You needn't worry about spoiler alerts for this old man, Rod. I wouldn't watch a new Spielberg film if you paid me to.
I think of the David Byrne lyrics:
*I wouldn't live there if you paid me to / I wouldn't do the things the way those people do / I wouldn't live there if you paid me to*
So:
*I wouldn't watch it if you paid me to / I wouldn't give a dime to those bloated f***s / I wouldn't watch it for a hundred bucks*
It's a Hollywood movie, yes? Nuff said.
People are arguing online about the upcoming *Odyssey* and its DEI aspects. I love Homer's Odyssey. OF COURSE I'm not going to watch this film.
“Christopher who?”
I'm put off that people I respect are even arguing about it. That they think it's big enough to argue about. They'll go watch it, then deliver a lengthy critique.
Be better. DON'T WATCH IT.
I hold these truths to be self-evident.
But here's to your butterfly wing. I hope you make a breakthrough with your mother and I'm very glad to hear there are some cracks in the walls she's put up.
I'm put off that people I respect are even arguing about it. That they think it's big enough to argue about. They'll go watch it and then deliver a lengthy critique.
This is a mistake. It's not a good movie, but the WAY it is bad is extremely significant, for reasons that have nothing to do with this particular movie. It delivers a potent anti-Christian message, one that the masses have been primed to hear. Just because many people will not subject themselves to this particular film doesn't mean that millions of others won't. And you should expect this same Narrative to appear in many other forms. I'm telling you, Attention Must Be Paid, for the same reason a Sovietologist back in the day needed to read Pravda and Izvestia: to know what the official Narrative was.
Rod, if you paid for your ticket, you just paid people whose business model is to deliver “potent anti-Christian messages.”
They don’t care about your critique. They already got what they need from you. Ticket sales. Just sayin’.
In my view, we need to be ready for this by being able to see it as so utterly alien that we wouldn’t think to enter the shitty, pop-stained Temple in which it’s being played.
Nobody paid for Izvestia. ;) Hollywood Pravda lives on *ticket sales*.
Our wallets aren’t big, but we should vote with them whenever we can. No?
For those who like that sort of thing,that is the sort of thing they like . I keep coming back to my line in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie because it’s useful ( It’s not my favorite Spark novel. I like both The Comforters and Loitering with Intent more).
Look if you have a worldview like Stephen Spielberg- childish, sentimental, melioristic, cartoonish, moralistic in a shallow liberal way- this sort of thing may be appealing. People who think aliens are going to show up and straighten everything out are living in a fantasy world from which I doubt they can be delivered from.
Now I know people can be stupid and gullible ( takes one to know one). Let’s assume aliens are really demons. I can see certain people wanting to cozy up to them to rule the world or become Dr. Faustus. Demon manifestations are not good! I’m not entirely clear as to why the masses would start worshipping them as gods.
Ok so the aliens are really extra terrestrials with a more advanced technologies . Knowledge of them will cause the masses to reject Christianity and become, I’m not sure for what? Look the masses are already rejecting Christianity for any number of things ranging from fast food, pornography, politics , you name it. What’s Klatu got to do with it? (Apologies Tina Turner)?.
As far as Spielberg himself is concerned, "People who think aliens are going to show up and straighten everything out are living in a fantasy world from which I doubt they can be delivered from" need to be amended. They WANT TO BE SEEN as living in a fantasy world.
I've never seen any demons or UFOs or UAPs or things that go bump in the night but maybe that's because I don't look for them and I ain't interested in them so they ain't interested in me. And if they ever do become interested in me, I'll just give 'em the raspberry.
I once bought a book on<a href="https://readingfreely.com/2023/05/18/log-cabin-pioneers/"> log cabins</a> purely because it had a blurb from Abraham Lincoln saying "“For those of you who like this kind of a book, this is the kind of book you will like.”
Eric, it's my job, as a cultural critic, to see this stuff and write about it. I know Hollywood is not my audience. My audience is people who will see the film, or who will have friends and family who see the film, and who are not prepared, intellectually or otherwise, to understand the propaganda and messaging here.
Box office estimates showed that about 2.8 million people saw "Disclosure Day" this past weekend. That's roughly 10 percent of the number of people in the US who went to church this past Sunday. I'd be willing to bet that Spielberg's "sermon" was a lot more theologically potent than what most got from the pulpit. But it's a lie.
Well, ours was given by an African nun telling us about her mission and why we should help out financially, which I did, without understanding anything she said. My hearing's not what it was and I really don't do heavy accents well.
You're right about this. Ignoring things doesn't make them go away, and whatever profit they got from you would even out if even one person DOESN'T see the movie based on your comments.
It's really hard to say why something is incorrect if you don't see it.
I'd be willing to bet that Spielberg's "sermon" was a lot more theologically potent than what most got from the pulpit. But it's a lie.- Really- look sermons are boring and banal. That’s true. However, Spielbergs pablum is potent? Only in the sense that this type of banal pablum fits in with the zeitgeist and is the kind of message that the dominant cultural elite likes. It may be true as Mencken stated that no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the masses but I have my doubts that this very silly sounding movie will have any great impact. I don’t think movies are all that important anymore. You’ve heard of the notion that what you attend to helps determine what you see . It’s distinctly possible you attend too much to the product/ agit prop of Hollywood and it affects your vision more than is desirable. Likewise you assume others do . The scope of all this is probably a lot more limited than you think. The world may be about to end . I don’t think it’s going to end because of this movie.
Yes, I get it, Rod. Such lies, built up from teamwork and huge reserves of funding, and now with special-effects tech that can do anything, will always be powerful "sermons." And will get more powerful.
But I will choose to ding their funding.
Anyhow, seems your writing has already led a few to opt not to see it. Thus my mea culpa below. ;)
We seem trapped in a kind of mass society mass man thing here where the ephemeral products of a capitalist marketing machine ( marketed by people who pretend to be above it all) are supremely important and must be attended to. Why?
Spielberg has been dishing out this sort of nonsense for decades. Consider Close Encounters. Consider ET . ( I remember with fondness - many years ago- a writer in The Spectator commenting on American sentimentality saying a British schoolboy would have crushed ET with a rock).
Even "Saving Private Ryan" had its silly moments. George Marshall spending even one second on June 6, 1944 starting a search for Private Ryan was preposterous. And Tom Hanks' ridiculous death scene. Or even sending a platoon to search for Private Ryan. Spielberg's sense of reality doesn't stretch passed Culver City.
I wouldn’t have it in for Spielberg but for my hostility to hype. I can’t stand the way he’s been hyped to be some great film maker. He’s ok but nothing spectacular. Visually adequate, intellectually weak and rather immature.Look I can be entertained by schlock but I won’t pretend it’s great art. Even someone like William Friedkin struck me as far more interesting than Spielberg. And being honest, I’d probably enjoy a Hammer Dracula film with Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing and preferably Veronica Carlson, Caroline Munro or Stephanie Beacham than another vitally important film by Spielberg.
"1941" was terrible. Because I had young children at the time it came out, I saw the first "Jurassic Park" about seven times. What I got out of that movie was 1) how did they fit Laura Dern into the jeans she was wearing and 2) how is Samuel Jackson considered any sort of able actor. I saw "ET" and "First Encounters" and have little memory of them. "Jaws" was a lot of fun. That's about all the Spielberg I've watched.
What got me chafing in Private Ryan were two things. These guys were Rangers, not ordinary GIs, and their experience was nothing like a seasick kid stretched out on the sand on Omaha Beach. And he was just cool with shooting prisoners. Because they were German.
I mentioned the film to my young adult sons last week. They had zero interest is saying it and asked, "Is that the psyop film?". The other dismissed it as "Boomer notalgia slop".
The half empty theater on opening weekend is a really strong sign that it didn't connect. Young people don't want to watch another Spielberg movie where aliens are nice.
As someone who was born a bit earlier than you, I think the Baby Boomer ends in 1954, the last year in which you could have born with immediate expectation of being drafted (though the draft would have ended a year before you would have been eligible). I think the "Generation Jones" idea is much more appropriate.
I doubt the movie will be that important or remembered in years to come. There is so much out now and new things come out all the time. It's not like it was decades ago where certain albums and movies can be remembered for generations. I don't see that happening as much now just due to how much content there is out there.
Are you sure its message reaches across generations though? Your description makes it sound like the fever dream hallucinations of a Boomer in the latter stages of delirium, with the typical Boomer valences (the 1990s positive optimism, reification of Knowledge and Goodness, Utopian delusions about converting humanity to The Truth as soon as the Smart People (or their standins - AI, Aliens) figure out The Message and take it to the benighted masses).
Is any of this even comprehensible to Zoomers? Or is it as far distant to them as the Silent Generation black and white movies are to you and me?
Poor Boomers! Technically I am one but although I readily identify with my age ,I don’t identify with a generation and believe generational identification is shallow, glib and an unappealing form of collectivist group identity. Run away from it if you can.
For what it’s worth, I am not a utopian , I don’t reify knowledge or goodness and I certainly don’t believe in converting humanity to Truth. Also I think Spielberg is a silly git!
Well, to be fair, you're right - a lot of Boomers here probably feel alienated by the Boomer stereotypes, just like I feel alienated (and alien to) the Millenial stereotypes.
Still, there's some kind of style of media common to 1990s - sappy, winsome "normie" and very positivity and optimism focused. In many ways, the opposite of the type of chaotic, edgy energy Trump represents. Jeffrey Seinfeld is another flagbearer of these "1990s vibes".
For what it’s worth I think I watched Seinfeld twice. Not my thing.
Let’s see, David Lynch and John Waters are around the same age and Blue Velvet and Pink Flamingos aren’t exactly pictures of All American optimism. Not trying to be difficult but beware of narrow stereotypes. Stereotypes usually have some truth to them. However I suspect generational stereotypes particularly in the last hundred years, have minimal use as analytical tools.
Rod: In your case, writing an influential blog with brilliant film criticism, it's worth paying to see it.
However, I don't think you should be advertising for your readers to pay to see it. That's just filling the coffers of the Satanists. The money would be better spent on, say, a bottle of wine.
I’m definitely not concerned about being in the minority here in terms of folks dissing Spielberg and the film. And I’m not a spiritual novice when it comes to seeking, reading, and practicing. I’m intensely intrigued about 21st Century Christianity and alien disclosure. I also went into Disclosure Day after listening to Pageau’s commentary. I understand where the critiques are coming from and yet I very much enjoyed the film as an immersive entertainment experience. Unlike other negative commentators I don’t look to Spielberg to deliver high-end art nor go I let him influence my views of humanity and the cosmos. I applaud you going to see the film and providing what I think is a clean and honest assessment. It’s why your Substack is only one of the two I subscribe to. Keep up your great work. Hoping your next book tour includes Colorado and Boulder Bookstore. Thanks!
I agree with you Darrell. I loved the movie. Absolutely gripping. It didn't shake my faith in Jesus. I don't see the movie as part of a wider plot to supplant Christianity. The aliens are worth listening to only to the extent that they do not contradict the revealed God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Jesus.
I hear you, but I'm telling you, this movie is important as an example of the Narrative that has been pushed on us, and will only ramp up with more disclosure. I don't blame you for not wanting to pay money to see a mediocre movie. But it is VITAL data for how the whole disclosure narrative will be framed and promoted. Christians (and others) need to be ready.
I actually think that Rod's review of the movie is enough for me to be able to discuss the movie and its anti Christian narrative and other such things with people. It saved me a ticket. I am sure there are other reviews I could read that would do the same.
Top Gun 2 was my last one. I thought it was fun, and Tom Cruise for all his weirdness, had a talking head either before or after the movie (I forget which) thanking everyone for watching. To me that's what movies should be, the creator of the movie proud of their product, it wasn't pushy on political views or anything, it was fun, and there was even bits of fan service.
A much nicer film that you will enjoy even though it also is set in “space” is Project Hail Mary. No attempt to indoctrinate there. There is the requisite “adorable” alien creature with its own ways, but the film posits two different world and an exchange of scientific info but no savior ideology.
We are practicing Christians attending two sound and Bible teaching churches, thanks be to God. Acquainted with the idea of principalities and powers and the “ruler of this world” who tried to tempt Jesus himself. So I will take a pass on “Disclosure Day”. However, those of us with some prudence should try to help our family, friends and neighbors and most of all use this as an opportunity to share the Gospel.
Okay, @Rod Dreher, I take it all back. March boldly into those pixellated dens of anomie! It turns out every ticket you buy saves a dozen other sinners from the ticket booth!
Like various other movies, this one will be available on DVD from public libraries if you can wait. The missus and I probably will wait, as we have often waited for other recent movies.
Rod, whatever you do, don't watch the documentary about exorcists investigating demonic possession in the Baton Rogue sasquatch population! Don't you do it now!
Rod, what will stay with me was not only the UFOs but the butterfly wing. Human beings can endure a lot of suffering, but we struggle to endure meaninglessness. We all carry around a desire for reconciliation, healing, and wholeness. The danger is not that people will suddenly start worshiping aliens. The danger is that when we are hurting badly enough, we become willing to accept substitutes.
Your essay reminded me of the Soviet movie Solaris, where the mystery isn’t really the alien intelligence but whether a man can still tell the difference between what is true and what he desperately wants to be true.
What struck me most was your line about the missing wing. We all want that other wing. We want the broken thing fixed, the relationship healed, the burden lifted. That longing is real. But it can also make us vulnerable.
Yesterday’s Gospel had Our Lord speaking of asking the Father in His name. At Mass, kneeling there, it occurred to me that every age is tempted by some version of salvation without sacrifice, wisdom without obedience, and truth without God. The old temptation never really changes.
The Christian answer isn’t fear of mystery. It’s discernment. Not every light is heaven’s light, and not every messenger comes from God. Sometimes the hardest thing is remembering to kneel before reaching for the fruit.
My take on the woman kneeling before Margaret and crossing herself is that Margaret is a new deity which explains why she says she is not anyone's religion. She is John the Baptist.
The good news is that the theater last night was almost entirely empty.
Mr. Ruse, your girl Carrie Prejean is going to be VERY disappointed in you for seeing a movie made by a Jew. Wait, I know: maybe DISCLOSURE DAY is just another Zionist conspiracy!
Rod, as a follow-up to your article and my earlier comment, I wonder if one of the great disciplines modern people need to recover is silence.
We somehow find time for the gym, a yoga class, social media, podcasts, television, and a hundred other demands on our attention, yet many of us spend almost no time in genuine silence. Cardinal Robert Sarah wrote an entire book, The Power of Silence, warning about what he called the “dictatorship of noise.” The phrase has stayed with me.
Perhaps that is one reason modern people are so vulnerable to every new revelation, ideology, or promise of salvation. We have lost some of the habits of contemplation that previous generations took for granted. It is difficult to hear the still, small voice when every other voice is shouting.
The longing for meaning is real. The longing for wholeness is real. But sometimes the first step toward wisdom is not discovering something new. It is finding enough silence to recognize what was already true.
Christ still speaks from the Cross. The problem is not that He has become silent. The problem is that we have become surrounded by so much noise that we rarely stop long enough to listen.
Exactly. I love sitting quietly in my living room, enjoying peace and quiet. I have relatives who think I should join a yoga class if I enjoy silence. I can’t figure out why I need to pay an instructor and a gym for something I can do for free at home. Also, no “instruction” is truly silent.
It seems people want some kind of validation that they think can be had if they engage in some approved activity, like enrolling in a yoga class. Nothing seems to be done for no reason at all. Everything lies under the tyranny of Purpose. It used to be that you climbed mountains because they’re there. Now, the climb is merely the scaffold on which are laid book and movie contracts, the genesis of a climbing equipment business, etc. The thing itself is lost in a storm of Justification.
I have 4 kids ten and below. I miss silence I really do. I don't have a smart phone and often on the weekend I don't even look at a phone much less have it on me regularly but I can't get silence ever. Most I get is about 10-15 minutes when I read and pray the Daily Office.
In principle I agree. But I find it hard to stop and be silent, when I am in the later portion of my life and have so much still to do. When you are young you seek to absorb from all around you, but when old, there is an urgency to impart what one has made of a long life so it isn't lost to the world.
This is disturbing to hear and reminds me of the high praise for "The Golden Compass" years ago. Upon reading it I was taken aback when the protagonist's father murdered a little boy early on, justified by the pursuit of knowledge. The reason I kept reading was, since Pullman had proclaimed moral disgust with Narnia, to see how this child sacrifice would be faced. My shock deepened upon completion because not only was the murder never meaningfully addressed, but the murderer continued to be fleshed out and portrayed as a self-sacrificing hero despite never showing any sign of repentance. It seemed stunning, terrifying, that this book was hailed by critics as the longed-for replacement of Lewis's Christian morality fairy tales. Others have also noted the accepted child murder, but that so many did not, even if they disliked the book, has continued to trouble me.
That Spielberg has leaned in on child abduction trauma, one-eye symbolism, and even portraying the cannibal witch's house as "re-enchantment" is as surprising. I thought great artists, even if I disagreed with them, were beyond that sort of Grammy-performance bait. And on a topic as pivotal as how the human race is trying to understand itself in the wake of an all-consuming technological revolution? It's confusing, is there truly no "there there," no dissent, no creativity among the narrative-shaping class?
At the time of the release of the movie Pullman gave mass-market press interviews saying the books were never intended to be anti-Christian. Peter Hitchens had the receipts and shut him up.
I got a little excited by a movie preview of The Golden Compass. Your review reassured me that its just as well I didn't devote any time to either the movie or the book.
Movie and book are okay but not amazing. There are new books out that are sequels to the early ones and I've debated reading them. But I haven't gotten around to them.
Pullman, that profile in courage: obviously the suits at New Line got to him and told him to put the atheism on the downlow. The problem was he hadn't been shy about his loathing of the religion of his ancestors.
I read all three books and saw the movie and the first season of the newer show. The movie was okay but didn't adapt all of the first book. I remember hearing the series described as "Atheist Narnia" and there is some truth to that.
Pullman is one of the most virulent Christianity-haters put there. It's very disturbing that so many people, especially young people, have fallen under his influence.
Pullman hit the kid-lit bigtime in the early 2000s, riding in the generous wake of Harry Potter. People who had loved Potter (or were looking for the "next Potter") gravitated to Pullman since he was targeting the same audience, and also playing in the Fantasy literary space (he was one of several to do so successfully). I don't know as he has had the same staying power as Potter - his books mostly hit home for their anti-Narnia sentiments, pulling him along also in the wake of the New Atheists. Like them, however, what he had to say, and the way he said it, was like devouring a pack of Oreos - tasty and cloying upfront, but leaving a kind of icky sour aftertaste.
Now, more than 20 years on, Pullman is still a crank whose success is limited, and his books still only seem to have a strong resonance with those who are anti-Christianity - they lack the broad appeal that Potter still has.
The good news is that while the mainstream critics tend to give the flick and its message a thumbs-up, the reviews online have been mostly tepid to terminal. Gen Z criticism in particular has been a collective eye-roll. Not that that makes them any less gullible than their elders in the long run, just that this particular vehicle isn't going to have much more impact than, say, the lamentable Indiana Jones and the crystal skull film had on, well, anybody.
I hope you're right. But when the same basic Narrative gets repurposed in a film or TV show made by someone with more skill and less sentimentality, it will be a lot more potent.
Well, Kyle Smith in the Wall Street Journal gave it a horrible review. (I was planning to see it until I read Smith's review - then I decided to give it a miss.) I think the WSJ should count as mainstream, and Smith is one of the best newspaper movie critics out there, in my opinion.
It would be fair to say that the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times are America's two newspapers of national record. The Washington Post no longer is.
Really? I was a professional film critic for a decade, the final year and a half of it in NYC. I never once saw any hint that film critics were afraid of Spielberg.
That was then. Look, I don't have any information, this is based on what textual critics call internal evidence. The reviews are so fawning, so gushy, that what I smelt was fear. It's like the unbelievable run-up to Prada II. It's obvious they're all scared of la Streep. I am too.
Thirty years ago it was possible to imagine a career as a movie critic. Not any more. If these guys have a gig, by God they mean to keep it, because outside of the Times and the Journal, and I suppose the NY Post and Daily News, there aren't any more jobs linked to a daily organ. Smith in the Journal is an exception, but the Journal cultural pages are exceptional as well, e.g., Meghan Cox Gurdon.
On the the other hand Peggy Noonan went into full soppy mode Friday with an ode to Rocky. And on the same day Will revealed he fell for Death of a Salesman, that fearful tripe. It's like Flaubert. "If only they had read my Sentimental Education we would never have gone to war with Prussia." He said that.
Noonan is so Irish maudlin as to be unreadable most days. She's been mostly downhill since Pointe du Hoc, but like a .200 batter, occasionally hits a double.
Also, they watch movies for a living, day in and day out, so they're jaded. That's why they so often love films that are bizarre and avant-garde. It's not just that they're leftists, it's that they're BORED, so as time goes on, they can only be stimulated by things that are ever more shocking and off-putting to normal people.
From memory, I believe Chesterton defined coincidences as “spiritual puns.” Perhaps that thought is rooted in St. Paul’s letter to the Romans, “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”
Gnosticism, totalitarianism, moral therapeutic deism? Time for you to read Eric Voegelin. A very difficult fellow to understand, but very much worth it. His concepts include symbolic forms, the history of consciousness, gnosticism’s “immanentizing the eschaton” (yes, that’s Voegelin). He was a refugee from the Nazis, escaping one step ahead of the Gestapo on his heels (like Dietrich Von Hildebrand and Gerhart Niemeyer). He wrote on that period in his dissection of the appeal Hitler had for the Germans (“Hitler and the Germans”).
And, to really blow you mind in a Jungian sort of synchronicity - Voegelin’s academic home in America was LSU!
I adore Spielberg but found this film to be extremely weak. I didn't feel a deep connection to the characters, and the characters themselves felt generic and without a clear "why" for their actions.
I also think the best scenes were spoiled by the commercials. Almost every time something fun or unexpected happened on screen, I was disappointed to realize I'd see it a hundred times before on YouTube promos.
That all being said, I did love the scene where the nun quoted Scripture to drive home the point that the Bible only states we're his most beloved creation ON EARTH. That was a fun moment, and I wish there had been more like it!
It seems like Josh O'Connor's talents were wasted here (no fault of his, of course). He was very good as a priest in spiritual crisis in the latest Knives Out installment.
Why Kansas City? Kansas. Because the movie is riffing on “The Wizard of Oz.” All about trying to go home. The “home” in “Disclosure Day” is fabricated in a hangar. Like on a movie set. Wink-wink. One of the few clever things in an otherwise clunker of a film. To quote Rod: “shallow Boomer sentimentalism.”
Many people do not understand, the Kansas City everyone knows (Chiefs, Jazz, BBQ, etc.) is in Missouri and only bleeds incidentally into Kansas City, Kansas. But the Oz imagery is at least as likely as the Disney.
What did you think of the film as a movie? My understanding is that it's too long, mostly boring, the characters are stupid (You're determined to broadcast your super- secret alien information on a local TV station when the Joe Rogan podcast is a thing?), and the whole thing just reeks of Boomer sentimentality for the "I'd like to buy the world a Coke" nonsense that they thought they were going to create and failed spectacularly.
Just that seems to make a mockery of the film. It’s 2026 and it takes all this perilous effort to break a story that could be done on forchan or YouTube in 30 seconds? Why was the mainstream media, irrelevant for years, so necessary to disclosure? Pageau points this out as invalidating the whole plot. It is a Boomer wish fulfillment that the mainstream media have an important role.
That's one of the reasons why I believe there's something (don't know what) to the UAP thing. QAnon was obviously for pimple-popping mom's basement boys devastated by the death of Rush but knock me over with a feather it turns out there was child rape for politicians and it turns out that "pizza" is code for horrors. Somehow the word abut Epstein (a private rape island beats anything QAnon came up with) got metagrobalized into fantasy, but it was closer to the truth than simple denial.
The depths of depravity have not quite lost their ability to shock, but in the past ten years we have gotten very close. Is this what God saw in the days of Noah?
The thing about CP and cheese pizza, the code word, comes from 4chan and maybe other parts of the internet. I imagine that at least some of the people who bought the QAnon thing came from 4chan or other sites.
Jonathan Pageau would disagree with you on this. I haven’t seen the film but he is a reliable narrator. Also, no one watches the news so how would it really be better? The age of the audience for mainstream media seems to hover in the 70’s.
People DO tune into cable news in times of global crisis. I never watch it, and haven't had cable for years, but when there's a huge crisis (war, etc), I find a way to watch. Besides, in the movie, the broadcast from Kansas City is carried live on networks around the globe. Are you sure that news channel watching habits outside the US are the same as in America? Anyway, this is not really an important point to the story's message, in my view.
Yes I no longer have cable either. I follow elections results and weather emergencies online. I followed Covid news mostly online too-- and that was the premier global emergency of my lifetime.
I didn't think it was bad *as a movie*, but it was only so-so. The local TV station, in the film, is a near-instant gateway to all broadcast networks in the world. All the world's networks start running that channel's feed within minutes of its start. It appears that (within the film) they chose the KC station because the Margaret character is an on-air personality there, and can easily get onto the air. (I think in terms of storytelling, this is Spielberg's nod to Disney as enchanter.)
The Joe Rogan option makes no sense in terms of the movie's action. The Wardex company, on behalf of the government, is trying to kill the protagonists to keep the information -- a huge trove of double-plus classified data -- from going public. Most of the movie is a life-or-death chase.
The Zoomer who saw the movie with his dad and me said on the way out, "Why not Wikileaks?" Fair question, but in the movie's story, the world is on the verge of World War III, and the alien message has to be broadcast simultaneously. The world's television channels break into their war programming to show the videos. And there's a cameo by an ancient alien. The movie ends with what one presumes will be a command to the global powers to Stop Fighting. A Wikileaks leak would not have had the immediacy this particular narrative demands.
Rod what did you make up when Jane was trying to stop Colin Firth she clutches her crucifix from her necklace and then gives in and lets it fall to the ground. I didn’t like that.
Have not seen the movie, do not plan to, but have read the objection that in 2026, you would go on,the internet for a big reveal! Not if you have stolen important info from the powers that be and are running for your life! Hopefully my being g a boomer doesn't invalidate my opinuon!
I didn’t laugh out loud reading this . I did come close. The movie sounds laughably stupid. I may be in a minority of one but I’ve never thought Spielberg is a great artist. He’s a Hollywood schlockmeister- sentimental , shallow and politically correct.His best movie was Jaws .That at least succeeded in making a scary movie about a nasty fish. Why everyone needs to see this steaming mass of tripe is beyond me.
I do think calling this stuff Gnostic is very much on point. One of the illusions of the modern world is all problems come down to problems of knowledge and are rendered solvable by greater knowledge . So if aliens pop over and put implants in your eye , problems solved. Yep that’s exactly the kind of wisdom I’d expect from Spielberg.
"Aliens (“aliens”) descending from spaceships to proclaim new truths to us would be rather more persuasive to the masses today than the watery god of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism, wouldn’t you say?"
The gay, overeducated philistine boomer running the Archdiocese of Washington, Cardinal Bob McElroy, last week banished an exorcist for suggesting a connection between aliens and the demonic. This week he has banned altar rails from archdiocese parishes...
I believe it is a case of egalitarianism combined with anti-clericalism. The congregation is the equal of the priest. Communion in the hand is part of it. Communion handed out by the laity. Altar rails pulled out so the laity can stride the altar.
I once took an elderly Hispanic friend to mass at a rather large cathedral. There must have been about ten lay assistants handing out the wafers from baskets. I could easily have taken one, if I didn't know I wasn't acceptable by church standards, or if I didn't respect the standards anyway. I thought it was simply due to the large number of people to be served.
I went to a Catholic Church in Surf City NC circa 2000 where the wafer- I can't believe it was a Host- was self-serve out of a Bluebonnet margarine plastic container.
I frequently attend a Baptist church that streams its service online. Communion is not served every week, but when it is, the pastor invites the online participants to get a cracker or bread and some juice and join us. (He is very strict about reading Paul's admonitions about communion, but of course its not served in the spirit of Transubstantiation.)
When I used to go with my father to his Baptist church growing up, they used to hand out little plastic cups of grape juice and packets of crackers which we could consume ourselves and then deposit in the designated receptacles on the back side of the pew in front of us.
Those who have addressed your question seem correct, but more concerning why it became a thing and caught on, rather than concerning its origins. The latter came, I believe, from a penchant for "patristicizing" antiquarianism. Another instance of the same ting is "altars facing the people." The latter turns our to have been an historical error, and while the former was historically accurate it effectively destroyed the piety of masses of Catholics, together with "communion in the hand."
The moral? Don't set out to fix things that aren't broken, not to improve things that are just fine as is.
As early as 1962 the English Anglican Cyril Pocknee insisted on this point in his The Christian Altar, but his words were drowned in the roaring of the waves of fashion.
Yes, I'm sure that the Golden Corral buffet line that passes for communion in many places is very ancient, in the sense that it is preferred by many ageing boomers who were taught it during the Revolution
The altar rail was the LAST vestige of the separation between the altar/sanctuary and congregation that had been standard in churches since time immemorial (and still is in the East, with their iconostasis).
You want to go back to "ancient times"? Then let's restore the extremely rigorous fasting regimens and long and arduous penitential practices before being permitted to receive communion again that existed in the early Church. Then we'll talk about communion in the hand.
Discontinued over a millennium ago by all Christians save the Nestorians, and no reason for the "Latins" to restore them in the 1960s save for fasddishness and bad histotry.
Cyril was the great (and a bit unscrupulous) opponent of Nestorius and his Christological thinking. Two years after Nestorius's condemnation at the Council of Ephesus in 431 Cyril and his followers reached an agreement with some former followers of Nestorius, especially Patriarch John of Antioch, in the"Formula of Reunion." The formula used in this agreement anticipated the Chalcedonian definition of 451. It wasn't Cyril's preferred manner of speaking, but he accepted it as orthodox.
Cyril died in 444. His successor, Dioscoros, seems to have decided that the "Formula of Reunion," if it didn't actually betray Cyril's though, left "crypto-Nestoriasns" too much room to maneuver, and he bent all his efforts to get rid of it and to condemn its proponents (including Pope Leo) as Nestoriands. This he achieved at the so-called "robber council " of Ephesus in 449 amidst scenes of violence and tumult, excommunications Pope Leo in the process. Two years later, with a new emperor on the throne, a council was called at Chalcedon which, among other things formulated the Chalcedonian Definition and excommunicated and deposed Patriarch Dioscoros of Alezandria. A hundred years of controversy and attempted, but always failed, compromises ensued, and by 565 two separate, and long hostile, church communions had emerged, those whom we today term the "Chalcedonian Orthodox," and those whom we term the "Oriental Orthodox," or "Miaphysites." Cyril is a hero and saint alike to the Chalcedonian Orthodox and the Oriental Orthodox, and a villain to the "Assyrians" (as those who hold Nestorius to be one of their teachers prefer to term themselves and be termed by others). Rome and the Latin West were part of the "Chalcedonan Orthodox" Communion until whatever time one wishes to date "the
No, that's not why. I'm sure there is a lot of egalitarianism and anti-clericalism in the Church today, but reforms in the 60s and 70s were based on trying to do what was done in the early Church, which was to receive communion standing. Kneeling is a tradition in the West that arose much later.
When the liturgy was revamped, some efforts were made to bring it more in line with the liturgy before the Orthodox split away. Kneeling during Holy Communion is a Western tradition. The Orthodox do kneel at parts of their Divine Liturgy, but they stand during Communion, and the liturgical reformers determined that to be the posture of the entire early Church. I haven't done the research to know if that's correct or not, but that's the reason I was taught.
Thank you, Gail, that's interesting. Kneeling to receive seems to be firmly settled in my Confessional Lutheran tradition, with pictures from the earliest years of the Lutheran reformation showing the faithful kneeling, in continuity with the medieval custom.
"It is simply bizarre that Spielberg would reproduce the kind of intense trauma testified to by many “experiencers” as something beneficial — especially when it involves (in the film) kidnapping and violating the bodies of innocent children. Read the cultural room, Steve!"
The same Spielberg who was (and may still be) planning a film dramatization of the Edgardo Mortara case!
I don't know Steven Spielberg nor have I watched many of his films. I gather he despises Christianity in private. Much of that hatred is probably due to the fact that most Christians are politically conservative, Republicans, and support Donald Trump. Rod Dreher mentions that a key to the aliens is that they have empathy that humans lack. Most lefties, at least those with half a brain, heartily believe that they are profoundly empathetic and that the hated conservatives and Trump supporters have no empathy and only deserving of contempt. I expect Spielberg got the idea of "Disclosure Day" out of his contempt for Trump and those who voted for him.
It is gratifying that the theatre Dreher attended was only half full. Hollywood has been moving hard left since the 60s but that movement has accelerated since the 90s. Hollywood is a sinkhole of depravity. I celebrate every film bomb. Modern Hollywood offers products that tens of millions of Americans don't want and are often attacks on conservative American values. To be fair to Hollywood, as the country ages, older Americans tend to find it easier to stay home and watch films on television rather than drive to some mall or movie-house and watch a film in an uncomfortable arena with young nitwits hooting throughout the film.
I don't know that Spielberg "despises Christianity in private." I'd say he's a standard-grade Hollywood liberal Boomer who, if he thinks about Christianity at all, it's to think of it as repressive and authoritarian.
A person who considers Christianity to be "repressive and authoritarian" probably dislikes Christianity. I believe most secular Americans have no use for Christianity and leftist Americans dislike Christianity and Christians in general. They get a good chuckle out of "art" like Piss Christ, the Crucifix in a jar of urine.
That scene of Henry Senior slapping Indy in the face for taking the Lord's name in vain was amazing.
There are a couple of wonderful pro-Christian and pro-Catholic scenes in Amistad as well. The scene of the Africans going through an illustrated Bible, as well as a scene of the Catholic judge praying intensely in a chapel before destroying his career by ordering the Africans to be freed.
Most Christians support Donald Trump? Maybe Spielberg believes that -- I don't know him well enough to say. But surely you aren't passing if off as The Truth?
I have no problem with that, as long as you voted in the same spirit that I voted for Kamala Harris -- a calculation as to whose mess would be easier to clean up from. But that's off point. You referenced "the fact that most Christians... voted for Donald Trump." You didn't just say Spielberg sees it that way, you said it was a fact. It is no more supportable that "most" Christians voted for Trump than it is that "most" Americans voted for Donald Trump. (Its equally unsupportable that "most" Americans voted for Joe Biden in 2020 -- about half did.)
That's a bit like saying a wrecking ball is doing something about termites. Dairy farmers in Wisconsin, and small businesses in Door County are not pleased. Nobody gets almost half the vote without tapping into some real and legitimate grievances. You and I could sit down and work out a much better "something" than has ever hyphenated the space between Donald Trump's ears.
Maybe some data would be useful here. According to this exit poll in 2024 (https://edition.cnn.com/election/2024/exit-polls/national-results/general/president/0), 63% of Protestants and 59% of Catholics voted for President Trump. I think that PROBABLY is enough to justify the label "most", given that there are more Protestants than Catholics in the US - certainly well over 60% overall.
If we limit ourselves to white Christians (as I suspect Spielberg would in his head- liberals have a remarkable capacity to ignore the existence of non-white Christians!), then it's 72% of Protestants and 63% of Catholics.
There are still a sort of Catholic, I guess many of them Catholics, who attend services on Easter and Christmas and no other times. I can see the Cuomos as being Easter-Christmas Catholics.
No, it doesn't justify the label "most." It means about 40 percent of Christians did NOT vote for Donald Trump. "Most" does not require 100 percent, that would be "all," but it suggests something so overwhelming that it is virtually characteristic of being a Christian. More like 90 percent. This is a problem I have with many characterizations. It remains true that "most" Americans who identify or are identified as "black" (or Afro-American or colored or Negro or whatever the term du jour is) vote Democratic. But in 1956, about 39 percent voted for Eisenhower, which may have tipped the electoral votes of Louisiana and Kentucky ("colored" voters were not so rare everywhere as they were in Mississippi). When pollsters talk about which way "the Catholic vote" went or "the Baptist vote" or "the Polish vote," they are not talking about anywhere near all, but a substantial majority. At the peak of union power and influence, no more than two thirds of union members voted the way their union leadership recommended -- which means a full one third voted differently.
Hollywood isn't hard left, said the self-described hard-leftist. Its more squishy social fascist dilatente faux left. Its nothing like producing the Grapes of Wrath. (Come to think of it, that movie was produced by a hard core conservative, but his wife liked the book.)
My extremely conservative grandmother's favorite movie. But it must be said that it wouldn't have been if John Ford had made the movie closer to the book!
I was disappointed that John Ford's "Cheyenne Autumn" was nowhere close to the book. The Secretary of the Interior rides to the rescue etc. Not what happened, although it is true some of the Northern Cheyenne survived. I was really happy, late in life, to discover his "Sergeant Rutledge."
I just watched "Sgt. Rutledge" two months ago. A fine film. Woody Strode was very proud of it. Strode used to sleep on the floor in Ford's bedroom when Ford was nearing the end. That's how strong their friendship was.
The bit about the cardinal as symbolizing Pentecost — I had a similar feeling about Pluribus on Apple TV. It seemed like a perversion of the Christian view of the church as a mystical body, crucifying the self and sharing one Spirit, in that the hero fights for the affirmation of the individual flesh in opposition to the communal oneness with the Spirit. In both, aliens stand in for the Divine.
Except that the aliens are pure evil who bring peace in the guise of good. To the extent it was a message -- and I have no idea what the creators were thinking -- I found it a brutal satire of political utopians.
I don't think they were saying that the Christian view of the Church as mystical body was wrong--I don't think they care about Christian views at all, frankly--I think they were saying the aliens SEEMED to offer that, but instead just obliterated the people whose bodies they inhabited.
An Even Better Disclosure:
You needn't worry about spoiler alerts for this old man, Rod. I wouldn't watch a new Spielberg film if you paid me to.
I think of the David Byrne lyrics:
*I wouldn't live there if you paid me to / I wouldn't do the things the way those people do / I wouldn't live there if you paid me to*
So:
*I wouldn't watch it if you paid me to / I wouldn't give a dime to those bloated f***s / I wouldn't watch it for a hundred bucks*
It's a Hollywood movie, yes? Nuff said.
People are arguing online about the upcoming *Odyssey* and its DEI aspects. I love Homer's Odyssey. OF COURSE I'm not going to watch this film.
“Christopher who?”
I'm put off that people I respect are even arguing about it. That they think it's big enough to argue about. They'll go watch it, then deliver a lengthy critique.
Be better. DON'T WATCH IT.
I hold these truths to be self-evident.
But here's to your butterfly wing. I hope you make a breakthrough with your mother and I'm very glad to hear there are some cracks in the walls she's put up.
I'm put off that people I respect are even arguing about it. That they think it's big enough to argue about. They'll go watch it and then deliver a lengthy critique.
Be better. DON'T WATCH IT.
This is a mistake. It's not a good movie, but the WAY it is bad is extremely significant, for reasons that have nothing to do with this particular movie. It delivers a potent anti-Christian message, one that the masses have been primed to hear. Just because many people will not subject themselves to this particular film doesn't mean that millions of others won't. And you should expect this same Narrative to appear in many other forms. I'm telling you, Attention Must Be Paid, for the same reason a Sovietologist back in the day needed to read Pravda and Izvestia: to know what the official Narrative was.
Rod, if you paid for your ticket, you just paid people whose business model is to deliver “potent anti-Christian messages.”
They don’t care about your critique. They already got what they need from you. Ticket sales. Just sayin’.
In my view, we need to be ready for this by being able to see it as so utterly alien that we wouldn’t think to enter the shitty, pop-stained Temple in which it’s being played.
Nobody paid for Izvestia. ;) Hollywood Pravda lives on *ticket sales*.
Our wallets aren’t big, but we should vote with them whenever we can. No?
For those who like that sort of thing,that is the sort of thing they like . I keep coming back to my line in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie because it’s useful ( It’s not my favorite Spark novel. I like both The Comforters and Loitering with Intent more).
Look if you have a worldview like Stephen Spielberg- childish, sentimental, melioristic, cartoonish, moralistic in a shallow liberal way- this sort of thing may be appealing. People who think aliens are going to show up and straighten everything out are living in a fantasy world from which I doubt they can be delivered from.
Now I know people can be stupid and gullible ( takes one to know one). Let’s assume aliens are really demons. I can see certain people wanting to cozy up to them to rule the world or become Dr. Faustus. Demon manifestations are not good! I’m not entirely clear as to why the masses would start worshipping them as gods.
Ok so the aliens are really extra terrestrials with a more advanced technologies . Knowledge of them will cause the masses to reject Christianity and become, I’m not sure for what? Look the masses are already rejecting Christianity for any number of things ranging from fast food, pornography, politics , you name it. What’s Klatu got to do with it? (Apologies Tina Turner)?.
As far as Spielberg himself is concerned, "People who think aliens are going to show up and straighten everything out are living in a fantasy world from which I doubt they can be delivered from" need to be amended. They WANT TO BE SEEN as living in a fantasy world.
Interplanetary, extraordinary.
I've never seen any demons or UFOs or UAPs or things that go bump in the night but maybe that's because I don't look for them and I ain't interested in them so they ain't interested in me. And if they ever do become interested in me, I'll just give 'em the raspberry.
I once bought a book on<a href="https://readingfreely.com/2023/05/18/log-cabin-pioneers/"> log cabins</a> purely because it had a blurb from Abraham Lincoln saying "“For those of you who like this kind of a book, this is the kind of book you will like.”
Eric, it's my job, as a cultural critic, to see this stuff and write about it. I know Hollywood is not my audience. My audience is people who will see the film, or who will have friends and family who see the film, and who are not prepared, intellectually or otherwise, to understand the propaganda and messaging here.
Box office estimates showed that about 2.8 million people saw "Disclosure Day" this past weekend. That's roughly 10 percent of the number of people in the US who went to church this past Sunday. I'd be willing to bet that Spielberg's "sermon" was a lot more theologically potent than what most got from the pulpit. But it's a lie.
We had a fifteen-minute sermon on the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Pretty well spoken.
Well, ours was given by an African nun telling us about her mission and why we should help out financially, which I did, without understanding anything she said. My hearing's not what it was and I really don't do heavy accents well.
You're right about this. Ignoring things doesn't make them go away, and whatever profit they got from you would even out if even one person DOESN'T see the movie based on your comments.
It's really hard to say why something is incorrect if you don't see it.
I'd be willing to bet that Spielberg's "sermon" was a lot more theologically potent than what most got from the pulpit. But it's a lie.- Really- look sermons are boring and banal. That’s true. However, Spielbergs pablum is potent? Only in the sense that this type of banal pablum fits in with the zeitgeist and is the kind of message that the dominant cultural elite likes. It may be true as Mencken stated that no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the masses but I have my doubts that this very silly sounding movie will have any great impact. I don’t think movies are all that important anymore. You’ve heard of the notion that what you attend to helps determine what you see . It’s distinctly possible you attend too much to the product/ agit prop of Hollywood and it affects your vision more than is desirable. Likewise you assume others do . The scope of all this is probably a lot more limited than you think. The world may be about to end . I don’t think it’s going to end because of this movie.
Yes, I get it, Rod. Such lies, built up from teamwork and huge reserves of funding, and now with special-effects tech that can do anything, will always be powerful "sermons." And will get more powerful.
But I will choose to ding their funding.
Anyhow, seems your writing has already led a few to opt not to see it. Thus my mea culpa below. ;)
Rod, You have good intent, but your auidence just hates Hollywood because Hollywood hates your audience.
It's a Spanish Civil War thing,
You can watch "Disclosure Day" the way we probably will.
When it arrives on DVD at our library, paid for by our tax dollars.
I don't have to send my $$ to Hollywood to watch a movie when the library has it available.
I’ve already said I wouldn’t watch it if you paid me to. Why would I take it out of a library?
Thing is, it really is possible to be completely uninterested in Hollywood’s crappy mythmaking. I know it is, firsthand.
We seem trapped in a kind of mass society mass man thing here where the ephemeral products of a capitalist marketing machine ( marketed by people who pretend to be above it all) are supremely important and must be attended to. Why?
Spielberg has been dishing out this sort of nonsense for decades. Consider Close Encounters. Consider ET . ( I remember with fondness - many years ago- a writer in The Spectator commenting on American sentimentality saying a British schoolboy would have crushed ET with a rock).
Here’s to schoolboys. When they were still boys.
“E.T. phone home.”
“Yeah, mate, how about E.T. GET home before we make you cry for your fish-faced green Mum? Go on, then, get crackin’. Outta my closet now!”
I think I have a plot for a rollickin’ 2026 British remake of the film, no?
“E.T.—Banned in a cinema near you.”
Even "Saving Private Ryan" had its silly moments. George Marshall spending even one second on June 6, 1944 starting a search for Private Ryan was preposterous. And Tom Hanks' ridiculous death scene. Or even sending a platoon to search for Private Ryan. Spielberg's sense of reality doesn't stretch passed Culver City.
I wouldn’t have it in for Spielberg but for my hostility to hype. I can’t stand the way he’s been hyped to be some great film maker. He’s ok but nothing spectacular. Visually adequate, intellectually weak and rather immature.Look I can be entertained by schlock but I won’t pretend it’s great art. Even someone like William Friedkin struck me as far more interesting than Spielberg. And being honest, I’d probably enjoy a Hammer Dracula film with Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing and preferably Veronica Carlson, Caroline Munro or Stephanie Beacham than another vitally important film by Spielberg.
"1941" was terrible. Because I had young children at the time it came out, I saw the first "Jurassic Park" about seven times. What I got out of that movie was 1) how did they fit Laura Dern into the jeans she was wearing and 2) how is Samuel Jackson considered any sort of able actor. I saw "ET" and "First Encounters" and have little memory of them. "Jaws" was a lot of fun. That's about all the Spielberg I've watched.
The Hammer Films were great! Christopher Lee served at Mass as an altar boy at the anglo-catholic church T.S. Eliot frequented.
What got me chafing in Private Ryan were two things. These guys were Rangers, not ordinary GIs, and their experience was nothing like a seasick kid stretched out on the sand on Omaha Beach. And he was just cool with shooting prisoners. Because they were German.
I don't know about you but I find Tom Hanks disgusting to watch. I wish he would have died and not the dog in "Turner and Hootch."
I agree with all of this.
I mentioned the film to my young adult sons last week. They had zero interest is saying it and asked, "Is that the psyop film?". The other dismissed it as "Boomer notalgia slop".
The half empty theater on opening weekend is a really strong sign that it didn't connect. Young people don't want to watch another Spielberg movie where aliens are nice.
I think the association of the film with boomers is in any form is enough to kill its appeal.
I desperately cling to old charts that show the baby boom ending in 1960 vs. 1961-64 as most do. My husband and I were born at the tail end of 1961.
As someone who was born a bit earlier than you, I think the Baby Boomer ends in 1954, the last year in which you could have born with immediate expectation of being drafted (though the draft would have ended a year before you would have been eligible). I think the "Generation Jones" idea is much more appropriate.
I registered for the draft in 1970. I still carry the card in my wallet.
There is a lot of validity to splitting Boomers into two. Second half, aka Gen Jones, had different experiences than the first half.
Good for them.
I doubt the movie will be that important or remembered in years to come. There is so much out now and new things come out all the time. It's not like it was decades ago where certain albums and movies can be remembered for generations. I don't see that happening as much now just due to how much content there is out there.
Are you sure its message reaches across generations though? Your description makes it sound like the fever dream hallucinations of a Boomer in the latter stages of delirium, with the typical Boomer valences (the 1990s positive optimism, reification of Knowledge and Goodness, Utopian delusions about converting humanity to The Truth as soon as the Smart People (or their standins - AI, Aliens) figure out The Message and take it to the benighted masses).
Is any of this even comprehensible to Zoomers? Or is it as far distant to them as the Silent Generation black and white movies are to you and me?
Poor Boomers! Technically I am one but although I readily identify with my age ,I don’t identify with a generation and believe generational identification is shallow, glib and an unappealing form of collectivist group identity. Run away from it if you can.
For what it’s worth, I am not a utopian , I don’t reify knowledge or goodness and I certainly don’t believe in converting humanity to Truth. Also I think Spielberg is a silly git!
Well, to be fair, you're right - a lot of Boomers here probably feel alienated by the Boomer stereotypes, just like I feel alienated (and alien to) the Millenial stereotypes.
Still, there's some kind of style of media common to 1990s - sappy, winsome "normie" and very positivity and optimism focused. In many ways, the opposite of the type of chaotic, edgy energy Trump represents. Jeffrey Seinfeld is another flagbearer of these "1990s vibes".
For what it’s worth I think I watched Seinfeld twice. Not my thing.
Let’s see, David Lynch and John Waters are around the same age and Blue Velvet and Pink Flamingos aren’t exactly pictures of All American optimism. Not trying to be difficult but beware of narrow stereotypes. Stereotypes usually have some truth to them. However I suspect generational stereotypes particularly in the last hundred years, have minimal use as analytical tools.
I think my first experience with the word 'git' was from Aqualung but I prefer the following;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtyO4tmpPdk
The Beatles- I’m so tired - sir Walter Raleigh/ half way decent poet-
I'm so tired, I'm feeling so upset
Although I'm so tired I'll have another cigarette
And curse Sir Walter Raleigh
He was such a stupid git
Monty Python, in my case.
Rod: In your case, writing an influential blog with brilliant film criticism, it's worth paying to see it.
However, I don't think you should be advertising for your readers to pay to see it. That's just filling the coffers of the Satanists. The money would be better spent on, say, a bottle of wine.
Disclosure Day is an excellent film worth watching.
Tell me more. Why did you conclude this?
I’m definitely not concerned about being in the minority here in terms of folks dissing Spielberg and the film. And I’m not a spiritual novice when it comes to seeking, reading, and practicing. I’m intensely intrigued about 21st Century Christianity and alien disclosure. I also went into Disclosure Day after listening to Pageau’s commentary. I understand where the critiques are coming from and yet I very much enjoyed the film as an immersive entertainment experience. Unlike other negative commentators I don’t look to Spielberg to deliver high-end art nor go I let him influence my views of humanity and the cosmos. I applaud you going to see the film and providing what I think is a clean and honest assessment. It’s why your Substack is only one of the two I subscribe to. Keep up your great work. Hoping your next book tour includes Colorado and Boulder Bookstore. Thanks!
I agree with you Darrell. I loved the movie. Absolutely gripping. It didn't shake my faith in Jesus. I don't see the movie as part of a wider plot to supplant Christianity. The aliens are worth listening to only to the extent that they do not contradict the revealed God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Jesus.
I hear you, but I'm telling you, this movie is important as an example of the Narrative that has been pushed on us, and will only ramp up with more disclosure. I don't blame you for not wanting to pay money to see a mediocre movie. But it is VITAL data for how the whole disclosure narrative will be framed and promoted. Christians (and others) need to be ready.
You’re doing research, in other words. If so, why not wait until you can pirate it or watch it for free somewhere? Is it that pressing?
For me it’s not a matter of putting out money for a mediocre movie, but of holding up an American movie industry that needs to die.
I want to help it along in any small way I can.
I actually think that Rod's review of the movie is enough for me to be able to discuss the movie and its anti Christian narrative and other such things with people. It saved me a ticket. I am sure there are other reviews I could read that would do the same.
Jonathan Pageau covers this in a 20 minute YouTube podcast. Highly recommended.
Well then, that’s good. Rod’s saving one viewer at a time. He takes on the ticket sales of all of us.
“But yet more blessed are those who didn’t need a Dreher review to keep them from entering a theater.”
I think I was safe from buying a ticket anyway. It has been near 5 years since I went to the movies. Possibly more.
Last time I bought a ticket was for the Blade Runner remake. Had to. Other than that, it’s been a dozen years without a dime for them.
I haven't been to a theatre since "Master and Commander." I had to go because I liked the novels so much.
I went to see 'Hail Mary', twice. I see a movie in a theater about every 3 years.
The arguement to not fund hollywood (sic) is pretty persuasive to me.
Top Gun 2 was my last one. I thought it was fun, and Tom Cruise for all his weirdness, had a talking head either before or after the movie (I forget which) thanking everyone for watching. To me that's what movies should be, the creator of the movie proud of their product, it wasn't pushy on political views or anything, it was fun, and there was even bits of fan service.
A much nicer film that you will enjoy even though it also is set in “space” is Project Hail Mary. No attempt to indoctrinate there. There is the requisite “adorable” alien creature with its own ways, but the film posits two different world and an exchange of scientific info but no savior ideology.
We are practicing Christians attending two sound and Bible teaching churches, thanks be to God. Acquainted with the idea of principalities and powers and the “ruler of this world” who tried to tempt Jesus himself. So I will take a pass on “Disclosure Day”. However, those of us with some prudence should try to help our family, friends and neighbors and most of all use this as an opportunity to share the Gospel.
I forget the last time I was in a movie theater.
I view Rod as our agent who is venturing into enemy territory to gather intelligence.
Okay, @Rod Dreher, I take it all back. March boldly into those pixellated dens of anomie! It turns out every ticket you buy saves a dozen other sinners from the ticket booth!
(Really, this is more fun than the movies.)
He's a journalist, Eric. He has to.
Like various other movies, this one will be available on DVD from public libraries if you can wait. The missus and I probably will wait, as we have often waited for other recent movies.
A hundred bucks? I'm in.
A man of parts.
Telling Rod to not watch something he's interested in is like telling a fish to stop swimming
Knute: Waves stop!
Rod, whatever you do, don't watch the documentary about exorcists investigating demonic possession in the Baton Rogue sasquatch population! Don't you do it now!
Rod, what will stay with me was not only the UFOs but the butterfly wing. Human beings can endure a lot of suffering, but we struggle to endure meaninglessness. We all carry around a desire for reconciliation, healing, and wholeness. The danger is not that people will suddenly start worshiping aliens. The danger is that when we are hurting badly enough, we become willing to accept substitutes.
Your essay reminded me of the Soviet movie Solaris, where the mystery isn’t really the alien intelligence but whether a man can still tell the difference between what is true and what he desperately wants to be true.
What struck me most was your line about the missing wing. We all want that other wing. We want the broken thing fixed, the relationship healed, the burden lifted. That longing is real. But it can also make us vulnerable.
Yesterday’s Gospel had Our Lord speaking of asking the Father in His name. At Mass, kneeling there, it occurred to me that every age is tempted by some version of salvation without sacrifice, wisdom without obedience, and truth without God. The old temptation never really changes.
The Christian answer isn’t fear of mystery. It’s discernment. Not every light is heaven’s light, and not every messenger comes from God. Sometimes the hardest thing is remembering to kneel before reaching for the fruit.
Re: wisdom without obedience,
Wisdom without enlightenment would be a better way to put it. The wise do not desire slaves.
My take on the woman kneeling before Margaret and crossing herself is that Margaret is a new deity which explains why she says she is not anyone's religion. She is John the Baptist.
The good news is that the theater last night was almost entirely empty.
Oh, right! That makes more sense.
Delightful news about the empty theatre.
Mr. Ruse, your girl Carrie Prejean is going to be VERY disappointed in you for seeing a movie made by a Jew. Wait, I know: maybe DISCLOSURE DAY is just another Zionist conspiracy!
Look, Vince,..i am not going to date you...
Yikes, that's your best attempt at wit?
Look, I get it. Trying to defend Carrie Prejean when she keeps saying and tweeting more delusional nonsense undoubtedly causes brain-rot.
Give it up, dude...you are not my type..
But has Rod watched "Predator" yet? That he hadn't seen it captured last week's thread.
Rod, as a follow-up to your article and my earlier comment, I wonder if one of the great disciplines modern people need to recover is silence.
We somehow find time for the gym, a yoga class, social media, podcasts, television, and a hundred other demands on our attention, yet many of us spend almost no time in genuine silence. Cardinal Robert Sarah wrote an entire book, The Power of Silence, warning about what he called the “dictatorship of noise.” The phrase has stayed with me.
Perhaps that is one reason modern people are so vulnerable to every new revelation, ideology, or promise of salvation. We have lost some of the habits of contemplation that previous generations took for granted. It is difficult to hear the still, small voice when every other voice is shouting.
The longing for meaning is real. The longing for wholeness is real. But sometimes the first step toward wisdom is not discovering something new. It is finding enough silence to recognize what was already true.
Christ still speaks from the Cross. The problem is not that He has become silent. The problem is that we have become surrounded by so much noise that we rarely stop long enough to listen.
Exactly. I love sitting quietly in my living room, enjoying peace and quiet. I have relatives who think I should join a yoga class if I enjoy silence. I can’t figure out why I need to pay an instructor and a gym for something I can do for free at home. Also, no “instruction” is truly silent.
It seems people want some kind of validation that they think can be had if they engage in some approved activity, like enrolling in a yoga class. Nothing seems to be done for no reason at all. Everything lies under the tyranny of Purpose. It used to be that you climbed mountains because they’re there. Now, the climb is merely the scaffold on which are laid book and movie contracts, the genesis of a climbing equipment business, etc. The thing itself is lost in a storm of Justification.
I have 4 kids ten and below. I miss silence I really do. I don't have a smart phone and often on the weekend I don't even look at a phone much less have it on me regularly but I can't get silence ever. Most I get is about 10-15 minutes when I read and pray the Daily Office.
In principle I agree. But I find it hard to stop and be silent, when I am in the later portion of my life and have so much still to do. When you are young you seek to absorb from all around you, but when old, there is an urgency to impart what one has made of a long life so it isn't lost to the world.
This is disturbing to hear and reminds me of the high praise for "The Golden Compass" years ago. Upon reading it I was taken aback when the protagonist's father murdered a little boy early on, justified by the pursuit of knowledge. The reason I kept reading was, since Pullman had proclaimed moral disgust with Narnia, to see how this child sacrifice would be faced. My shock deepened upon completion because not only was the murder never meaningfully addressed, but the murderer continued to be fleshed out and portrayed as a self-sacrificing hero despite never showing any sign of repentance. It seemed stunning, terrifying, that this book was hailed by critics as the longed-for replacement of Lewis's Christian morality fairy tales. Others have also noted the accepted child murder, but that so many did not, even if they disliked the book, has continued to trouble me.
That Spielberg has leaned in on child abduction trauma, one-eye symbolism, and even portraying the cannibal witch's house as "re-enchantment" is as surprising. I thought great artists, even if I disagreed with them, were beyond that sort of Grammy-performance bait. And on a topic as pivotal as how the human race is trying to understand itself in the wake of an all-consuming technological revolution? It's confusing, is there truly no "there there," no dissent, no creativity among the narrative-shaping class?
At the time of the release of the movie Pullman gave mass-market press interviews saying the books were never intended to be anti-Christian. Peter Hitchens had the receipts and shut him up.
Peter Hitchens strikes again! God bless that man!
Yeah, I’m not even a Christian or especially knowledgeable about theology, and that much was glaringly obvious to me upon finishing the books.
I got a little excited by a movie preview of The Golden Compass. Your review reassured me that its just as well I didn't devote any time to either the movie or the book.
Movie and book are okay but not amazing. There are new books out that are sequels to the early ones and I've debated reading them. But I haven't gotten around to them.
Pullman, that profile in courage: obviously the suits at New Line got to him and told him to put the atheism on the downlow. The problem was he hadn't been shy about his loathing of the religion of his ancestors.
I read all three books and saw the movie and the first season of the newer show. The movie was okay but didn't adapt all of the first book. I remember hearing the series described as "Atheist Narnia" and there is some truth to that.
Pullman is one of the most virulent Christianity-haters put there. It's very disturbing that so many people, especially young people, have fallen under his influence.
Not familiar with Pullman. Young people on the north side of Milwaukee are definitely not under his influence.
Pullman hit the kid-lit bigtime in the early 2000s, riding in the generous wake of Harry Potter. People who had loved Potter (or were looking for the "next Potter") gravitated to Pullman since he was targeting the same audience, and also playing in the Fantasy literary space (he was one of several to do so successfully). I don't know as he has had the same staying power as Potter - his books mostly hit home for their anti-Narnia sentiments, pulling him along also in the wake of the New Atheists. Like them, however, what he had to say, and the way he said it, was like devouring a pack of Oreos - tasty and cloying upfront, but leaving a kind of icky sour aftertaste.
Now, more than 20 years on, Pullman is still a crank whose success is limited, and his books still only seem to have a strong resonance with those who are anti-Christianity - they lack the broad appeal that Potter still has.
Oh. I appreciate Narnia.
The good news is that while the mainstream critics tend to give the flick and its message a thumbs-up, the reviews online have been mostly tepid to terminal. Gen Z criticism in particular has been a collective eye-roll. Not that that makes them any less gullible than their elders in the long run, just that this particular vehicle isn't going to have much more impact than, say, the lamentable Indiana Jones and the crystal skull film had on, well, anybody.
I hope you're right. But when the same basic Narrative gets repurposed in a film or TV show made by someone with more skill and less sentimentality, it will be a lot more potent.
Agreed.
Well, Kyle Smith in the Wall Street Journal gave it a horrible review. (I was planning to see it until I read Smith's review - then I decided to give it a miss.) I think the WSJ should count as mainstream, and Smith is one of the best newspaper movie critics out there, in my opinion.
It would be fair to say that the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times are America's two newspapers of national record. The Washington Post no longer is.
But the Journal is behind a paywall, so how many people will have a chance to read his review?
I refuse to give the Wall Street Journal one cent. It is almost as evil as the New York Times and the Washington Post.
What you must understand is that movie critics are afraid of Spielberg.
Really? I was a professional film critic for a decade, the final year and a half of it in NYC. I never once saw any hint that film critics were afraid of Spielberg.
That was then. Look, I don't have any information, this is based on what textual critics call internal evidence. The reviews are so fawning, so gushy, that what I smelt was fear. It's like the unbelievable run-up to Prada II. It's obvious they're all scared of la Streep. I am too.
Thirty years ago it was possible to imagine a career as a movie critic. Not any more. If these guys have a gig, by God they mean to keep it, because outside of the Times and the Journal, and I suppose the NY Post and Daily News, there aren't any more jobs linked to a daily organ. Smith in the Journal is an exception, but the Journal cultural pages are exceptional as well, e.g., Meghan Cox Gurdon.
On the the other hand Peggy Noonan went into full soppy mode Friday with an ode to Rocky. And on the same day Will revealed he fell for Death of a Salesman, that fearful tripe. It's like Flaubert. "If only they had read my Sentimental Education we would never have gone to war with Prussia." He said that.
Noonan is so Irish maudlin as to be unreadable most days. She's been mostly downhill since Pointe du Hoc, but like a .200 batter, occasionally hits a double.
She exceeded my treacly sap quotient many years ago.
Movie critics are almost uniformly part of the cultural left. Not worthy of trust.
Also, they watch movies for a living, day in and day out, so they're jaded. That's why they so often love films that are bizarre and avant-garde. It's not just that they're leftists, it's that they're BORED, so as time goes on, they can only be stimulated by things that are ever more shocking and off-putting to normal people.
Movie critics like crap like "My Dinner with Andre" when most normal people think it's a load of manure. Blah, blah, blah.
From memory, I believe Chesterton defined coincidences as “spiritual puns.” Perhaps that thought is rooted in St. Paul’s letter to the Romans, “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”
Gnosticism, totalitarianism, moral therapeutic deism? Time for you to read Eric Voegelin. A very difficult fellow to understand, but very much worth it. His concepts include symbolic forms, the history of consciousness, gnosticism’s “immanentizing the eschaton” (yes, that’s Voegelin). He was a refugee from the Nazis, escaping one step ahead of the Gestapo on his heels (like Dietrich Von Hildebrand and Gerhart Niemeyer). He wrote on that period in his dissection of the appeal Hitler had for the Germans (“Hitler and the Germans”).
And, to really blow you mind in a Jungian sort of synchronicity - Voegelin’s academic home in America was LSU!
https://voegelinview.com/eric-voegelin-primer/
I adore Spielberg but found this film to be extremely weak. I didn't feel a deep connection to the characters, and the characters themselves felt generic and without a clear "why" for their actions.
I also think the best scenes were spoiled by the commercials. Almost every time something fun or unexpected happened on screen, I was disappointed to realize I'd see it a hundred times before on YouTube promos.
That all being said, I did love the scene where the nun quoted Scripture to drive home the point that the Bible only states we're his most beloved creation ON EARTH. That was a fun moment, and I wish there had been more like it!
It seems like Josh O'Connor's talents were wasted here (no fault of his, of course). He was very good as a priest in spiritual crisis in the latest Knives Out installment.
Yes, I agree that he didn't have too much to work with in the story. He was, of course, wonderful in the Crown!
Still haven't seen that latest installment but have heard nothing but good things!
Why Kansas City? Kansas. Because the movie is riffing on “The Wizard of Oz.” All about trying to go home. The “home” in “Disclosure Day” is fabricated in a hangar. Like on a movie set. Wink-wink. One of the few clever things in an otherwise clunker of a film. To quote Rod: “shallow Boomer sentimentalism.”
Many people do not understand, the Kansas City everyone knows (Chiefs, Jazz, BBQ, etc.) is in Missouri and only bleeds incidentally into Kansas City, Kansas. But the Oz imagery is at least as likely as the Disney.
Thank you. I was about to say the same.
Poor boomers! To blame for all that is wrong. Partially, kidding. Still shallow sentimentality is not confined to Boomers- unfortunately!
What did you think of the film as a movie? My understanding is that it's too long, mostly boring, the characters are stupid (You're determined to broadcast your super- secret alien information on a local TV station when the Joe Rogan podcast is a thing?), and the whole thing just reeks of Boomer sentimentality for the "I'd like to buy the world a Coke" nonsense that they thought they were going to create and failed spectacularly.
Just that seems to make a mockery of the film. It’s 2026 and it takes all this perilous effort to break a story that could be done on forchan or YouTube in 30 seconds? Why was the mainstream media, irrelevant for years, so necessary to disclosure? Pageau points this out as invalidating the whole plot. It is a Boomer wish fulfillment that the mainstream media have an important role.
That's one of the reasons why I believe there's something (don't know what) to the UAP thing. QAnon was obviously for pimple-popping mom's basement boys devastated by the death of Rush but knock me over with a feather it turns out there was child rape for politicians and it turns out that "pizza" is code for horrors. Somehow the word abut Epstein (a private rape island beats anything QAnon came up with) got metagrobalized into fantasy, but it was closer to the truth than simple denial.
The depths of depravity have not quite lost their ability to shock, but in the past ten years we have gotten very close. Is this what God saw in the days of Noah?
The thing about CP and cheese pizza, the code word, comes from 4chan and maybe other parts of the internet. I imagine that at least some of the people who bought the QAnon thing came from 4chan or other sites.
See my answer above. It makes sense in light of the particulars of the DD plot.
Jonathan Pageau would disagree with you on this. I haven’t seen the film but he is a reliable narrator. Also, no one watches the news so how would it really be better? The age of the audience for mainstream media seems to hover in the 70’s.
People DO tune into cable news in times of global crisis. I never watch it, and haven't had cable for years, but when there's a huge crisis (war, etc), I find a way to watch. Besides, in the movie, the broadcast from Kansas City is carried live on networks around the globe. Are you sure that news channel watching habits outside the US are the same as in America? Anyway, this is not really an important point to the story's message, in my view.
Yes I no longer have cable either. I follow elections results and weather emergencies online. I followed Covid news mostly online too-- and that was the premier global emergency of my lifetime.
Yes that alone discredits the entire story. Boomers gonna boom, I guess.
I didn't think it was bad *as a movie*, but it was only so-so. The local TV station, in the film, is a near-instant gateway to all broadcast networks in the world. All the world's networks start running that channel's feed within minutes of its start. It appears that (within the film) they chose the KC station because the Margaret character is an on-air personality there, and can easily get onto the air. (I think in terms of storytelling, this is Spielberg's nod to Disney as enchanter.)
The Joe Rogan option makes no sense in terms of the movie's action. The Wardex company, on behalf of the government, is trying to kill the protagonists to keep the information -- a huge trove of double-plus classified data -- from going public. Most of the movie is a life-or-death chase.
The Zoomer who saw the movie with his dad and me said on the way out, "Why not Wikileaks?" Fair question, but in the movie's story, the world is on the verge of World War III, and the alien message has to be broadcast simultaneously. The world's television channels break into their war programming to show the videos. And there's a cameo by an ancient alien. The movie ends with what one presumes will be a command to the global powers to Stop Fighting. A Wikileaks leak would not have had the immediacy this particular narrative demands.
Rod what did you make up when Jane was trying to stop Colin Firth she clutches her crucifix from her necklace and then gives in and lets it fall to the ground. I didn’t like that.
I got that she tried her best to resist, heroically, but was ultimately overwhelmed.
Sounds like the reason I never finished watching Oppenheimer. Tedious, boring, never seemed to either get to a point, nor reveal the life of a person.
But the gratuitous sex scene told us that Oppie at least had a pulse...
I hate gratuitous sex scenes. Like, 'Tin Cup' is such a great movie and then there's the 'trailers bouncing' scene. I mean, really.
Have not seen the movie, do not plan to, but have read the objection that in 2026, you would go on,the internet for a big reveal! Not if you have stolen important info from the powers that be and are running for your life! Hopefully my being g a boomer doesn't invalidate my opinuon!
I didn’t laugh out loud reading this . I did come close. The movie sounds laughably stupid. I may be in a minority of one but I’ve never thought Spielberg is a great artist. He’s a Hollywood schlockmeister- sentimental , shallow and politically correct.His best movie was Jaws .That at least succeeded in making a scary movie about a nasty fish. Why everyone needs to see this steaming mass of tripe is beyond me.
I do think calling this stuff Gnostic is very much on point. One of the illusions of the modern world is all problems come down to problems of knowledge and are rendered solvable by greater knowledge . So if aliens pop over and put implants in your eye , problems solved. Yep that’s exactly the kind of wisdom I’d expect from Spielberg.
"Aliens (“aliens”) descending from spaceships to proclaim new truths to us would be rather more persuasive to the masses today than the watery god of Moralistic Therapeutic Deism, wouldn’t you say?"
The gay, overeducated philistine boomer running the Archdiocese of Washington, Cardinal Bob McElroy, last week banished an exorcist for suggesting a connection between aliens and the demonic. This week he has banned altar rails from archdiocese parishes...
Thanks for the information. And he banned the altar rails. What a piece of work, Cardinal McElroy.
What is the reason that Roman Catholics now so often receive the Sacrament standing? I'm curious about the theological justification for that.
I believe it is a case of egalitarianism combined with anti-clericalism. The congregation is the equal of the priest. Communion in the hand is part of it. Communion handed out by the laity. Altar rails pulled out so the laity can stride the altar.
I once took an elderly Hispanic friend to mass at a rather large cathedral. There must have been about ten lay assistants handing out the wafers from baskets. I could easily have taken one, if I didn't know I wasn't acceptable by church standards, or if I didn't respect the standards anyway. I thought it was simply due to the large number of people to be served.
I went to a Catholic Church in Surf City NC circa 2000 where the wafer- I can't believe it was a Host- was self-serve out of a Bluebonnet margarine plastic container.
I frequently attend a Baptist church that streams its service online. Communion is not served every week, but when it is, the pastor invites the online participants to get a cracker or bread and some juice and join us. (He is very strict about reading Paul's admonitions about communion, but of course its not served in the spirit of Transubstantiation.)
When I used to go with my father to his Baptist church growing up, they used to hand out little plastic cups of grape juice and packets of crackers which we could consume ourselves and then deposit in the designated receptacles on the back side of the pew in front of us.
OK, thanks. That must be rough on the consciences and sensibilities of some Roman Catholic faithful
Those who have addressed your question seem correct, but more concerning why it became a thing and caught on, rather than concerning its origins. The latter came, I believe, from a penchant for "patristicizing" antiquarianism. Another instance of the same ting is "altars facing the people." The latter turns our to have been an historical error, and while the former was historically accurate it effectively destroyed the piety of masses of Catholics, together with "communion in the hand."
The moral? Don't set out to fix things that aren't broken, not to improve things that are just fine as is.
Just to be clear, is it altars facing the people is the historical error?
Yes
Cf.: https://ignatius.com/turning-towards-the-lord-2nd-edition-ttl2p/
As early as 1962 the English Anglican Cyril Pocknee insisted on this point in his The Christian Altar, but his words were drowned in the roaring of the waves of fashion.
https://scispace.com/papers/the-christian-altar-in-history-and-today-49v5uk7udp
https://www.ebay.com/itm/204164186067
Cmon man! Standing and receiving in the hand are ancient practices.
Yes, I'm sure that the Golden Corral buffet line that passes for communion in many places is very ancient, in the sense that it is preferred by many ageing boomers who were taught it during the Revolution
The altar rail was the LAST vestige of the separation between the altar/sanctuary and congregation that had been standard in churches since time immemorial (and still is in the East, with their iconostasis).
You want to go back to "ancient times"? Then let's restore the extremely rigorous fasting regimens and long and arduous penitential practices before being permitted to receive communion again that existed in the early Church. Then we'll talk about communion in the hand.
Note that in the East the priest comes all the way out into the nave to give communion
Yes because there is no question of them going in the sanctuary.
Discontinued over a millennium ago by all Christians save the Nestorians, and no reason for the "Latins" to restore them in the 1960s save for fasddishness and bad histotry.
Was Cyril of Alexandria a Nestorian?
No, the opposite (maybe).
Cyril was the great (and a bit unscrupulous) opponent of Nestorius and his Christological thinking. Two years after Nestorius's condemnation at the Council of Ephesus in 431 Cyril and his followers reached an agreement with some former followers of Nestorius, especially Patriarch John of Antioch, in the"Formula of Reunion." The formula used in this agreement anticipated the Chalcedonian definition of 451. It wasn't Cyril's preferred manner of speaking, but he accepted it as orthodox.
Cyril died in 444. His successor, Dioscoros, seems to have decided that the "Formula of Reunion," if it didn't actually betray Cyril's though, left "crypto-Nestoriasns" too much room to maneuver, and he bent all his efforts to get rid of it and to condemn its proponents (including Pope Leo) as Nestoriands. This he achieved at the so-called "robber council " of Ephesus in 449 amidst scenes of violence and tumult, excommunications Pope Leo in the process. Two years later, with a new emperor on the throne, a council was called at Chalcedon which, among other things formulated the Chalcedonian Definition and excommunicated and deposed Patriarch Dioscoros of Alezandria. A hundred years of controversy and attempted, but always failed, compromises ensued, and by 565 two separate, and long hostile, church communions had emerged, those whom we today term the "Chalcedonian Orthodox," and those whom we term the "Oriental Orthodox," or "Miaphysites." Cyril is a hero and saint alike to the Chalcedonian Orthodox and the Oriental Orthodox, and a villain to the "Assyrians" (as those who hold Nestorius to be one of their teachers prefer to term themselves and be termed by others). Rome and the Latin West were part of the "Chalcedonan Orthodox" Communion until whatever time one wishes to date "the
Schism" - not in 1954, for sure, on which, see
https://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=38-04-036-f&readcode=11254
No, that's not why. I'm sure there is a lot of egalitarianism and anti-clericalism in the Church today, but reforms in the 60s and 70s were based on trying to do what was done in the early Church, which was to receive communion standing. Kneeling is a tradition in the West that arose much later.
When the liturgy was revamped, some efforts were made to bring it more in line with the liturgy before the Orthodox split away. Kneeling during Holy Communion is a Western tradition. The Orthodox do kneel at parts of their Divine Liturgy, but they stand during Communion, and the liturgical reformers determined that to be the posture of the entire early Church. I haven't done the research to know if that's correct or not, but that's the reason I was taught.
Thank you, Gail, that's interesting. Kneeling to receive seems to be firmly settled in my Confessional Lutheran tradition, with pictures from the earliest years of the Lutheran reformation showing the faithful kneeling, in continuity with the medieval custom.
I'm Catholic and I think that, as people of the West, we should kneel. But that was the original idea.
"It is simply bizarre that Spielberg would reproduce the kind of intense trauma testified to by many “experiencers” as something beneficial — especially when it involves (in the film) kidnapping and violating the bodies of innocent children. Read the cultural room, Steve!"
The same Spielberg who was (and may still be) planning a film dramatization of the Edgardo Mortara case!
Tell me you're part of the Epstein class without telling me you're part of the Epstein class.
Spot on
I don't know Steven Spielberg nor have I watched many of his films. I gather he despises Christianity in private. Much of that hatred is probably due to the fact that most Christians are politically conservative, Republicans, and support Donald Trump. Rod Dreher mentions that a key to the aliens is that they have empathy that humans lack. Most lefties, at least those with half a brain, heartily believe that they are profoundly empathetic and that the hated conservatives and Trump supporters have no empathy and only deserving of contempt. I expect Spielberg got the idea of "Disclosure Day" out of his contempt for Trump and those who voted for him.
It is gratifying that the theatre Dreher attended was only half full. Hollywood has been moving hard left since the 60s but that movement has accelerated since the 90s. Hollywood is a sinkhole of depravity. I celebrate every film bomb. Modern Hollywood offers products that tens of millions of Americans don't want and are often attacks on conservative American values. To be fair to Hollywood, as the country ages, older Americans tend to find it easier to stay home and watch films on television rather than drive to some mall or movie-house and watch a film in an uncomfortable arena with young nitwits hooting throughout the film.
I don't know that Spielberg "despises Christianity in private." I'd say he's a standard-grade Hollywood liberal Boomer who, if he thinks about Christianity at all, it's to think of it as repressive and authoritarian.
A person who considers Christianity to be "repressive and authoritarian" probably dislikes Christianity. I believe most secular Americans have no use for Christianity and leftist Americans dislike Christianity and Christians in general. They get a good chuckle out of "art" like Piss Christ, the Crucifix in a jar of urine.
Which shows they are not serious, merely enjoying the thrills of pushing envelopes.
He’s not a believer, but I think he’s respectful of Christianity. Anybody see “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade?”
I imagine so. Likely due to Jesus being Jewish and the Jewish origins of Christianity.
Only God can know the heart. I don’t think you qualify.
That scene of Henry Senior slapping Indy in the face for taking the Lord's name in vain was amazing.
There are a couple of wonderful pro-Christian and pro-Catholic scenes in Amistad as well. The scene of the Africans going through an illustrated Bible, as well as a scene of the Catholic judge praying intensely in a chapel before destroying his career by ordering the Africans to be freed.
The name of the evil archeologist whose face melts in Raiders is Bellocq, but that's likely Kasdan.
Most Christians support Donald Trump? Maybe Spielberg believes that -- I don't know him well enough to say. But surely you aren't passing if off as The Truth?
I consider Trump to be a vulgar man who has no use for Christianity except as a political tool. But I voted for him anyway.
I have no problem with that, as long as you voted in the same spirit that I voted for Kamala Harris -- a calculation as to whose mess would be easier to clean up from. But that's off point. You referenced "the fact that most Christians... voted for Donald Trump." You didn't just say Spielberg sees it that way, you said it was a fact. It is no more supportable that "most" Christians voted for Trump than it is that "most" Americans voted for Donald Trump. (Its equally unsupportable that "most" Americans voted for Joe Biden in 2020 -- about half did.)
Trump is doing something about immigration and that's good enough for me.
That's a bit like saying a wrecking ball is doing something about termites. Dairy farmers in Wisconsin, and small businesses in Door County are not pleased. Nobody gets almost half the vote without tapping into some real and legitimate grievances. You and I could sit down and work out a much better "something" than has ever hyphenated the space between Donald Trump's ears.
Maybe some data would be useful here. According to this exit poll in 2024 (https://edition.cnn.com/election/2024/exit-polls/national-results/general/president/0), 63% of Protestants and 59% of Catholics voted for President Trump. I think that PROBABLY is enough to justify the label "most", given that there are more Protestants than Catholics in the US - certainly well over 60% overall.
If we limit ourselves to white Christians (as I suspect Spielberg would in his head- liberals have a remarkable capacity to ignore the existence of non-white Christians!), then it's 72% of Protestants and 63% of Catholics.
There are still a sort of Catholic, I guess many of them Catholics, who attend services on Easter and Christmas and no other times. I can see the Cuomos as being Easter-Christmas Catholics.
No, it doesn't justify the label "most." It means about 40 percent of Christians did NOT vote for Donald Trump. "Most" does not require 100 percent, that would be "all," but it suggests something so overwhelming that it is virtually characteristic of being a Christian. More like 90 percent. This is a problem I have with many characterizations. It remains true that "most" Americans who identify or are identified as "black" (or Afro-American or colored or Negro or whatever the term du jour is) vote Democratic. But in 1956, about 39 percent voted for Eisenhower, which may have tipped the electoral votes of Louisiana and Kentucky ("colored" voters were not so rare everywhere as they were in Mississippi). When pollsters talk about which way "the Catholic vote" went or "the Baptist vote" or "the Polish vote," they are not talking about anywhere near all, but a substantial majority. At the peak of union power and influence, no more than two thirds of union members voted the way their union leadership recommended -- which means a full one third voted differently.
Hollywood isn't hard left, said the self-described hard-leftist. Its more squishy social fascist dilatente faux left. Its nothing like producing the Grapes of Wrath. (Come to think of it, that movie was produced by a hard core conservative, but his wife liked the book.)
My extremely conservative grandmother's favorite movie. But it must be said that it wouldn't have been if John Ford had made the movie closer to the book!
I was disappointed that John Ford's "Cheyenne Autumn" was nowhere close to the book. The Secretary of the Interior rides to the rescue etc. Not what happened, although it is true some of the Northern Cheyenne survived. I was really happy, late in life, to discover his "Sergeant Rutledge."
I just watched "Sgt. Rutledge" two months ago. A fine film. Woody Strode was very proud of it. Strode used to sleep on the floor in Ford's bedroom when Ford was nearing the end. That's how strong their friendship was.
The bit about the cardinal as symbolizing Pentecost — I had a similar feeling about Pluribus on Apple TV. It seemed like a perversion of the Christian view of the church as a mystical body, crucifying the self and sharing one Spirit, in that the hero fights for the affirmation of the individual flesh in opposition to the communal oneness with the Spirit. In both, aliens stand in for the Divine.
Except that the aliens are pure evil who bring peace in the guise of good. To the extent it was a message -- and I have no idea what the creators were thinking -- I found it a brutal satire of political utopians.
I don't think they were saying that the Christian view of the Church as mystical body was wrong--I don't think they care about Christian views at all, frankly--I think they were saying the aliens SEEMED to offer that, but instead just obliterated the people whose bodies they inhabited.
Intentional or not, it produces a similar vibe as a text. That’s all I was saying.