Paul O'Donnell: May 2008 Archives

Sharon Stone was caught by reporters on a Cannes red carpet and asked what she thought of the earthquake in China. (Funny, but do they ever ask George Bush or U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon what they thought of "If These Walls Could Talk 2"?) Stone was happy to discourse on the spiritual implications of China's biggest natural disaster in three decades, of course, and while the result was not exactly the Jerry Falwell moment the gossip sites are playing it as ("Actress Sharon Stone Blames China's Treatment Of Tibet For Earthquake"), it was a good example of how Hollywood Buddhism is different from all other Buddhism.

Since he released his third solo album, "Portable Sounds," a year ago, Christian music veteran tobyMac has been, well, reborn. The hip-hop heavy collection entered the Billboard 200 at #10— tobyMac's highest showing ever—and this year, with his Diverse City band, he's been dubbed best Christian act by anyone who makes such distinctions, including the Gospel Music Association, which honored him as Artist of the Year at this month's Dove Awards ceremonies.

While it's been 12 years since he's won that prize (as a member of the groundbreaking rap group dc Talk), Toby has never really been out of the game.

Used to be, any main character who had a rough day had critics crying "Christ figure": Billy Budd, Charlie Brown--Harry Potter, for the Lord's sake! But Richard Corliss, writing in this week's Time magazine, says that Aslan's similarity to Christ is expertly hidden by Disney in their most recent installment of The Chronicles of Narnia: "Prince Caspian." Nevermind that in the last "Narnia" movie Aslan was sacrificed on an altar--the same altar that is the navel of the Narnians' situation room in the current flick.

This just in: churchgoers know a bad movie when they see it.

After furiously pandering to evangelical Christians in recent years, the major Hollywood studios are backing away from faith-based marketing schemes that offer churches private screenings and Bible study guides based on a movie's characters or themes. The reason cited was simple: they don't work. "I'd rather spend my money elsewhere," one mogul marketer told the Hollywood Reporter.

The evidence? The faithful didn't flock to stinkers like "Evan Almighty" or "The Nativity Story."

Don't get me wrong, "Prince Caspian," the second of Disney's movie remakes of C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia novels is pure fun, an old-fashioned tale of a wicked uncle who usurps a throne, only to be overthrown by his goodly nephew—Caspian himself, with the help of talking animals and some swashbuckling strangers.

Director Andrew Adamson knows how to breathe life into this classic material, too. The swordfights are suspenseful, the effects cheesily magnificent and neither the sweaty chases nor the intricately planned attacks always go as you expect. In a Hollywood first, even the dwarf is funny.

But it's also the most Christian movie your kids will drag you to this year.

Laila Lalami, a novelist and literary blogger, has a review of the new indie film "The Visitor" in The Nation that serves as a mini-compendium of Muslim film, and how Hollywood has represented Islam since 9/11....

Newsweek reports this week that Oprah Winfrey and Barack Obama share more than a wish to see him be president: Oprah attended Obama's church when she first moved to Chicago, and both called the troublesome Rev. Jeremiah Wright their pastor....

We know the convictions of Travolta and Tom, Madonna and Val Kilmer, but rank-and-file celebrities are so vague about their spiritual leanings it's hard to know which faith we'd put them into, but comments by Gwyneth Paltrow to the British...

Heaven, along with heart, may be the most overused word in the pop lexicon. What I'm after here is not the tunes that insist that kisses are heaven or that heaven only knows what's going to happen to our love....

Lewis Black has founded his comedy career on his eruptions of screaming: the irrational outbursts of a rational man in a world gone mad. Religion is rich territory for his kind of humor, and as the title of his Comedy...

Someday someone will make the Christian "Spinal Tap," a brilliant satire of the Christian rock world. Until then, it's worth checking out "Jesus People," airing on the web-based Independent Comedy Channel. The mockumentary, about the founding of a Christian dance...