The Folly of Being a Savior
Posted on May 7, 2008
Filed Under Deeper Walk | 1 Comment
I’m tempted to believe that I would make a good Savior. I’m not so brazen as to actually suggest myself a replacement for the true redeemer of the world. However, if my actions belie my convictions, then on most days, I fancy that if Jesus wanted to take a long weekend and leave the world in my hands, I could pretty much keep it together without much of a hitch.
I feverishly pour myself into treacherous situations, exerting a kind of energy that, for me at least, expresses a major trust in self and a very minor trust in God. I gather up other people’s expectations and problems, add them on top of my own, and then set out to resolve them with sweat and skill - and manipulation, if necessary. Only in the direst circumstances will I ponder what God’s activity in the whole affair might be. I mean, really, do I have to depend on God? Has it gotten that desperate?
I recently read the story of Tyler Wigg Stevenson’s improbable journey to faith. Tyler was an agnostic who threw himself into advocacy for ridding the world’s nuclear arsenals. He recounts his nightmarish days, immersed in the grim facts and apocalyptic scenarios, where his mind would twist with the endless visions of “merciless white flashes” ripping across metropolitan cities, melting whole city blocks and wide swaths of human population. It’s enough to make a man go mad.
It was the enormity of this crisis - and his utter inability to truly do anything of lasting impact to alter it - that ultimately led him to Jesus as his (and humanity’s) only hope. Now, Stevenson spends his days working for the same good cause, but he does it with a much different view of himself and a much wider view of who our planet’s Savior truly is. “The world is not mine to save,” said Tyler, “But I can serve the mission of the God who has already done so.”
That line has been rolling around in my head for days. Indeed, the world is not ours to save. But God has already enacted the rescue. We are not the Savior. We are not the Savior. But Jesus is. And both of those assertions are good, good news.
peace / winn
p.s. My friend, Justin Scott, has posted a hilarious little piece about haircuts. I recommend it.
Slowly but surely…
Posted on May 5, 2008
Filed Under Dallas Jenkins | Leave a Comment
More from my journal of the making of my film, “Mountain”:
We seem to be making bits and pieces of progress here and there. We’re currently in discussions with a few different financial options. One big foreign sales company has verbally committed to a $1 million “minimum guarantee,” which is something that they give to a bank in exchange for a loan of that amount. That would get us close to our budget, and with the money that comes from whatever state we shoot in, we’d be just about there. There are also a couple other private investment people and groups that I’m talking with, all of which have some level of serious interest. Who ever knows what’s going to happen? This is my least favorite part of the whole process. We’re also going to talk about casting this week–we might just go ahead and start making some offers. A few different people are talking about Kevin Bacon, so he might be our first approach.
I’m currently reading “The Conversations with Walter Murch,” a book of interviews with the legendary editor Walter Murch. Terrific book. Up next are a couple similar books, interviews with Truffaut and Kurusawa. I’m watching “The Seven Samurai” today, “Wild Bunch” tomorrow,” and I watched “The Godfather” a couple days ago. I’d seen it before, but watching it after reading some of Walter Murch’s comments on it was great. I’d always encourage filmmakers to watch films before or after you read some good analysis or inside info on them. And I’m going to go out on a limb and say that The Godfather is a solid film. I know that may put me in the minority, but I’m holding strong in that belief.
Released 5/6/08 (I’m Not There)
Posted on May 5, 2008
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“The only truly natural things are dreams…”
The night before I saw I’m Not There, I dreamt that I met Bob Dylan outside of a concert venue. He was standing against a wall by himself, sporting his little mustache and familiar scowl. I approached him immediately, wanting so badly just to shake his hand and show my appreciation and respect. As soon as he saw that I was heading towards him, he started to shy away, but I spoke up and held my hand in front of him, “Sir, my name is Dylan Peterson, my father named me after you.” He looked at me, didn’t shake my hand, but asked for my dad’s email address.
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One of the most interesting American figures of all time is revealed through multiple names, faces, and personalities in I’m Not There, the latest film from Todd Haynes. The name “Bob Dylan” never shows up in the movie, and though the songs heard in the movie are tried and true Dylan’s, they’re never titled as Bob Dylan songs. (Record album covers are altered to read something like “Travellin’ On” instead of “Freewheelin.’”) There’s some truth in the film, some fiction, and a lot of blur. In a way, the blur is the only thing that keeps the movie going. When character development begins to deepen, the story takes another hairpin turn into another time or place, never allowing the audience to really become comfortable with the perplexing filmmaking they’ve decided to put themselves through.
About 15 minutes into this movie, I thought, “I’m enjoying this, but would this movie do anything at all for someone who isn’t a Dylan fan?” The haze is just so thick. Catching the visual poetry of a Tarantula being projected across a room is fun for one familiar with Dylan’s history, but what is this movie otherwise?
When I found out that a movie about Bob Dylan was in production, I was excited, but I wondered if it was a good idea. For one thing, I heard that a female actress was playing Dylan (a risky move altogether), and I couldn’t get away from the simple fact that Dylan was still alive. Usually a biopic doesn’t really work until the star is gone, and the movie becomes a memorial to the artist (e.g., Ray Charles and Johnny Cash). But this type of thinking is not aligned with the typical Bob Dylan mindset. Bob Dylan has never been anything but unpredictable, and the more I gave up to this truth, the more excited I became about this experimental movie. And after seeing it, I clearly see how ridiculous it was for me to assume that a proper biopic couldn’t be made until the star was deceased. This is because while Dylan represented something in the 60s, he actually represents the same thing today. Bob Dylan represents the present.
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“Sing about your own time”
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Paradox, puzzle, and chaos seem to be the only clear themes in I’m Not There, and they make for a perfectly post-modern movie. If looking at each Dylan-life separately, the characters in I’m Not There will not have the proper effect, because they are separate and whole at the same time. They are male and female, everyone and no one. The stories are true, and exaggerated beyond belief. The facts are skewed, but the fiction holds just as much ground as the non-fiction. We ask ourselves “who is Bob Dylan?” and while we never find out, we always know the answer.
I’m Not There is visually stunning. Black and white Cate Blanchett blows minds as the Dylan of ’65, capturing his mannerisms while maintaining her own personal interpretation of the overdosed rock star. Richard Gere’s colorful world in Riddle delights viewers to the richest of colors in a Fellini-esque environment. Ostriches and giraffes roam Billy the Kid’s Halloween town, where adults love to wear makeup and kids wear Mr. Peanut costumes. Christian Bale’s born again version of Dylan momentarily summons the saved Zimmerman (much like the Joaquin Phoenix became Johnny Cash in Walk the Line), demanding double takes.
All of the other visual Dylans are just as great, but things really get interesting when the music comes on. The I’m Not There soundtrack features 33 Dylan covers, performed by some of the most ambitious music-makers today. Sufjan Stevens, Iron and Wine, Stephen Malkmus, Calexico, Sonic Youth, Willie Nelson, Jim James, and so many more bring their personal touch to Dylan’s already over-covered songs. And while only a few of the double-disc’s tracks make their way into the actual movie, the soundtrack accomplishes with sound what the film does with visuals.
Dylan’s songs have not only withstood time, but I’m Not There’s soundtrack proves that they have moved along with time, becoming anthems for freedom despite the era they’re played in. The capabilities the songs have to be performed in so many different ways testify to their genius. Iron and Wine and Calexico don’t really sound like Bob Dylan, but “Dark Eyes” sounds truly sincere as they’ve rendered it. Cat Power delivers one of her finest moments by taking on a Dylan impression in her rendition of “Stuck Inside of Mobile…” Sufjan sounds impeccably “Sufjan” without subtracting from the uniqueness that Bob Dylan created lyrically on “Ring Them Bells.”
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A man living in his present age wrote the songs, and they spoke to his generation with great clarity. When performed by contemporary artists today, they lose none of the fervor that they had in the days when they were first heard.
Bob Dylan’s music, and this movie, should be experienced repeatedly. They’re not merely singular works of art, but constantly transforming and growing into new things, perpetual experiences, always different from what they began as. See I’m Not There as an existentialist, not as a historian.
Arthur Rimbaud (Ben Whishaw) reminds us towards the end of the film that only our dreams are susceptible to nature’s decay. I’m Not There is one of the most dream-like movie going experiences imaginable. It’s a practice in visual present tense. It’s a film to think about, but for the most part, it’s a film to make you feel. It’s a film for the present moment, a vivid dream in the night.
http://www.imnotthere-movie.com
Confessions of a former music pirate
Posted on May 5, 2008
Filed Under Music | 4 Comments
“Dude, I burned Toby’s first record.” Strange words to speak to the Vice-President of EMI CMG records, home of David Crowder Band, Switchfoot, TobyMac, Edison Glass, and others. By traditional thinking, these words were, at worst career-killers, and at best, really really stupid. But I had faith that Grant Hubbard, referred to by many as “The Godfather of Christian radio” would understand my motives. After years a a rabid music pirate, I was ready to spread a different message. (By the way, the side bar bio is still broken. this is tower. I do afternoons on 89.7 Shine.FM Chicago. You can stream my show at www.shine.fm).
This change of heart had come primarily from two experiences. The first was my college RD, Matt. After returning from a conference where he learned that 90% of all albums made lose money, Matt threw away all of his burned CD’s and deleted all non-purchased music from his iTunes library.
This got me thinking about my own choices. As an early adopter of Napster, I loved leaving the dial-up connected overnight (keep in mind that it was 2001 and I lived on my parents farm 15 miles from town), and waking up to a new batch of songs. When I got to college, I discovered the “joy” of trading music via AOL Insant Messenger’s “File Transfer” feature. Soon, I had built an immense library in excess of 10,000 songs. And the ripping was continual. If a guy in the dorm went and purchased a just released album, it wasn’t unusual for 25 copies to be made by the end of the night.
But what should have been a music fan’s dream turned out to be…not that satisfying. Listening to music digressed into just skimming tracks for 30 seconds at a time, never settling in enough to listen to a full song, let alone an album. In high school, there had been a thrill to ripping the shrink-wrap off of a CD, popping in the disc, reading the liner notes. But when I started pirating music en-mass, that thrill, the connection to the songs and the artist, began to fade away. If you’ve ever seen the episode of The Simpsons episode where Bart sells his soul, and is no longer feel anything, it’s a pretty good depiction of what my listening experience had become.
These days, the feeling is back. I can’t wait until next Tuesday, when the new Death Cab for Cutie project, Narrow Stairs, hits the shelf at my local Best Buy. Now that I’m purchasing rather than downloading, getting new music is like dining at a fine restaurant or hanging with my best friends in downtown Chicago: half the fun is the anticipation. I’ve read all the buzz on this album. I’ve listened to clips, and hunted down information in the blogs to discover that the lyrical content was heavily inspired by one of my literary heroes and strongest writing influences, Jack Kerouac.
What I love about digging into Kerouac’s writing is that he got so much out of life by finding meaning and passion in things and situations that others only saw as common, disposable…which was the view I took of music when during my days of rabid pirating. Now that I choose to exchange my hard earned money for art, I have a lot less albums on my iPod.
But listening is a much greater joy than it’s ever been, because music is special again.
The Book Club
Posted on May 2, 2008
Filed Under Deeper Walk | 7 Comments
Oprah has nothing on us.
Okay, well, besides her massive wealth and fame and Stedman and her friendship with both Cruise and Obama and the fact that she has her own glamor shot on the cover of a monthly magazine that bears her name -other than all that, she has nothing on us.
Because here comes our book club.
I’ve hinted at it, batted the idea around. Today, I say, what the heck?
So, during May, consider joining me with a good read. We’ll reflect on the book a month for now. You have two options:
If you want to go fiction, May’s choice will be G.K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare. Chesterton called this piece of his work “a very melodramatic sort of moonshine.” I’m intrigued. Any fellow who writes with the heart of a romantic as well as with the mind of a philosopher has my attention, not to mention the fact that he was a major influence on C.S. Lewis. You may have read Chesterton’s classic work, Orthodoxy or his Father Brown mysteries or his work in literary criticism. This, however, will be a tale that I think will snag your interest.
If you want to go theological, May’s choice will by N.T. Wright’s Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection and the Mission of the Church. Few theologians are having as much impact as Wright on the Western theological scene (particularly as it relates to theological praxis in Christian communities). Even Newsweek has taken note, calling Wright “the world’s leading New Testament scholar.” This book will not be some dry treatise on vague, theoretical concepts, however. It will expand your imagination to think quite differently about the reality of heaven - and about our role as the people of God here on earth.
I’m pretty excited about reading both of these. I’d love to have some interaction around these books when we convene our club here in a month (btw, should we name it? I mean, every good club has a name, right?). Drop me an email or land a comment if you plan to join up. The more, the merrier.
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