So I watched that documentary, Holy Ghost, thats been making the rounds on the web. My brother paid to see the early release, and he was really excited about it. My thoughts on the movie are... complicated, to say the least. So, sit back, its film criticism time. I first heard about this movie a few months ago, after a friend posted about it on Facebook. Being an atheist, I naturally was a little bit wary of a movie titled Holy Ghost, but I dont judge a movie by its title (most of the time, at least), so I checked out the page. It actually looked pretty promising, as the description promised an exploration of the effects of (belief in) the Holy Spirit across the country, and different cultures around the world. But then I watched the trailer. And it was everything I didnt want it to be. Preachy, riddled with Church cliches, and made to look like a Grand Adventure. It didnt completely dismay me, by any means, as I could easily attribute the faults in the trailer to the fact that a movie like this would obviously be targeting a mostly Christian audience, and every other trailer Ive ever seen for any other Christian movie is exactly the same. The trailer doesnt make the movie though, and so I was willing to let it slide. It still had the promise of an interesting take on shared religious experiences around the world, so I decided Id check it out whenever it came out. Boy was that a mistake. So the movie opens up with what youd expect a documentary to do: state its thesis. At first, nothing really seems out of place. There are a number of interviews with different leading Christian authorities, and the filmmakers themselves also appear to introduce us to the film and its strange style. But then, when they introduce the thesis statement, it gets problematic. Namely, because the goal of the movie is to simultaneously prove the existence of the Holy Spirit and make a film directed by the Holy Spirit. Now, you may already know why thats problematic, but in case you dont, Ill explain: You cant prove the existence of the Holy Spirit. You just cant. Its impossible. Its the same thing as trying to definitively prove God exists. You can believe in the Holy Spirit, and let it guide your life, but there is no way to prove that something like the Holy Spirit exists without evidence, which we dont have, and likely wont have at any point in time. Now, Im not trying to insult anyone for believing in God. I understand that the motivation for believing in God is generally very personal, and not based on intellectual proof or evidence. And thats cool. But that very reason why you believe in God is exactly why you cant prove his existence. And trying to prove (or disprove, for that matter) the existence of God does not make for an interesting film. So then we get to the second part of their goal: to make a film directed by the Holy Spirit. Theres nothing wrong with that, per se; its definitely an interesting concept for a documentary, and a good team of filmmakers could definitely pull it off. The problem arises when they start talking about how risky this part of their goal is. Umm, yeah, sure. Making an independent documentary targeted at Christian audiences is such a massive risk in the US. Where Christians are the majority. Sure. (Though, interestingly enough, the risks of making a film without any real plan at all does become apparent later). This movie really isnt off to a great start. In stating their thesis, theyve revealed a fundamental misunderstanding of both logic and their own religion, as well as a heavy persecution complex (shared by way too many Christians, but thats an argument for another time). Still, theres time for this movie to take off, and the concept of being directed by the Holy Spirit is still solid enough to make up for trying to prove its existence. At this point, Ive only got a little hope left for the movie, but I know plenty of good movies with uninteresting prologues (Ip Man and Pacific Rim, for example), and this could be one of them. Act 1 begins with our filmmakers interviewing a Mormon pastor in Salt Lake City. This is probably the best part of the movie, as their conversation with him basically revolves around the separation of the church between two categories (which they (inaccurately) call the Spirit-based church and the Word-based church (a much better dividing line is Protestant/Catholic, though I understand their issues with the division of Protestants between Charismatics/Evangelical churches and more liturgical churches)). They switch between the Mormon pastor and what I can only assume is the filmmakers pastor, and they both basically agree that the division of the church is damaging to their effectiveness in spreading the gospel. Id like if they acknowledged that doing good works in the world is more important than proselytizing, but Im used to that. Unfortunately, this is where the movie goes downhill; they interview a few more people after this (apparently the creator of VeggieTales qualifies as an expert on the Holy Spirit), but the majority of the film follows the filmmakers going around on the street having spiritual encounters with random people on the street. And trust me, its so much more awkward and off-putting than you think. Act 1 of the film tracks the filmmakers as they perform faith healing to random people in Salt Lake City. To anyone familiar with cold reading however, it is incredibly obvious that these guys are doing the same thing as every psychic or televangelist. Theyre not demanding payment, which makes it a little better, but honestly, its really atrocious to lie about the supernatural like that, whether youre making a profit in it or not. Act 2 is even worse. They interview two (former?) members of Korn who have converted to Christianity (man, they couldnt have picked a worse band, could they?). They have them give their testimony, which is a little boring, but not problematic. After they interview them though, they go with these members out to the entrance to the concert hall theyre performing in, in order to randomly pray with the people on their way into the concert hall. Korn fans. Being prayed for. Yeah... They even come across an atheist who tries to avoid being prayed for, but they coerce him into letting them pray over his leg (and they decide to pray over his leg after finding out he has some back pain. What?). After a short prayer, they all start freaking out in joy, because apparently the mans leg grew an inch. Sure. Its not like they, I dont know, measured the leg before and measured again after to confirm this, but sure. His leg grew an inch. Remind me how thats supposed to help him again? Needless to say, the atheist is unimpressed with their magicianship, and just moves on to his concert. And now, Act 3. I only watched the first part of this, but I dont think I need to see anything past what I watched. The premise of this act is that they decide to go to India and risk everything by going and praying out loud in the name of Jesus in the middle of a Hindu temple. Yes, thats right. They decide that its a good idea to pray out loud as Christians, in the middle of a Hindu temple. Because other cultures are evil if they dont have Jesus. I stopped watching here. I can only assume that they were fine, because being rude American stereotypes isnt generally cause to get murdered, just mocked incessantly. The pure idiocy of that move was just too much for me take. It seriously irks me that no one involved had the common sense or decency to stop these guys from doing this. But the idiocy of the three acts could still have been redeemed. If this film had been well put together, I could at least give it credit for telling a cohesive story, like any good film must aspire to, but it is just terribly edited together, not to mention completely visually unappealing. The acts of the film are pretty much entirely unconnected, with virtually no material between them attempting to provide a transition of any sort at all, let alone a smooth one. The film is also terribly shot. For a documentary. Yeah, its that bad. There is a scene where theyre praying with a woman, and the camera is just sitting on the table theyre sitting at, barely facing the woman, and hardly in focus. I understand the need to not have the camera intrude on whats going on, but its a documentary. Documenting events is more important than not intruding on events. There is a balance between too much intrusion and poor documentation, to be sure, but its your job as a filmmaker to find the balance that works best for your film. Choosing one side entirely over the other, however, is always a bad decision. Even worse though, is the fact that the entire movie essentially is just the disjointed adventures of these filmmakers walking around praying for people. There is no cohesive narrative at all, and the things the filmmakers talk about being the connective material break the most important rule in filmmaking: show, dont tell. I have to give this film a 0 out of 5. The filmmakers have no real goal, and it shows in the editing and structure of the film. They also conform to all of the worst stereotypes about Charismatic Christians, and are really quite disrespectful in the way they attempt to proselytize every single person they meet. Theres only one redeemable section of this film, but it deals with its topic incredibly poorly in comparison to any kind of in depth discussion of the topic. TL;DR Movie that follows the Holy Spirit has no decent story structure or flow, and focuses on the culturally insensitive exploits of a group of cold reading faith healers. 0/5, would not watch again.
Posted on: Mon, 11 Aug 2014 01:50:53 +0000
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