A Harvard professor assesses the treatment of religion, race, and gender in fifteen critically acclaimed popular films, from Thelma and Louise to The Piano, and explains how movies may help Americans deal with racism and "homophobia."
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Library Journal
Bringing scholarly theological insight and incisive cultural criticism to bear on 15 motion pictures, Miles (historical theology, Harvard Divinity Sch.) examines Hollywood's view of religion and values in America from a cultural studies perspective. The films she analyzes, produced between 1981 and 1993, include The Last Temptation of Christ, Romero, The Chosen, Thelma and Louise, and The Rapture. Miles focuses on the treatment of religion, including its absence, and on box-office influences. She explores the way films attempt to answer the ancient question of how we should live. Prevailing issues of race, gender, class, violence, and marginalization provide the referents in film texts and subtexts, bolstered by specific social statistics and survey results. The author concludes that films are best at expressing the anxieties of a changing society. An appendix provides questions for film analysis as cultural product, text, and cultural voice. Challenging and articulate, this book is recommended for serious film study. Two related titles are Tom O'Brien's The Screening of America (Continuum, 1990) and Michael Medved's Hollywood vs. America (LJ 9/15/92).
Anna M. Donnelly, St. John's Univ. Lib., N.Y.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Anna M. Donnelly, St. John's Univ. Lib., N.Y.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Review
Takes the religious study of film to new and rather glorious heights. --Publishers Weekly
"Margaret Miles has an almost uncanny ability to see, to observe so carefully that she helped me see what I had missed in the films on which she so thoughtfully comments. This is an important book for anyone concerned with American values and the social powers that sponsor and disseminate them." --Harvey Cox, author of Fire from Heaven
"As we become an increasingly pluralistic, anxious, visually oriented, and entertained culture, and as video technology becomes the dominant influence in the formation of the public imagination, Seeing and Believing is a timely, important, splendid book-a 'must read' for anyone who wants to think and talk about movies and what they tell us about who we are." --Sharon Daloz Parks, coauthor of Common Fire: Leading Lives of Commitment in a Complex World
"[Miles's] graceful writing style, intelligent analysis, committed religious-political perspective and affection for the movies will appeal to anyone interested in cultural, religious or film studies." --Marilynne S. Mason, Christian Century
"A splendidly readable, intelligent, and compelling volume." --T. Lindvall, Choice --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
"Margaret Miles has an almost uncanny ability to see, to observe so carefully that she helped me see what I had missed in the films on which she so thoughtfully comments. This is an important book for anyone concerned with American values and the social powers that sponsor and disseminate them." --Harvey Cox, author of Fire from Heaven
"As we become an increasingly pluralistic, anxious, visually oriented, and entertained culture, and as video technology becomes the dominant influence in the formation of the public imagination, Seeing and Believing is a timely, important, splendid book-a 'must read' for anyone who wants to think and talk about movies and what they tell us about who we are." --Sharon Daloz Parks, coauthor of Common Fire: Leading Lives of Commitment in a Complex World
"[Miles's] graceful writing style, intelligent analysis, committed religious-political perspective and affection for the movies will appeal to anyone interested in cultural, religious or film studies." --Marilynne S. Mason, Christian Century
"A splendidly readable, intelligent, and compelling volume." --T. Lindvall, Choice --This text refers to the Paperback edition.
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