When you go to the theater, do you simply let the story wash over you? Or do you have the skills to analyze what a film is saying? A movie generally communicates its perspective through the lead character. What the main character learns or discovers is what the filmmakers want the audience to learn. . . .
When watching a movie, we should be asking: What worldview is the movie communicating? Are there elements that are true? Are there elements that are false and destructive? If Christians do not learn to ask those questions, they may well absorb nonbiblical ideas without even being aware of it. T.S. Eliot once noted that the serious books we read do not influence us nearly as much as the books we read for fun (or the movies we watch for entertainment). Why? Because when we are relaxing, our guard is down and we engage in the "suspension of disbelief" that allows us to enter imaginatively into the story. As a result, the assumptions of the author or screenwriter may go unnoticed and seep all the more deeply into our consciousness. When we "suspend disbelief," we must take care not to suspend our critical faculties.
Nancy Pearcey, "Saving Leonardo: A Call to Resist the Secular Assault on Mind, Morals, & Meaning," p.253
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