Film: The Life of Brian
January 14th, 2007, by Hilko
The Life of Brian is not only hilarious, but to my surprise, a great movie as well! Why the surprise? Well, I started watching it expecting one of those irritating, blasphemous, over-the-line movies that has me crying with laughter, as well as feeling guilty for not hating something that is so against my beliefs. It was banned on release in many places, after all! Instead, it turned out to be a very funny movie (click for short clips of the movie), with a mostly good message and, in my opinion, only mildly offensive material.
This is quite amazing, considering that the Monty Python group is known to be staunchly atheist, and consequently, quite anti-christian in sentiment. From this group, you’d expect a ‘Christianity-themed comedy’ to be biting, hurtful and offensive to everything Christianity stands for. Why wasn’t this the case?
Apparently, this was their original plan. However, once they started researching the subject, the plan changed. In a short documentary on the movie’s creation, release, and resulting backlash, one of the Monty Python crew has the following to say:
You got Christ saying very good things, and saying the right things as a wonderful figure. That’s not where the fun lies, really.
They discovered that Christ’s teachings were sensible, commendable and, consequently, rather unfunny. He just wasn’t comedy material. Fortunately, they still had a lot to say about His followers.
And so, in the new approach, the central figure was Brian, one of Jesus’ fictional contemporaries; a bumbling, unlucky nobody. The film chronicles his life, his his unwilling rise to fame as ‘messiah’, and eventually, his crucifixion.
So what role do Christianity and Christ play in this movie? Well, Jesus appears only twice, and is treated with respect in both cases. It’s his followers, opponents, and other contemporaries that are ridiculed. The Python crew targeted the harshness and zealotry of ‘followers’ in general, and the accompanying lack of individuality and general stupidity that they often display. They sharply expose how ‘believers’ often see what they want to believe, distort the original message, don’t actually do half they believe, and violate or disregard what little is left.
And why is this wrong, again?
Ironically, the huge backlash from the Christian world validates the image of Christians presented in the movie. Harsh, mindless criticism, usually without actually having seen the movie, and forcefully imposing personal beliefs on the public.
So, surely we’ve all grown up, and decided to have a more loving, Christ-like attitude to the world and it’s worldly things, right? Right?
Unfortunately, no. In fact, it’s probably worsened. As the writers point out in the documentary, a film like Life of Brian would probably not have been released today. There are countless examples of similar reactions from the Christian world: Harry Potter, The DaVinci Code, Lord of the Rings, even Narnia.
Let me end with a suggestion: go watch LifĂ?e of Brian, if you haven’t seen it yet (hey, I can’t be the only one a few years late). If it offends you: ask yourself why. Could it be that’s a bit of a fanatic in you as well?