Movie Review: 'American Gospel'
By Tim Challies - Posted at Challies.com:
I would like to think we’re coming into a golden age for documentary film and television. There are many reasons for this, though most are related to the new digital economy. Not only does the internet provide new channels for distribution, but it also provides new methods for fundraising. Creating a film is extremely expensive, but crowdfunding (via Kickstarter or its many competitors) can defray that expense across hundreds or thousands of people. Meanwhile investors and other financial supporters are seeing greater promise in the medium. Filmmakers are responding by creating some excellent new works that may not have been possible even a decade ago.
New to the field is American Gospel: Christ Alone, a film about what Americans understand to be the good news of the Christian faith. It asks, “Is Christianity Christ + the American dream?” It then tells “how the prosperity gospel (the Word of Faith movement) has distorted the gospel message, and how this theology is being exported abroad.” It is, in short, a film about how the gospel espoused by so many so-called Christians is not good news at all. This gospel is not drawn from the Bible but from the worldly desire for a long, comfortable, and affluential life.
Read more here.
I would like to think we’re coming into a golden age for documentary film and television. There are many reasons for this, though most are related to the new digital economy. Not only does the internet provide new channels for distribution, but it also provides new methods for fundraising. Creating a film is extremely expensive, but crowdfunding (via Kickstarter or its many competitors) can defray that expense across hundreds or thousands of people. Meanwhile investors and other financial supporters are seeing greater promise in the medium. Filmmakers are responding by creating some excellent new works that may not have been possible even a decade ago.
New to the field is American Gospel: Christ Alone, a film about what Americans understand to be the good news of the Christian faith. It asks, “Is Christianity Christ + the American dream?” It then tells “how the prosperity gospel (the Word of Faith movement) has distorted the gospel message, and how this theology is being exported abroad.” It is, in short, a film about how the gospel espoused by so many so-called Christians is not good news at all. This gospel is not drawn from the Bible but from the worldly desire for a long, comfortable, and affluential life.
Read more here.
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