Film critics typically downgrade a film if the main characters lack character development. Literary critics distinguish between round, flat, and stock characters. Stock characters and flat characters lack complexity, including a capacity to change and evolve.
Yet, as a practical matter, many people in real life are more like stock characters or flat characters than round characters. Many real people change little in the course of a lifetime. Their character traits are cast in bronze from an early age. They retain the same basic worldview throughout life. They are static characters rather than dynamic characters.
So why are filmmakers faulted for realistic characters? If that’s the way most people are, then why do film critics demand unrealistic characterization?
Well, aside from the fact that it’s more dramatically interesting, I wonder if this doesn’t reflect a redemptive motif which even secular film critics have unconsciously internalized from Christianity.
Take the parable of the prodigal son. Or the parable of the lost sheep. Take the life of David. Or Jacob. Or Joseph. Samson or Moses. We like stories where the protagonist has a transformative experience that makes him a better person. Stories that exemplify a lost and found or death and rebirth motif.
This often takes the form of a journey–the classic quest genre. But the quest can also be internalized. A journey of self-discovery–and redemption.
As I was channel surfing recently, I stumbled across Have a Little Faith, a film starring Laurence Fishburne–a recovering junkie who kicked the habit when he underwent a Christian conversion. He’s now an inner city pastor, ministering to other hoods, junkies, and street people. I don’t care for the film’s ecumenical agenda, but the character of Pastor Covington is quite appealing. And there are endless films and TV dramas that exemplify a redemptive motif–even when that’s secularized. Those who spurn the Gospel unwittingly recreate the Gospel.
Thanks for this post, Steve! Great point. :-)
ReplyDeleteOn a related note, it seems like modern film critics usually don't positively review movies with entirely good or entirely evil characters. They seem to think these movies are naive at best. They prefer and sometimes outright relish moral ambiguity.
Perhaps they don't think such clarity is realistic. Of course, it's not realistic. People aren't entirely good or evil. (Although it'd be interesting to explore the notion of the "holy fool" in film and literature. Why do even secularists see something noble about such a one?)
At the same time, the subtext in these film reviews sometimes seems to be that these film critics (at least the more optimistic ones) do wish people were so clear and simple and straightforward. They do wish people, moral choices, life, etc. could be so purely good and true. So easy to discern too. You'd know when a bad guy is truly a bad guy and when a good guy truly is a good guy. Many modern film critics fondly review classic movies in the Hollywood's supposed golden age, even though they think many of these movies were a bit too black and white (no pun intended) for their tastes. They appreciate the freshness and innocence.
And haven't past writers done the same? Whatever period of history one lives in, many seem to look back to a previous golden age when things were "purer," "simpler," "better," etc.
I wonder if this too doesn't "reflect a redemptive motif which even secular film critics have unconsciously internalized from Christianity"? Christian eschatology. From paradise lost to paradise regained.
Recapitulated in miniature in the individual Christian's own salvation - his justification, sanctification, glorification. When there shall be no guile or craftiness. Our hearts pure and undefiled. And revealed as such.
And also judgment day. Heaven and hell. The separation of the sheep from the goats. For in the end, not only does God win, but God will make his people perfectly sinless and the reprobate reprobate. Perhaps in one way or another secularists realize to one degree or another that the end is coming. The wheat will be separated from the tares.