Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Cannes Top Award [Jay]

The Cannes Film Festival has awarded the Palm d’Or to “4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days.” The film is described in this CNN article as “a harrowing portrait of an illegal abortion in communist-era Romania.”

I am including a link to a review of the movie, which encompasses all that I know about the content of this film. The entertainment industry loves abortion films. The strange thing is why they love it. I have seen the TV shows House and Everwood both take their shot at the issue, as well as movies like Cider House Rules and there always seems to be an element of heroism involved in being able to perform abortions. It is an ugly job, but someone has to be able to step up and perform this grim task. The language describing the choice of abortion for women seems so confusing to me. It is so hard to make this decision. Gut wrenching, soul searching, and painful. In the movie and entertainment industry getting an abortion seems like a matter of courage and even the ultimate source of conflict in this newest offering. Recently my wife and I were watching a certain blockbuster film (unrelated to abortion) and she leaned over and asked me, “Who am I supposed to be rooting for?” This question is magnified for me with this film in question. Do I go to this movie and root for the young girls to fulfill their quest for an abortion? Is it just the same old story? Abortions are terrible, but they have to be done and you have no right to interject yourself into this decision. In fact, see what happens when you make it hard for women to get abortions? Is this the message I am supposed to receive here? Is this the "harrowing" award winning and emotionally powerful point?

I will in all likelihood never see this film. Time is too precious to watch a film where the ultimate payoff is that “She finally got her abortion.” I am getting more and more curious about the fascination with the “heroic” elements of abortion, though. Why so much emotion from those who see this as the destruction of soulless valueless tissue? Would Jane Fonda ever award the Palm d’Or to a film about the heroic journey of a Romanian college student to have her tooth illegally extracted? If not, then why is this different for them? If they think that the unborn are human beings and so the decision is very hard, how can they possibly think that killing innocent human beings is heroic? Curious.

I would worry less if I thought that movies and entertainment were not incredibly more effective at conveying information, false or not, to people in our culture than reasoned argument. Look at the hysteria over Farenheit 9-11, The DaVinci Code, and An Inconvenient Truth. No amount of after the fact debunking of bad science and history ever fully stems the tide of the initial emotional responses. Pro-lifers need to be more keenly aware of how cleverly abortion is framed through these programs. The message is strong. It is hard, difficult, terrible, and a personal choice. I am certain our arguments are better than theirs. I am terribly afraid that their movies and TV shows are better than ours. I know they are more widely seen and awarded. It is hard to measure how much this effects the whole terrain of the debate, but it must not be dismissed as irrelevent.

3 comments:

  1. Here Here! We need more pro-life filmakers out there! I hope metanoia studios gets a good reception for their film "Bella" opening in August. Right now, it's really the only professional pro-life film out there.

    This void inspired my friend and I to create a pro-life film for her ethics class, but the professor claimed that he "ran out of time" and couldn't show it, even though he had enough time to show three pornographic films before ours. In any case, here is the link below if you are interested in viewing it.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqT2rKypkGM

    ReplyDelete
  2. I've heard about this web site liseaning Radio Maria. I'm a Rumanian. I'm a Catholic. I am a physician. I am against abortion like other friends of mine. Little is done about preventing abortions in my country. The NGO are busy with family planning and due to this it seems that the number of abortions reduced the last time. Anyhow since the liberalization of the low of abortion, 17 years ago, there have been aborted about 13 or 17 million children.
    I will see as soon as possible, but probably not earlear than September, this film.I still hope this is not a slap in the face of God, of people who respect, love life. But may be this film could be a such a slap and than God will change it in something good: bringing aver the world the question of abortion and how was/is treated in Romania. A country in which 97% of people are saying that they belive in God.The most Christian country in Europe!
    One of the beautiful things done against abortion is the initiative of an Orthodox priest, parintele Tanase, who saves children of abortion in a village called "Valea Plopului". A real colony of life. His only network: God and the villagers, as a friend of mine expressed it.
    The pro-life work done by so many curreageous people in America is a real blessing for my heart and an important source of inspiration. Thank you very much and may God bless you all.
    Ana Daniela

    ReplyDelete
  3. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

    ReplyDelete

All comments are moderated. We reject all comments containing obscenity. We reserve the right to reject any and all comments that are considered inappropriate or off-topic without explanation.