On the same general topic as the last post, here’s an article by Thomas Friedman in the NYT (link requires registration) about reconciliation between Muslims and a synagogue bombed by Islamists in Turkey. (Thanks to Donald Sensing for the link.)

Let’s start with Turkey — the only Muslim, free-market democracy in Europe. I happened to be in Istanbul when the street outside one of the two synagogues that were suicide-bombed on Nov. 15 was reopened. Three things struck me: First, the chief rabbi of Turkey appeared at the ceremony, hand in hand with the top Muslim cleric of Istanbul and the local mayor, while crowds in the street threw red carnations on them. Second, the Turkish leader, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who comes from an Islamist party, paid a visit to the chief rabbi — the first time a Turkish prime minister had ever called on the chief rabbi. Third, and most revealing, was the statement made by the father of one of the Turkish suicide bombers who hit the synagogues.

“We are a respectful family who love our nation, flag and the Koran,” the grieving father, Sefik Elaltuntas, told the Zaman newspaper. “But we cannot understand why this child had done the thing he had done . . . First, let us meet with the chief rabbi of our Jewish brothers. Let me hug him. Let me kiss his hands and flowing robe. Let me apologize in the name of my son and offer my condolences for the deaths. . . . We will be damned if we do not reconcile with them.”

Good stuff. But it does raise the question of how much of the terrorist expression of Islam is inherent in the religion itself, and how much is accretion. The moderates and the radicals both say they’re the true Islam, and it seems like observers outside Islam just pick whichever Islam they want to be the real Islam and call it that, like Bush saying that Islam was a religion of peace. That obviously serves his political purposes, but what are his actual credentials for making such a statement?

Certainly I think that the west, in prosecuting this war, ought to do everything it can to court moderate Muslims as allies. That’s good policy because they will make very effective allies since they will put to lie the idea that the war is about Muslims vs. the World, and also because they truly are the enemies of our enemies, and thus there is common cause. But whether that equates to allying ourselves to the “true Muslims” is an entirely separate question.

And frankly, I believe, an irrelevant question. That’s a question for Muslims to decide, just as we Christians ought to have no concern over what branch of Christianity the Buddhists or the agnostics like the best. When one deals with a religious group, one must deal with the religion as it is lived and expressed by the adherents. One does not have to deal with a theory about how that religion ought to be expressed, unless one is a college professor. One deals with the religion as one finds it. And so if Islam drives some to be peaceful freedom-loving citizens, then we can work with that. But if Islam drives others to walk into children-packed pizza parlors with nail bombs strapped to their chests, then that version at least of that religion is repugnant, and deserves to be castigated and its adherents destroyed.

Power Line has an article on the Palestinian Authority running out of money. Seems that supporting baby-killers just doesn’t buy one the advantages that it used to.

It very much appears that more and more countries are getting on the right side of Bush’s “with freedom or with terrorism” formulation.

Big Fish is Tim Burton’s latest film, after a couple of disappointing movies, Planet of the Apes and Sleepy Hollow. Burton seemed like he was on autopilot for these two films, especially PotA, a formulaic star vehicle with no life at all. Sleepy Hollow had some interesting moments, but no third act and no structure.

Big Fish, however, reminds us why so many think so much of Tim Burton. Recalling Ed Wood and Edward Scissorhands, Big Fish is a journey through the life of a dying man, as the stories are recalled by the son who feels he never knew him. The father’s stories are unbelievable, populated with ten-foot tall giants, lycanthropic circus owners and siamese twins. The son has never heard anything about his father except for these stories, and so tries to get his father to tell him the truth about his life. The movie is that search, as the son tries to find the real man behind the stories, or in the stories.

Everything about this movie is a pleasure. Ewan MacGregor is bursting with life and energy as the young father, the hero of all the stories who can never be stopped or deterred by any setback, who is loved by all. Billy Crudup is the adult son, exuding much of his father’s charm but detached by the relationship with his father, which is based on nothing but lies, as far as the son can tell. Helena Bonham Carter plays a few different roles, including a decrepit old witch who can show you your death in her glass eye and a young southern belle, and is stellar in both.

The way the movie moves you through the relationships and the stories is a work of art, wonderful to behold. You start out disliking the father, only thinking of him as a liar and a braggart, and as you start to see him in his stories, you see every spinner of every tall tale, with himself at the center of all of them, winning at everything, one-upping everyone, loved by all, accomplishing impossible feats and seeing impossible sights. As the stories progress, though, you really start to like the character, and you want the stories to be true. The way the son gradually comes to understand who his father really is, through the stories, is beautiful and complex in a way rarely attempted in movies these days, it seems.

There’s a little bit of totally unnecessary partial nudity, unfortunately. So watch out for that, although if you’re in the habit of going to movies much, it’s really quite mild. Still, I don’t know why it was even there- it was the only part of the movie that jarred me- that snapped me out of the cinematic reverie to think about the fact that I was watching a movie, and to think about the movie I was watching. Anytime I think about the movie I’m watching as a moive, while I’m watching it, that strikes me as a weakness in the movie. A really perfect movie will prompt you to think about and focus on the story, the characters, and the scenery, but not the movie, as a movie. And this was very nearly that.

4/5 stars.

Rent the DVD free from Netflix!

Thanks to Jenny Jo Johnson for helping me spice up the site look. I am now one step beyond total blog dork still using a default blogger template.

Baby steps, baby steps.

Here’s a story from Breakpoint about George W Bush engaging in a little Christmas spirit. You could say it’s just for the press coverage, I suppose, except that there was no press coverage.

Link from the Sophorist– thanks.

More on the situation in Iran here, and on the UN Human Rights Commission role in the situation. The claim of the article is that not only does the UNHCR do nothing at all to help, it makes problems worse.

You know, it’s not that I really care about this stupid story at all, but it seems like if anyone knew what was safe to do around a crocodile, it would be Steve Irwin.

This sort of thing has the feel of religious fervor, like what Steve Irwin really did wrong was to use an object of worship in a frivolous manner. It’s been said before that our society worships children, and I believe it, and so the fact that a child was used in this manner is a matter of religious offense. But there’s not this much outcry from the media over the babies slaughtered by abortion every day.

Kofi Annan has declared that the peace process, the new constitution and the new election in Afghanistan are jeopardized by terrorist attacks.

But of course, he knows, doesn’t he, that THIS IS EXACTLY THE INTENTION OF THE ATTACKS???

I wouldn’t trust that guy to lead a parade, let alone the UN.

Sunday’s Sermon is up. It’s called “Abiding in Christ”. and it’s a sermon on the topic of what it means to be a branch of Jesus’ vine. Link’s on the sidebar.

It’s going to be another pretty slow blogging week. I have a week-long seminar-style class starting today, so I’m going to be in Colorado Springs most of the week.

Fitzcarraldo is the story of a man who wants to build an opera in the jungle. He is an Irish entrepreneur (his real name is Fitzgerald, but that was hard for the locals to pronounce) in the jungles of Peru who has had a few different schemes, none of which have really been profitable, but he has a dream, a passion, and a burning ambition to make it happen.

He had tried to build a railroad over the Andes, and then got into ice production, and finally tries his hand at the rubber trade. All of the best tracts of land have been taken up, and so his plan is to buy a tract of land that is thought unreachable due to impassable rapids on the river that leads to the tract. So Fitzcarraldo’s plan is to get a steamboat, sail it up a parallel river and then portage the boat over the hills to the other side, sail back up the river and exploit the rich rubber region. He needs the help of the local natives to do it, which they offer for reasons which only become clear by the end.

It’s a beautifully shot and directed movie. The shot of the steamboat being dragged up the side of the mountain, almost sailing up it, is the shot that will stick with me. The jungle is gorgeous.

Klaus Kinski is the lead, and he plays the role like a maniac. He has an extremely expressive face, one that communicates the obsession in his heart, for the opera. Fighting against all odds, you really want him to win out and be successful in his venture so that he can have his opera.

Fitzcarraldo is an excellent movie, if for no other reason that it will show you in graphic detail the meaning of the existentialist philosophy, that pervades the world we live in.

4/5 stars.

Rent the DVD free from Netflix!

*SPOILERS AHEAD- Don’t read, unless you never plan on seeing the movie, have already seen the movie, or, like my mother-in-law, won’t be hurt by reading the spoilers since you will forget it by the time you see the movie.

But in the end, it’s all pointless. It’s an existentialist movie at heart, which teaches its viewers that nature is random and capricious, that forces outside of our control can and do destroy all our plans, and that the only thing in the end that matters is the expression of self- the defining act that shouts to the world, HERE I AM! Even if Fitzcarraldo wastes all his money, and that of his investors, just so he can engage in that one act, that one moment of transcendental joy, it’s all worth it.

But even if Fitzcarraldo achieves his moment, what then? How can he continue after that? His business is ruined, cannibalized for his opera, his moment. After the moment is over, what then? But of course, to ask the question is to compromise, to become the slave of nature. Just as to live, to make all the compromises and to do all the service for others that is necessary just to live in this world, all is to be the slave of nature, and the only way out is suicide. Indeed, suicide is the only act that can truly define the individual, the only true act of rebellion and defiance possible. All else ends in defeat.

And so, Fitzcarraldo is a movie about suicide. It never says that it is, of course, but it is. Just like so many of our teen movies, our romances, our dramas, are all movies about suicide. Every American Beauty, every Fight Club, every movie where the villian is the establishment, and the hero is the guy who always does whatever he wants and never lets anyone tell him what to do- all end in self-destruction. It’s inevitable. Nature is our enemy, you see, whatever the environmentalists say. Nobody goes back to nature, nobody. They war against nature, against society, against all the requirements just for living. For those who view this world as all that there is, this world is the enemy, but this world cannot be defeated. It will enslave you, it will require, as the price for your survival, your soul, your individuality. You can spend your life in drudging slavery in a factory or a cubicle or a welfare line, or you can defy the world, rebel against your slavery and kill yourself.

People kill themselves through drink, through drugs, through the mindless pursuit of sex or money or some other pleasure. Some actually do the deed.

Of course, there’s another option. The Christian knows that this world is not all that there is, and that there is life after this world. Further, what’s going on now is for the purpose of training us for the future, and so our existence is no longer pointless, and events are no longer our enemy. We have a benevolent God who, by the grace of Jesus Christ and for the sake of His blood, nurtures and cares for us, and use all things for our good, to conform us to the image of His son.