According to Martin Scorsese, films fulfill the human need "to share a common memory."[1] As biblical scholars, we study and teach texts that are already often part of the common memory shared by various communities, and since the visual imagery of movies such as The Ten Commandments are often the lens through which the biblical stories are read, it is helpful to scrutinize the filmmakers' interpretations of the texts in the context of a biblical studies class. If biblical movies are "common memories," then leaving them unexamined means that their power can overwhelm and even replace the text itself. Yet navigating this field in which few of us has formal training can be as tricky as it can be rewarding. The following is a brief report of some of the issues involved in teaching a course on "Film and the Bible" at McCormick Theological Seminary, co-taught by a biblical scholar and a film studies scholar.

Since the course had to fulfill a credit in biblical studies, its main goal was to help the students know more about the biblical text. Thus, the movies we selected were explicitly based on biblical narratives rather than more general religious themes. In addition to the exegetical skills that are generally advanced in biblical studies courses, we wanted to explore how the text resonates in the contemporary global society. How are international filmmakers reading and visualizing biblical stories, and what are they valorizing or criticizing via the biblical text?

We also wanted to stretch the student's ability to analyze the films as films, to move beyond an analysis that largely pertained to the film's fidelity to its biblical sources. While the questions about "textual accuracy" can be interesting, the goal was to open up engagement with the films so that they were not seen as would-be substitutes for scripture, but rather as exegetical projects that grappled with societal issues using the specific protocols of filmmaking.

Given that many aspects of film form analysis are shared with literary approaches to the biblical text, we found that the students could apply their skills from their other courses in bible such as analyzing irony, repetition, disclosure of information, and character and plot development. Looking at something as basic as how the story begins and ends can illuminate, for example, part of what is happening in Sissoko's La Gènese (Mali, 1999). In the first scene, Dinah washes Joseph's coat that has been stained with animal blood by her brothers in an attempt to cover up their crime. This image, following the film's dedication "to victims of fratricide," foreshadows the ensuing story of familial warfare and deception. When Dinah again appears at the end of the movie, together with a newly-reconciled Jacob and Esau, her prophecy that her brothers will find forgiveness with a "Prince of Egypt" links up the past events with another, now more hopeful, vision of the future where fratricidal strife is replaced with reconciliation. Likewise, heeding Meir Sternberg's warning about "adjusting" the biblical narrative according to the conventions of contemporary culture rather than that of the text itself is helpful in interpreting the character of David in film. [2] In King David (Beresford, USA, 1985), the main character is presented as a moral and heroic character, who, after being rejected by a spiteful Michal, virtuously saves Bathsheba from her abusive husband. The narrative and moral "gaps" in the biblical text that make the story so complex are filled in by the filmmaker to render David and his choices more sympathetic.

Yet film analysis has its own particular avenues of scrutiny such as the techniques of mise-en-scene, cinematography, editing, sound, as well as the film's generic protocols, and it was helpful to have the expertise of a film studies scholar to help guide the class in their analysis. Noticing what point of view the camera presents to the audience (are we watching Bathsheba from David's own voyeuristic gaze, or are we given "God's eye view" and watching David watch Bathsheba?), as well as the effects of lighting (Jesus' own special "inner-glow"), for example, move analysis beyond the actual spoken words in the movie. Likewise, linking the final shot in The Last Temptation of Christ (Scorsese, USA, 1988), with the techniques of experimental filmmaking transform the interpretation of the film. The image of Jesus on the cross fading into a brief sequence of flickering where the film seems to be overexposed and the sprocket holes are visible is similar to experimental techniques where the film is deliberately "marred" with scratches and overexposure. Such techniques are intended to highlight the viewer's relationship to the film material itself and to the technology of film production and exhibition. Thus The Last Temptation "ends" not with Jesus on the cross, but breaking down under the burden of trying to visualize what happens after his death.

When planning the course, we were immediately confronted with questions about which movies to watch, and what questions to give the students that would guide their analysis. Given the number of Jesus movies (and the writings about them), we dedicated almost half of the class to this topic. In order to put them in some perspective, we deliberately chose movies from different decades. By screening films that show the same story that were produced years apart, the class could see that the "memory" of biblical stories changes considerably throughout time. In the twentieth century, Jesus films increasingly replaced his divinity with his humanity (although the Jewish-ness of his humanity is rarely acknowledged and he usually appears as a light-haired Gentile). We decided to extend this project with our selection of films based on the Hebrew Bible, and chose other film "doublets" such as The Ten Commandments (1956) and The Prince of Egypt (1998), as well as David and Bathsheba (1951) and King David (1985). In these, God is also portrayed very differently from film to film, and one sees different treatments of women, issues of race, and the psychological motivation of the main characters. Questions that we included in the syllabus for the student's reflection and discussion follow below.

By the end of the semester, we found that watching and analyzing the Bible on film lead us to closer scrutiny of the biblical text while also encouraging a larger conversation about the interpretation of this text in contemporary culture. In reading biblical stories alongside their celluloid interpretations, the class had to negotiate the very different meanings of these "common memories" in ways that made them better readers and seers.

Issues for Reflection and Discussion

Adapting the Text

Does the film replicate the text's narrative structure? In doing so, does it convey the same points? How does the film deal with ambiguities or variations in the biblical accounts? What seems to be the basis for how the gaps are filled in (human nature, psychology, archaeology, theology, satisfying plot structures)?

The Politics of the Biblical Story

What political systems are being championed and/or normed in the film? How do you think audiences might have read the film's political messages at the time it was made, as opposed to an audience watching it today? Is God a capitalist or a communist?

Characterization of the Divine

How is God and/or Jesus portrayed (human, divine, stern, friendly, other)? What techniques are used to visualize God, Jesus, or other key characters? Are they costumed or photographed differently from other figures in the film? What is the effect? Is God and/or Jesus Jewish, Catholic, Protestant?

Characterization of Humanity

How are the women portrayed (holy, powerful, sexual)? How does this compare with their portrayal in the biblical text? Who are the "non-normative" groups or tribes? How are they portrayed? How do the human characters relate to the divine?

Characterization of the Land

How would you describe the land? Is it hospitable? Is it "foreign"? Is it believable? Is it a character or of little account? Does it appear to be "genuinely" Middle Eastern, or "genuinely" reflect the historical period of the text? If so, why did the filmmakers consider this a priority? If not, what effect does this have?

Targeted Audience

For whom was this film made, and how do you know?

A Brief Annotated Bibliography for Textual Resources on Biblical Films



Aichele, George and Richard Walsh, eds. Screening Scripture: Intertextual Connections between Scripture and Film. Harrisburg, Penn.: Trinity, 2002. Note especially the essays on The Prince of Egypt and David and Bathsheba (pp. 77-99 and 155-87).



Bach, Alice, ed. Biblical Glamour and Hollywood Glitz. Semeia 74. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 1996. Excellent articles and bibliographies.



Baugh, Lloyd. Imaging the Divine: Jesus and Christ-Figures in Film. Kansas City: Sheed & Ward, 1997.



Davies, Philip R. "Life of Brian Research." Pages 400-14 in Biblical Studies/Cultural Studies: The Third Sheffield Colloquium. Edited by J. Cheryl Exum and Stephen D. Moore. JSOTSupp 266. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998.



Exum, J. Cheryl. "Michal at the Movies." Pages 273-92 in The Bible in Human Society: Essays in Honour of John Rogerson. Edited by M. Daniel Carroll R., David J. A. Clines, and Philip R. Davies. JSOTSupp 200. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1995.



Fuller, Christopher C. "Not to Abolish the Text, but Displace It: The Repositioning of the Authorial Audience in Pasolini's Il Vangelo secondo Matteo" Pages 1-19 in Society of Biblical Literature, 1997 Seminar Papers. Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1997.



Stern, Richard C., Clayton N. Jefford, and Guerric Debona. Savior on the Silver Screen. New York: Paulist, 1999. Essays on Jesus films, with an appendix that lists the relevant biblical texts quoted or alluded to in the various movies (pp. 335-59).



Sternberg, Meir. The Poetics of Biblical Narrative. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987. Chapter 6, "Gaps, Ambiguity, and the Reading Process" (pp. 186-229), can be used in conjunction with David movies.



Sterritt, David. The Films of Jean-Luc Godard: Seeing the Invisible. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1999. Chapter 6 is an essay on Je vous salue, Marie.



Wright, Melanie J. Moses in America: The Cultural Uses of a Biblical Narrative. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003. Chapter 4 on The Ten Commandments (pp. 89-127) is especially relevant.

Resources on Film Form and Style



Boggs, Joseph M. The Art of Watching Films. 4th edition. Mountain View: Mayfield, 1996.

Bordwell, David and Kristin Thompson. Film Art: An Introduction. 6th edition. New York: McGraw Hill, 2001.

Corrigan, Timothy. A Short Guide to Writing about Film. 5th edition. New York: Longman/Longman, 2004.

Kolker, Robert Phillip. Film, Form, and Culture. Boston: McGraw Hill, 1999.

Roberts, Graham and Heather Wallis. Introducing Film. London and New York: Arnold and Oxford University Press, 2001.

Web-based Resources



Jesus: Real to Reel: post.queensu.ca/~rsa/realreel.htm

Journal of Religion and Film: www.unomaha.edu/~wwwjrf/



Web sites with plot lines and reviews:



www.newsreel.org/films/genese.htm (La Gènese)

www.hollywoodjesus.com/gospel_matthew.htm (Il Vangelo secondo Matteo)

www.mwscomp.com/movies/brian/brian.htm (Monty Python's Life of Brian)

www.jesusfilm.org (The Jesus Film)

Sources for Acquiring Films



facets.org

amazon.com.

newsreel.org (for La Gènese)

Melody Knowles is Assistant Professor of Hebrew Scriptures at McCormick Theological Seminary; Allison Whitney is a doctoral candidate in Cinema and Media Studies at the University of Chicago.

[1] For this quote, see The Century of Cinema: A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese through American Movies. Written and directed by Martin Scorsese and Michael Henry Wilson (London: Connoisseur/Academy Video: British Film Institute, 1995, 1996).



[2] Meir Sternberg, The Poetics of Biblical Narrative (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987), 188-89.

Citation: Allison Whitney, " Teaching Film and the Bible," SBL Forum , n.p. [cited March 2004]. Online:http://sbl-site.org/Article.aspx?ArticleID=241