Job and St. Augustine in one film: The Tree of Life (2011)
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
The Tree of Life may well be the greatest movie ever made. Heavily inspired by the book of Job and St. Augustine's Confessions (and even including some lines about nature and grace seemingly derived from The Imitation of Christ), director Terrence Malick gives profound spiritual and cosmic scope to the story of an ordinary family in 1950s Texas. The film begins with the death of a son, detours to the creation of the universe, and then flashes back to a richly observed sequence of childhood in all its beauty along with the tragic effects of sin - seen through the memory of a present-day...
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Freedom in vocation: The Sound of Music (1965)
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
The Sound of Music is rightly beloved by Catholics. James and Thomas discuss the movie's all-around excellence, break down Julie Andrews's virtuosic performance, and explore what the film says about the freedom and openness necessary to discern and pursue one's vocation in life. DONATE to make this show possible! SIGN UP for Catholic Culture's newsletter: Music is The Duskwhales, “Take It Back”, used with permission. https://theduskwhales.bandcamp.com
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The Chosen, Season 4: Lectio Divina or Fan Fiction?
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
The Chosen has now passed the halfway point of its seven seasons. Four seasons in, it is possible to take a big-picture look at the show’s trajectory. Season four takes us from the execution of John the Baptist to the raising of Lazarus, ending on the verge of Holy Week with the apostles preparing for Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem. Biblical threads throughout the season include the falling away of Judas, and Jesus’ sorrow and frustration at his disciples’ inability to hear His predictions of His imminent death. This season still has some of the great moments that have made The...
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Church Teaching on Cinema: Vatican II and Beyond
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
Thomas Mirus and Nathan Douglas's mini-series on magisterial documents about cinema comes to a close with an episode covering the Vatican II era - specifically between 1963 and 1995, spanning the pontificates of Pope St. Paul VI and Pope St. John Paul II. This was, frankly, an era of decline in terms of official Church engagement with cinema. Where previous pontificates had dealt with film as a unique artistic medium, Vatican II's decree Inter Mirifica set the template for lumping all modern mass media together under the label of "social communications" - discussing them as new technology and...
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A Brighter Summer Day (1991)
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
The 1991 film A Brighter Summer Day, directed by Edward Yang, is considered by many one of the best movies ever made. The film is set in Taiwan, shortly after the Chinese Civil War, when the country was under martial law, with a political and cultural pressure felt at every level of society. At the center of this intricately plotted four-hour drama is the family of fourteen-year-old Xiao Si'r, whose strong sense of honor and justice is pulled in various directions as he gets caught up in a youth gang and romantically entangled with the girlfriend of a disappeared gang leader. But more than...
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Pope Pius XII on The Ideal Film, Pt. 2 (Church Teaching on Cinema)
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
Thomas Mirus and Nathan Douglas continue their discussion of Pope Pius XII’s apostolic exhortations brought together in the 1955 document “The Ideal Film”, which remains the high water-mark of official Church engagement with the art form. They also touch on his 1957 encyclical Miranda prorsus, on radio, films, and television. In the first audience, Pius XII had discussed the ideal film in its relation to the spectator. In this second audience, he discusses the ideal film both in relation to its content, and in relation to society. He makes general observations on the legitimate...
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Pope Pius XII on The Ideal Film, Pt. 1 (Church Teaching on Cinema)
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
Continuing their survey of magisterial documents on cinema, Thomas Mirus and Nathan Douglas arrive at Pope Ven. Pius XII's two apostolic exhortations gathered under the title "The Ideal Film". Pius shows himself to be a true enthusiast of cinema with his poetic insights. "The Ideal Film" remains the high water-mark of official Church engagement with the art form. This episode covers the first of the two exhortations. Pius begins with an insightful discussion of the psychological effects of film on the viewer, not only insofar as the viewer is passive, but insofar as the viewer is invited to...
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Church Teaching on Cinema: Pope Pius XI
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
In 1936, Pope Pius XI published his encyclical on the motion picture, Vigilanti cura. The encyclical deals with the grave moral concerns raised by the cinema, which had by then become a ubiquitous social influence (though it was also a still-evolving medium, as the transition from silent film to talkies had only recently been completed). Pius holds up for worldwide emulation the initiative that had recently taken by the American bishops to influence the motion picture industry in a moral direction, as well as to protect their own flocks from immoral movies. Vigilanti cura was ghostwritten by...
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Wildcat does justice to Flannery O'Connor's faith (w/ Joshua Hren)
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
Joshua Hren, editor-in-chief of Wiseblood Books, joins the podcast to review Wildcat, the new Flannery O'Connor biopic directed by Ethan Hawke and starring Maya Hawke and Laura Linney. The film is a respectful and nuanced portrayal of O'Connor and her faith, accomplished by extensive quotation from her prayer journal and letters, as well as several interludes depicting her short stories (which keeps the film from feeling like a formulaic biopic). Wildcat's portrayal of the relationship between artistic ambition and faith is deeply relevant to Catholic artists. It should inspire them to...
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Malick’s humble camera: The New World (2005)
Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast
The Criteria crew continue their journey through the works of today's most significant Christian filmmaker, Terrence Malick. The New World is an underrated masterpiece about Pocahontas and the founding of Jamestown in 1607. Starring the 14-year-old Q'orianka Kilcher as Pocahontas, Colin Farrell as John Smith, and Christian Bale as John Rolfe, Malick's retelling of the story remarkably combines realism and historical accuracy with poetry and romance, as all three protagonists explore not just one but multiple new worlds, geographical and interior. With The New World, Malick definitively...
info_outlineSince we started Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast in May 2020, we've been hosting in-depth discussions of movies from the Vatican's 1995 list of important films. Now, after three years, we've finished discussing all 45 films - and in this episode, together with Catholic filmmaker Nathan Douglas, we're taking a look back at the list as a whole.
After discussing how and why the Vatican film list (actually titled "Some Important Films") was made, and putting it in the context of several decades of concern from the highest levels of the Vatican about the social and moral influence of cinema, we talk about our favorite and least favorite films on the Vatican's list, as well as the movies we think should be added in a hypothetical future update of the list.
Ultimately, watching through the entire Vatican film list is not only an education in the classics of world cinema, but also gives important perspective on the strengths and weaknesses of past cinematic engagement with religion, allowing us to see both the potential fruit that could be borne and the dead ends that should be avoided in the Catholic cinema of the future.
0:00 Introduction
11:31 History behind the Vatican film list
43:34 What films should be removed from the list?
1:24:10 Our favorite films on the list
1:55:30 What films should have been included that weren't?
2:34:09 What post-1995 films would we add?
3:00:19 The most Catholic/edifying films on the list
Links
Pope St. John Paul II's address on the 100th birthday of cinema https://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/speeches/1995/march/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_19950317_plen-pccs.html
"100 Years of Cinema" document from the Pontifical Council of Social Communications with model curriculum
https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/pccs/documents/rc_pc_pccs_doc_19960101_100-cinema_en.html
Below is the 1995 list by the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, "Some Important Films" (with links to our episode on each film):
Religion
- Andrei Rublev, Andrei Tarkovsky (1969, USSR)
- The Mission, Roland Joffé (1986, UK)
- The Passion of Joan of Arc, Carl T. Dreyer (1928, France)
- Vie et passion du Christ (Life and Passion of Christ), Ferdinand Zecca and Lucien Nonguet (1905, France)
- The Flowers of St. Francis, Roberto Rossellini (1950, Italy)
- The Gospel According to Matthew, Pier Paolo Pasolini (1964, France/Italy)
- Thérèse, Alain Cavalier (1986, France)
- Ordet (The Word), Carl T. Dreyer (1955, Denmark)
- The Sacrifice, Andrei Tarkowsky (1986, Sweden/UK/France)
- Francesco, Liliana Cavani (1989, Italy/Germany)
- Ben-Hur, William Wyler (1959, USA)
- Babette’s Feast, Gabriel Axel (1987, Denmark)
- Nazarín, Luis Buñuel (1958, Mexico)
- Monsieur Vincent, Maurice Cloche (1947, France)
- A Man for All Seasons, Fred Zinnemann (1966, UK)
Values
- Gandhi, Richard Attenborough (1982, UK/USA/India)
- Intolerance, D. W. Griffith (1916, USA)
- Dekalog (The Decalogue), Krzysztof Kieslowski (1987, Poland)
- Au Revoir, Les Enfants (Goodbye, Children), Louis Malle (1987, France)
- Dersu Uzala, Akira Kurosawa (1974, Japan)
- The Tree of Wooden Clogs, Ermanno Olmi (1978, Italy/France)
- Rome, Open City, Roberto Rossellini (1946, Italy)
- Wild Strawberries, Ingmar Bergman (1957, Sweden)
- The Seventh Seal, Ingmar Bergman (1957, Sweden)
- Chariots of Fire, Hugh Hudson (1981, UK)
- Bicycle Thieves, Vittorio de Sica (1948, Italy)
- It’s a Wonderful Life, Frank Capra (1946, USA)
- Schindler’s List, Steven Spielberg (1993, USA)
- On the Waterfront, Elia Kazan (1954, USA)
- The Burmese Harp, Kon Ichikawa (1956, Japan)
Art
- 2001: A Space Odyssey, Stanley Kubrick (1968, UK/USA)
- La Strada, Federico Fellini (1954, Italy)
- Citizen Kane, Orson Welles (1941, USA)
- Metropolis, Fritz Lang (1927, Germany)
- Modern Times, Charlie Chaplin (1936, USA)
- Napoléon, Abel Gance (1927, Italy)
- 8½, Federico Fellini (1963, Italy)
- La Grande Illusion, Jean Renoir (1937, France)
- Nosferatu, F. W. Murnau (1922, Germany)
- Stagecoach, John Ford (1939, USA)
- The Leopard, Luchino Visconti (1963, Italy/France)
- Fantasia (1940, USA)
- The Wizard of Oz, Victor Fleming (1939, USA)
- The Lavender Hill Mob, Charles Crichton (1951, UK)
- Little Women, George Cukor (1933, USA)