of Business and Technology and plan to use it this summer as the basis for a Spiritual Film Series at Central Presbyterian Church.

I love movies and was looking forward to reading about some of my own favorites in this book. What was disappointing was the writing, which was pedantic, redundant, and lifeless. As a writer myself, and a writing teacher, I kept wondering why in the world Anker's editor didn't get him on track. This book could have conveyed the same information and ideas in half the words. No kidding. As Mark Twain said, "I would have written a shorter letter, but I didn't have the time." I'm on my way to reading a couple other Christian perspectives on movies and hoping they are a little more lively.