Worst Movies for Catholics

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Okay, okay, something different… hmm… okay, here’s two!
  1. “Cannonball Run”–besides the fact that the movie is just this side of totally pointless, I can’t stand their portrayal of Dean Martin and Sammy Davis, Jr. as priests… all right, I know, BOGUS priests, but come on, it was beyond disrespectful as far as I’m concerned. Name any star in that movie and I’m sure this film is one of their “what was I thinking?” moments!
  2. “Real Women Have Curves”–I really wanted to like this film, but what I couldn’t stand was the way they contrasted the generations… the young “smart” modern Hispanic woman engages in premarital sex but uses “protection” (see how smart she is?) and her old-fashioned mother engages in a discussion with her sister about whether it is more effective to hang her St. Anthony statue upside down or stick him in a drawer until he grants her prayer request. I mean, the young woman had legitimate concerns (her sister getting paid peanuts for dresses that would be sold in New York City for hundreds of dollars, wanting a better life outside of the barrio, wanting an education) but it was all distilled to a fight with her mother about morals. The older generation comes off as looking ridiculous and superstitious. I guess maybe it’s because I could never imagine treating my own mother and aunts with such disrespect, despite the fact that I have moved beyond the barrio of my youth, been educated. Why do so many “coming of age” movies feel they have to belittle the older generation to get the point across? (I’d better stop, I’m getting to “rant” phase!)
Well those are my two, and they haven’t been mentioned before, so someone else step up to the plate!
 
Sister Act just came to mind - turning the Mass into a rock concert and portraying the clergy as obsessed with getting butts on seats 😦
 
Not quite on topic, but I thought the Forty Year Old Virgin could’ve been good. A 40-yr-old man who had never had sex (though he tried at the urging of his friends) and later decided that he actually wanted to wait until he was married. Unfortunately, it was filled with so much profanity and nudity (the workers at his electronics store even play porn that is shown in the background in some scenes).

Like having a nice juicy steak drop in the dirt. Well, maybe a hamburger.
 
all right, I don’t think anyone mentined this piece of dogfood:

The Messenger

Mila whats-her-name, in a vehicle by her director-boyfriend. Bad on so many levels–utterly mistates the natures of Joan of Arc’s visions into some sort of “wooshy-psychosis” driven by revenge–and utterly against the record of what she spoke repeatedly in many depositions. The armor, the weapons, the costumes, the stunt fighting–all so bad and non period (those anti-seige weapons were right out of Warner Brothers Looney Tunes!!!) And Mila was too old for the role (so was Ingrid Bergman but she played it reverently but not cloyingly 👍 )

Hank Reinhardt of Museam Replicas Ltd said he walked out of the performance–and later heard from a friend who sat through the end, a heckler in th audience kept shouting “Burn the witch!”
 
What about 40 Days and 40 Nights where the main character gives up sex for Lent? The whole idea is just terrible!!!
 
The Magdalene Sisters - the story of “wayward” women who were sent away to live with the most evil nuns & priests in Ireland up until the mid 1960’s.

This movie was so horrible - possibly because it was based at least on partial truth - that I almost decided not to become Catholic after watching it.
 
Since it is relatively recent, I’ll give you all a heads up. Don’t let anyone talk you into seeing **Crank. **I am normally tolerant, but that was horrid. Actually, so was Scary Movie, but you all probably know that one, as it is older.

These weren’t religious movies, though, and most of the stuff on the list is. I don’t think anyone mentioned Agnes of God. Do you like that one?
 
Million Dollar Baby is a bad movie for anyone to watch. Not only was it full of despair, it was poorly made…the lighting, etc., so depressing.

Spoiler Alert…

The worse thing was that not only did Clint Eastwood euthanize Hillary Swank, but the potty-mouthed priest told him if he did it, it was no hope of repentence, he would be “lost forever”.
 
childofmary1143 said:
We all list the best movies that we like and there is a good variety among them and having threads like them are good as they give a chance to express what movies really move us.

Well sometimes a really bad movie can have a profound effect too as it can clearly show what is wrong with us or society in general. So here goes my movie(s) that I hate the most:
  1. Titanic. This movie sucks for sooo many reasons. One, obviously is the cheap nudity which it has. Rose’s posing is as artistic as a Playboy centerfold posing . Two, the sexual intercourse scene. Three, Rose’s mother is an incredibly selfish character as to pressure her daughter to marry a rich man so she can have her comfortable lifestyle is just terrible. Fourth and perhaps very subtly you see Rose’s fiance (sorry I forget his name) is portrayed as the church going Christian yet he is the abusive man.
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I personally like this movie but I agree with your first two points. The painting scene could have just as effectively been done without showing the nudity and the intercourse could have been removed completely or been implied less gratuitously than it was. Both points cheapen an otherwise pretty powerful story.

I’m going to have to disagree on the other two points. I fail see how points three and four make this a bad movie for Catholics. Or even a bad movie in general. Point three is just a character flaw that was purposely written that way to illustrate a point and to create conflict in the story. Point four, singing in a church service does not make someone Christian. I really don’t think that James Cameron was trying to imply that Caledon was a two-faced Christian.
 
milimac said:
Yes, Dogma tops my list as well. However, it worked out for good, and helped me to re-examine my faith and become a serious devout Catholic. I was pretty much a cafeteria Catholic, though I wouldn’t have called myself that. One scene in the movie that stood out was when one of the main characters – a Catholic who worked at an abortion clinic – went to Mass. I don’t remember specifically what was said at the Mass, but they were all mumbling and I think something was said (in the Creed or somewhere) which was offensive and heretical and no one at the Mass even noticed or cared. Sometimes a good slap in the face will do wonders, although I’m pretty sure that effect wasn’t what Kevin Smith intended. He wanted me to laugh, but instead I cried.
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Seven with Morgan Freeman (one of my favorite actors) and Brad Pitt was based on the seven deadly sins.
The actual murders were so revolting in showing the bodies afterwards only, that though I thought the premise was good, the movie was too difficult to watch.
I’ve since watched the cleaned up version on regular tv and can get into the story much better.
 
It seems to me that the films that are most dangerous for Catholics are the ones that, at first blush, are seemingly innocuous but which contain deep and abiding error. The worst of these are always going to be the ones that are marketed to children. My list includes the following:
  • Star Wars: Promotes Manichean heresy. Encourages relativistic conceptions of Truth.
  • Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe: Presents Christ’s Incarnation as completely arbitrary.
  • Harry Potter, Mary Poppins, Sleeping Beauty, Aladdin, Cinderella,** Pinocchio**, etc.: Movies that promote the use of magic and witchcraft to achieve desirable ends. It ought to be noted that some of these ends, such as the willful disobedience of an authority figure in Cinderella. In others, such as Pinocchio, even the creation of life is subject to the intervention of magic.
    These are the types of movies that are most damaging to people who wish to follow the path of Christ.
 
Lion_of_Narnia said:
Say what???
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Christ came to be incarnated as a man, not a lion. To believe that Christ was incarnated as anything other than a man, even if in another reality, is to deny the intrinsic significance of the human body as made in the image and likeness of the Creator.
 
frail said:
I personally like this movie but I agree with your first two points. The painting scene could have just as effectively been done without showing the nudity and the intercourse could have been removed completely or been implied less gratuitously than it was. Both points cheapen an otherwise pretty powerful story.

I’m going to have to disagree on the other two points. I fail see how points three and four make this a bad movie for Catholics. Or even a bad movie in general. Point three is just a character flaw that was purposely written that way to illustrate a point and to create conflict in the story. Point four, singing in a church service does not make someone Christian. I really don’t think that James Cameron was trying to imply that Caledon was a two-faced Christian.
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thanks frail for your insightful and honest comments. I can see how one might interpret the last two points of my critique of Titanic. However I would like to remind myself and others of the expression “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts”. Points 3 and 4 aren’t as serious as the first two but I felt they deserved consideration. If Cameron wasn’t trying to imply that Caledon was two faced why did he have that scene where he was singing in a Christian service? It did nothing to the overall story of the movie.
 
Other_Eric said:
It seems to me that the films that are most dangerous for Catholics are the ones that, at first blush, are seemingly innocuous but which contain deep and abiding error. The worst of these are always going to be the ones that are marketed to children. My list includes the following:
  • Star Wars: Promotes Manichean heresy. Encourages relativistic conceptions of Truth.
  • Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe: Presents Christ’s Incarnation as completely arbitrary.
  • Harry Potter, Mary Poppins, Sleeping Beauty, Aladdin, Cinderella,** Pinocchio**, etc.: Movies that promote the use of magic and witchcraft to achieve desirable ends. It ought to be noted that some of these ends, such as the willful disobedience of an authority figure in Cinderella. In others, such as Pinocchio, even the creation of life is subject to the intervention of magic.
    These are the types of movies that are most damaging to people who wish to follow the path of Christ.
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Can you explain what the Manichean heresy is and how Star Wars promotes it?
 
childofmary1143 said:
Can you explain what the Manichean heresy is and how Star Wars promotes it?
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The Manichean heresy was one in which it was imagined that the body and, indeed, all physical matter was evil. Humans were not the ensouled bodies that the Church teaches they are. Instead, we were like angels trapped in base flesh. The spiritual was exalted at the expense of the physical.

In Star Wars, this is one of the principle themes that animate the Jedi philosophy. When Yoda says to Luke, “luminous beings are we, not this crude matter,” he is voicing a heresy that St. Augustine spent much of his life denouncing. Time and time again throughout the run of the series, physical existence is given short shrift to some imagined physical reality in which people have achieved their final end in becoming “one with the Force” in some sort of non-corporeal reality.

Christians, on the other hand, believe no such thing. Christians do not seek their final end in death where the soul is separated from the body but in the Resurrection, where body and soul are once again united. We note that Christ found His body to be so good that He took it to Heaven with him. Christians embrace the good of the physical universe as an aspect of God’s goodness.
 
Other_Eric said:
It seems to me that the films that are most dangerous for Catholics are the ones that, at first blush, are seemingly innocuous but which contain deep and abiding error. The worst of these are always going to be the ones that are marketed to children. My list includes the following:
  • Star Wars: Promotes Manichean heresy. Encourages relativistic conceptions of Truth.
  • Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe: Presents Christ’s Incarnation as completely arbitrary.
  • Harry Potter, Mary Poppins, Sleeping Beauty, Aladdin, Cinderella,** Pinocchio**, etc.: Movies that promote the use of magic and witchcraft to achieve desirable ends. It ought to be noted that some of these ends, such as the willful disobedience of an authority figure in Cinderella. In others, such as Pinocchio, even the creation of life is subject to the intervention of magic.
    These are the types of movies that are most damaging to people who wish to follow the path of Christ.
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:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: What movies do you watch, beyond ‘Man For All Seasons’ and Veggie Tales? Or are all works of imagination and fiction right out?
 
Other_Eric said:
The Manichean heresy was one in which it was imagined that the body and, indeed, all physical matter was evil. Humans were not the ensouled bodies that the Church teaches they are. Instead, we were like angels trapped in base flesh. The spiritual was exalted at the expense of the physical.

In Star Wars, this is one of the principle themes that animate the Jedi philosophy. When Yoda says to Luke, “luminous beings are we, not this crude matter,” he is voicing a heresy that St. Augustine spent much of his life denouncing. Time and time again throughout the run of the series, physical existence is given short shrift to some imagined physical reality in which people have achieved their final end in becoming “one with the Force” in some sort of non-corporeal reality.

Christians, on the other hand, believe no such thing. Christians do not seek their final end in death where the soul is separated from the body but in the Resurrection, where body and soul are once again united. We note that Christ found His body to be so good that He took it to Heaven with him. Christians embrace the good of the physical universe as an aspect of God’s goodness.
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I don’t think Star Wars promotes Manichean Heresy because for any movie to promote a heresy there has to be an intention to pass the “heresy” as a belief.

Star Wars is a fantasy movie. It is a movie that is very imaginative and can serve as an escape from reality. IMHO Lucas isn’t trying to indoctrinate anyone with this. At least not with the Original Trilogy (Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi). When Episode 1 came out and it had Anakin as not having any father I was disgusted as it was trying to pass him off as Star Wars’ own “Jesus”.

I noticed that you listed other cartoon movies too. I wonder if you would include The Wizard of Oz with Judy Garland?
 
Other_Eric said:
Christ came to be incarnated as a man, not a lion. To believe that Christ was incarnated as anything other than a man, even if in another reality, is to deny the intrinsic significance of the human body as made in the image and likeness of the Creator.
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Man was created in the image of God, not the other way around.

It means Man is created as a volitional, rational soul–a being capable of moral choice.

We’ve dealt with this on other links, but in the Incarnation, Jesus would have had a particular hair color, eye, and skin color–what it was hardly matter, other than it was one thing and not another–does it mean those of us who don’t share in Jesus’s partiucular human looks are not in the image of God? So women are right out because they’re not male and Jesus was?

In The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew, Aslan just literaly walks onto the scene, creating the universe of Narnia out of Song–there’s no Nativity of this “Son of the Emperor across the Sea” I imagine CS Lewis would argue there was the one Incarnation–but the Son will present Himself as He wills.

Unless you are a Mormon who believes Gods “has parts”, the idea that God is bound to human appearence–well, are you?
 
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