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Wednesday, August 3, 2016

"Captain Fantastic," An Oscar-Worthy Movie Starring Viggo Mortensen


Viggo Mortensen's "Captain Fantastic" (With A Canadian Twist)

http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2016/07/viggo-mortensens-captain-fantastic-with.html

 "Captain Fantastic," An Oscar-Worthy Movie Starring Viggo Mortensen

Before seeing "Captain Fantastic" I wrote a "pre-review" to friend Chuck and daughter MC.

 "I am so looking forward to "Captain Fantastic" that I am already planning to see it again, perhaps mid-week, with DK. I hope I am not setting myself up for disappointment. What I know about "Captain Fantastic" -- and this is not a spoiler -- is that the film's thesis and antithesis are so well presented that you come away from the movie wondering whether Mortensen is hero or "villain." I sooooo hope they pull that off! We all harbor our own inner Hitlers and it would be marvelous to see this heart-struggle on the silver screen."

 Did the movie live up to these expectations?

 Yes... and no.

 None of my "inner Hitlers" were awakened, although the movie's unexpectedly ferocious attack on Christianity was a challenge for my "inner Catholic" cut from the "same" heterodox cloth as Merton, DeChardin, Chesterton, and Pope Francis.

It will be tempting for many to fault the movie for treating Christianity derisively... an adjective deriving from the Latin words "de" and "ridere" meaning to make laughter from.

Visceral reactivity aside, "Captain Fantastic's" director and screenwriter display two saving graces.

One of them is the movie's juxtaposition of Christianity with Buddhism, a religion that takes no position on "faith" but invites interested parties to practice meditation (and "right living") with an eye to revelations that come from experience, the "best teacher of all."

I have come to believe that many bands on the spectrum of American Christianity deserve derision.

Although I have never expressed this before, I suddenly realize that I live with a perceived obligation to focus "conservative" Christianity's role as its own worst enemy. It is fair to say that conservative Christianity is "wrecking its own brand."

"They" want their country back. 

 I want Christianity back.


Christians Are Their Own Worst Enemy: Wrecking The Brand

The Essence of Religious Fanaticism
(Emo Philips cuts to the quick of religious mania)

We need look no farther than Despicable Donald whose white "Christian" Base shamelessly supports a "man" who is "beyond satanic," at least insofar as Satan's seductions provide real carnal pleasures.

 Trump, on the other hand, gives his cult nothing, not even -- as we used to say in Catholicism's Easter Vigil service -- "the glamor of Satan" to spice their small, spiteful lives.

At least glamor is a consolation prize, something "real" albeit superficial - "fast food" for the spiritually disembowelled. 

It is true that glamor conjures a kind of psycho-spiritual captivity, but Melania and Donald take great satisfaction -- even yuuuuge satisfaction -- in the pleasures of the flesh. 

Lamentably, Mel and DJ don't pay "the help" enough to purchase any pleasures for themselves.

 Meanwhile, America's favorite plutocrats "make out" like the bandits they are, shitting in their gold-plated Trump Tower toilets.

Compendium Of Pax Posts: "The Seven Deadly Sins"

 As an erstwhile hippy I easily empathized with the back-to-nature, shit-in-a-pit-letrine homestead that Mortensen and his six kids had carved from the Pacific Northwest wilderness. 

 In the early '70s, friend Paul and I squatted for six weeks in a lean-to on Louisiana-Pacific forest land in Washington state, not far from Cascades National Park.

 During 12 years living in California, my "tribe" camped regularly in the Sierra Nevada and as soon as tents were pitched we stripped naked and lived in unabashed "innocence" for the duration of the "holiday." 

 Only recently -- after reviewing film clips of "Deliverance" on YouTube -- did I recall one particularly heady experience of prolonged lovemaking atop a boulder in the middle of  the Yuba River. In hindsight, I realize my lover and I were visible from every canyon-top clearing for miles around. Luckily, we heard no banjos.

Although the first 45 minutes of "Captain Fantastic" pay homage to Rousseau's "noble savage," Noam Chomsky (whom I always think of as Gnome Chomsky... and now you will too) is the movie's "philosopher of record."

 SPOILER ALERT:

 What takes place after the death of Mortensen's wife in a distant hospital constellates the dramatic crux of the movie.

 En route to "Mom's" funeral, the Cash clan visits Mortensen's sister, an overnight stay which reveals the jejune culture America has created, our capitalist overlords insuring that "the successful" (and those who ape "success") live in electronic pleasure domes surrounded by electronic moats. In these Xanadus, our young people surrender to ceasless "gaming" and other "screen sports." We have devised a culture whose central credo -- more powerful than The Apostles Creed ever was -- is "s/he who dies with the most toys wins."

 When Mortensen and the kids get to the Catholic church where Mom's funeral has already started, everyone is keenly aware of their sacred mission --- a mission that predictably pushes Captain Fantastic's father-in-law toward terrible reprisal. 

 And in that church we witness a scene similar to (and as powerful as) Dustin Hoffman interrupting Katherine Ross's wedding in The Graduate, the betrothed couple already at the altar and starting to mouthe their vows. 

 There does come a moment -- for me transitory -- when Mortensen morphs from Captain Fantastic into a parent guilty of recklessly endangering his kids' lives. 

 The kids themselves are a fascinating brood, remarkably well-developed characters despite their numbers.

 Among Mortensen's progeny are two kids who suddenly exhibit shocking behavior, "plot twists" not done for effect but because the inexorble needs of the human psyche "will out."

 I would continue my review but for the last ten years have chosen to learn as little as possible about any movie that trusted friends recommend... or movies whose actors or directors I simply would not miss. 

 I will, for example, see any movie starring Vigo Mortensen who grew up speaking English, Danish and Spanish -- my own second langugae -- a remarkably gifted thespian who regularly performs "live theater" in Madrid and Buenos Aires.

 And so, while I refuse to provide "linchpin spoilers," I will mention, by way of conclusion, a small but revealing scene involving full-frontal nudity. In it, Mortensen greets both the day - and, unexpectedly - an elderly married couple at an RV park where the Cash clan just spent the night. 

 This brief scene has no profound meaning but its noble savage quality and striking matter-of-fact-ness left me wondering why are we so intent on "the cover-up?" 

 Not that it's advisable to push one's private parts in people's faces, but - if it "happens" - so what?

 You will come away from Captain Fantastic asking many questions, almost all of them bigger than "So what?"

"Any Religion That Needs Fear To Thrive Is Bad Religion"

"Bad Religion: A Compendium"

Good Religion And Bad Religion
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/02/bad-religion-and-good-religion.html

Bad Religion And The Abrahamic Tradition

James' Epistle: "Judgment Without Mercy Will Be Shown To Anyone Who Has Not Shown Mercy"

It Is Important To Know These Things So Religion Doesn't Do You More Harm Than Good

What Too Many Christians Get Wrong

Jesus: Festive Tippler And Friend Of Whores, Publicans, Tax Collectors And Sundry Sinners

Devout Catholic Christian, Blaise Pascal

The Age-Old Normalization Of Warfare Through Stupidity, Ego And Religion

Are Highly Religious People Less Compassionate?

Conservative Christians Delight In The Punishment And Pain Of Others


What's Wrong With The Abrahamic Religions: Absolutism, Scriptural Inerrancy, Bloodlust

Pastor John Piper "discusses the vexing problem of God ordering the mass killing of every Canaanite man, woman, and child."
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/peterenns/2012/07/john-piper-on-why-its-right-for-god-to-slaughter-women-and-children-anytime-he-pleases-and-why-i-have-some-major-problems-with-that/

Mistakes In Scripture: When The Bible Gets The Bible Wrong

"Is The Bible More Violent Than The Quran?"

"Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy," A Glimpse Of True Christianity
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/12/amish-grace-how-forgiveness-transcended.html

Biblical Literalism And The Cultivation Of Hatred

"God Enjoys The 10 Plagues Way Too Much"

ISIS And The Inquisition: The Shadow Side Of Religion. Why Does Belief Do This?

"What ISIS Really Wants" And How The Patriarch Abraham Appears To Be The Instigator

Christianity's Bedrock Commitment To Torture: Remaking "The Faithful" In God's Image

Time For Catholicism To "Shelve" Traditions And Texts That Represent God As A Terrorist
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/06/time-to-expunge-catholicism-of.html


"Trial By Ordeal: The Bloody Old Testamental Roots Of Modern Justice"

UNC-CH Professor Bart D. Ehrman:
Biblical Exegete And Former Christian Evangelical
The Bible and Textual Analysis

"Good Romans" Considered Jesus' Torture Necessary For Imperial Safety
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2014/12/when-jesus-was-tortured-good-romans.html

Americans, Especially Catholics, Approve Of Inquisitorial Torture

"The Catholic Voice In The Torture Debate," John A. Coleman S.J.

On Balance, Torture Is Massively Counter-Productive And Self-Destructive

Compendium Of Best Pax Posts On Religion

Pope Benedict XVI's Question: 'Can Modern Warfare Ever Be Just?'

"You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image 
when it turns out God hates all the same people you do."
Fr. Tom Weston S. J.

Dorothy Day: “I really only love God as much as I love the person I love the least.”

"Love and do what you will."
St. Augustine



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