Movies: Kingdom Of Heaven
I finally got around to seeing Kingdom of Heaven last night with Dave Powers (to celebrate our birthdays…)
Weak.
I LOVE movies of this genre, the epic “knights doing battle against the forces of evil” gets me every time. The problem is, the core message of this movie is: “Religion is dumb, can’t we all just get along?”. It stopped short of having Orlando Bloom (Baliam) assemble a “diverse”, “multicultural”, army of Jews, Muslims, and Christians, to fight against the evil religious fanatics for freedom and justice.
Now, I agree that religion, in the sense it was portrayed here, is ridiculous. Insane men shouting “God wills it!” to justify whatever it was they wanted to do (in this case, get slaughtered by superior forces), is just… dumb. There was one money scene that made the whole movie worth it though.
In their last stand against the Saracen horde, the defenders of Jerusalem are preparing for the final assault on the city. The coward “bishop” astutely observes, “You have no knights. how can you win a battle without knights?”. Legolas Orlando Bloom agrees, and proceeds to knight any man in the city that can carry a weapon, uttering what should have been a rather inspiring speech. But since it was delivered by an elf instead of Mel Gibson or Maximus, it was just… weak. However, after knighting every man in the city, morale rose by like 1000%.
The coward-”bishop” sneers “Who are you? Do you think you can change the World? Does making a man a knight make him a better fighter? ” Orlando looks around at the ragtag band of new knights, who you can tell feel like a million bucks, and says “Yes.”
Indeed.
Make a man a knight and you make him a better fighter.
Beautiful.
Update: There were several other scenes that I thought were excellent upon reflection.
Bishop: Convert to Islam… repent later!
Balian: You’ve taught me a lot about religion, your Eminence.
Hospitaller: I put no stock in religion. By the word religion I have seen the lunacy of fanatics of every denomination be called the will of god. Holiness is in right action, and courage on behalf of those who cannot defend themselves, and goodness. What god desires is here
[points to head]
and here
[points to heart]
and by what you decide to do every day, you will be a good man. Or not.
Balian: These men would die for what the Pope would have them do?
Hospitaller: Yes, but not Christ, I think…
Matt,
I disliked the movie as a whole, but I agree - the scene where he knights everyone definately stirred alot in me. That bishop was a tool, too.
I also agree that the speech Orlando Bloom (Legolas :P) makes is delivered in his usual weaksauce fasion, but he had the honor of having decent lines and scenes, and getting cast for a movie that he wasn’t really right for.
I know you agree with me mostly on this, but isn’t religion dumb? I mean I’d be very quick to wash my hands of that kind of behavior if I saw it in the church today (oh snap, George Bush! AHHHHHH). I kid, I kid. None of our nations leaders are even remotely as insane or bloodthirsty as those outrageous “crusaders” were. But I’ll keep the comparison standing for the sake of the incoming comments it’s sure to bring :)
Going back to religion, though. I think the point that the movie made that I agreed the most with was the idea that “religion” is stupid. The movie was set in an era that really existed, and the movie actually would have been far beyond “X” rated if it would have shown half the true colors of most of those historical “crusaders”.
I think we as believers in God should be very quick to say “Yea, that was really really awful. That wasn’t Godly at all. Please believe that we feel those men were totally evil and given over to the flesh. We completely disagree with how they lived. Please give me a chance to tell you what kind of a God we really have.”
/rant
By the way, for those that want to strangle me right now, I define religion as the systemic world of do’s and don’ts which justify their beliefs on text and human ideas.
I worship God, who I have a relationship with. The text that the crusaders used to justify (weakly) their crusade did not point to God. It pointed to them and their power on earth. The Bible has no authority (standing alone). God has 100% authority, and the bible is a conduit for said authority. The Bible without God is nothing. The crusaders clearly had no fear of or relationship with God.
Nate - good stuff. Any warring “crusade” in the name of God is definitely COMPLETELY out of bounds, unless Jesus himself is riding (on a white horse) at the head of the army.
I updated the post with a few other quotes I thought were excellent.
Matt - those were both very good quotes. I was apalled at how the bishop acted in several scenes.
Ya, it seems that The King of Jerusalem, the Hospitaler, and Balian were the only ones that “got it”. (I know that Ridley Scott tried to portral Saladin and the other high-ranking Saracen as “getting it” as well, but… )
I’d be willing to put “getting it” on a sliding scale, and put Saladin hundreds of miles ahead of almost all of the crusaders, and a tragic world behind anyone who actually knew Christ in the movie. And I think it’d debatable if anyone except Hospitaler really did. I haven’t seen the movie, but I think Balian took the humanistic “high road” out of there. The King was just a very noble individual, especially given the circumstances and other Lords you can compare him to. Not necessarily a man that knew God personally.
I could really be wrong about that. Like I said, I haven’t seen the movie in a while. That’s just how I remember it. None of the things the King said or did were necessarily fruits of the Spirit, they were just noble concepts and actions that don’t require being Godly, just being a really good guy.
Wait though - does being a really good guy get you into heaven? I hear this question alot. ;)
Nate, that’s a really good point.
Man I wish other people would comment :)
No, “being a really good guy” does not get you into heaven, it’s about being “as good as you possibly can…” you know, trying hard…
wait, no, that has absolutely nothing to do with how you get to heaven. at all. Matthew 25 has some strange things to say about that. It’s all about whether Christ knows you or not…
At the bottom of this comment is what I almost posted all my itself, half as a joke and half because I almost freaked out in the middle of your comment, then relaxed and laughed when I finished.
So what do I have to do to get into heaven? According to that passage, I have to be “righteous” which seems to be characterized by feeding/clothing/housing/protecting the weak and poor. I think I read in James that pure religion is to take care of orphans and widows in their distress. So if I don’t do those things, I won’t get into heaven? And if I do, I will?* What a relief. I’ll get on those things immediately.
*I’m only being half-way sarcastic here. Do we get to heaven strictly on grace (Romans), or do we get to it by works (Gospels and James) or is it a much deeper thing that you can only seen when you look at all the scriptures in context and read between the lines?
How do I get to heaven?
“No, “being a really good guy” does not get you into heaven, it’s about being “as good as you possibly can…” you know, trying hard…”
Heretic.
Holy jeez, apparently putting two dashed lines between my real comment and joke comment just made my text massive. Edit please? :(
And then feel free to delete this comment.
No way dude, your comment looks sweet with that huge text.
You’re gonna make me sweat cause of the heretic joke, aren’t you?
Hey, sorry to break up the love session, but you’re both way off on all of that stuff!
God first cares about
1. Tanks
2. Napalm
3. People
4. Penguins
In that order.
After drafting this comment four times and realizing that I can’t follow-up Dustin’s comment with anything but cheesy/lameness or wicked/sinfulness, I’ve decided to simply make this comment a confession of sin in my heart and leave it at that. I wanted to say more than one naughty thing.
You guys are really really strange.
I will just point out that when this movie came out, Matt got really excited, just like he does for every other movie that MIGHT involve spiritual things or giant battles. And I said, “That movie is going to suck.”
I’m sure glad I chose to keep hanging out at the bar last night instead of filling my mind with crap like Kingdom of Heaven.
-KERBLANG-
(Matt’s sarcasm meter explodes)
Warning: Clicking on the below link may be evidence of or a cause for heightened stupidity. And will present evidence to support Matt’s above claim.
Possible comment deletion incoming.
[link deleted to preserve everyone’s sanity]
oops?
hehehe, i was being funny ;)
if you really really want to link to it… go for it.
What! I can’t even get my html tags right, that comment was going to be gold!!
Nate, now you have to post the link, because my curiousity is killing me.
this was taken around three years ago:
http://img369.imageshack.us/img369/4011/copybs3.jpg
I present to you a future band leader/tech director and staffer for the rock.
This comment wouldn’t be complete without this verse:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=titus%202:6-7;&version=31;
Nate, you really should tell everyone that that picture is NSFW.
No, it really needs to be labeled: Gross! I didn’t want to see that! Needs even worse warning labels attached!
Wait! No, Kirsten, give me the laptop! Let me make a ridiculous comment on Matt’s blog!
Poop!
There.
Happy?
Oh, ya, I agree, I don’t think Orlando Bloom’s character knew God either. He just acted ethically, and fairly nobly.
nobly or knobbly… you decide….
What were we thinking? Making all these comments?
How did this all happen. I am so ashamed. :(