Unpop Culture

I have good news and bad news. The good news is that much of the pushback I received on my critique of the film Redeeming Love is based on statements I didn’t actually make and positions I don’t actually hold. As such, much of the disagreement publicly shared is unfounded. The bad news, of course, is that such a high level of reader misinterpretation happened in the first place. A lot of digital ink has been spilt arguing with rhetorical phantoms. While I am saddened that so many people walked away from my piece unnecessarily confused, I am also glad to clear the air and clarify my intentions. Toward that end, I wish to address several misconceptions. One key factor is the title of the article itself. In the beginning, my working title was Redeeming Love’s Unfortunate Exploitation . By using the word “unfortunate,” I hoped to communicate a sympathetic posture toward the film and its intentions. Of course, the final title is different from my initial suggestion: ‘Redeeming Love’...

“The truth does not matter. There is only the power of men.” These words come from The Last Duel , Ridley Scott’s historical drama about the last sanctioned trial-by-combat in medieval France . This particular movie has been on my radar for a while, as it touches on topics I have spent years researching and writing about. My friend Jonathan Broxton describes the focus of the film thus: “the powerlessness, lack of agency, and mis-treatment [sic] of women throughout time.” The story, he says, helps us see “how comparatively little has changed over the course of the past several centuries in terms of how sexual assault is viewed differently by men and women.” As such, I am grateful for the opportunity for collective introspection provided by big-screen treatments of this subject. In spite of my excitement over The Last Duel , however, there is a problem. Two problems, actually. In attempting to address the debasement of women in society, the movie inadvertently debases its actresses....

It is inherently problematic to condemn a specific film or television show from the sidelines, without personal experience of what that work of art communicates. When Christians dismissed Darren Aronofsky’s 2014 film Noah , for example, many of them did so on erroneous grounds, not knowing what was actually in the movie . Blind condemnation is dangerous and unhelpful. When it comes to pornographic content, however, we move away from the debatable and ambiguous elements of artistic merit, and toward more solid distinctions between right and wrong. Hypersexualized storytelling methods are an aspect worth criticizing. A Christian can—and should—condemn pornographic material without having to engage each instance on a case-by-case basis. Thus, I am comfortable and confident to condemn pornographic techniques used in any mainstream film, whether I’ve seen that film or not. Such condemnation is not unfair to the work as a whole. That is why I have spoken up about certain films I haven’t ...

As someone who’s not a fan of chick flicks and romantic comedies (like, at all), I was surprised to find myself genuinely intrigued by the first trailer I saw for Long Shot (starring Seth Rogen and Charlize Theron), which played up the sentimental aspects of the story. Subsequent trailers, however, more clearly hinted at the raunchier side of things . In the end, I decided not to see the movie. What I did recently see, however, was a video clip from an interview Rogen and Theron gave during their press tour for Long Shot . In a segment on The Graham Norton Show , where they were discussing porn star Stormy Daniels’ dalliances with Donald Trump, Norton brought up the fact that Seth Rogen has actually worked with Daniels before. After Theron incredulously asked, “What?!” several times, Rogen clarified what his working relationship with the porn star entailed. Below is a (slightly cleaned up) transcript of what he said: Stormy Daniels is in Knocked Up and The 40 Year ...

I’ve been researching and writing about sexualized entertainment for over four years now. One of the most frequent responses to my articles goes something like this: “Nudity and sex scenes don’t bother me.” While I’ve addressed this argument before, Speculative Faith asked me to write a more thorough rebuttal: In just the last few years, some of our most popular fantasy stories include material that at one time would have been considered porn. These include films such as Passengers , Blade Runner 2049 , and The Shape of Water , as well as TV shows such as Game of Thrones , Westworld , and Altered Carbon . Concerns about content like this are often raised in relation to children and teens, whose emotional and physical development make them more impressionable. When it comes to adults, however, we find little concern expressed. In fact, a lot of people claim to have no issues watching films with explicit sexual content. The material doesn’t affect them—or so they...

I’m not hip. My exposure to most pop music involves hearing the songs my wife adds to her Spotify playlists. If not for that, I probably wouldn’t know much (or anything) about Adele or Taylor Swift or One Republic or Imagine Dragons. Aren’t you glad she’s in my life? (I am—immensely.) Being the unhip hipster that I am (you know, uncool before it’s cool to be uncool), I only first heard Ed Sheeran’s “ Shape of You ” several weeks ago. It caught my attention for a couple of reasons. First, it’s catchy. And second, it reminded me of Harvey Weinstein. My mind made an immediate connection between the song’s lyrics and Salma Hayek’s 2017 op-ed for The New York Times: “ Harvey Weinstein Is My Monster Too .” In it, Hayek describes how Weinstein manipulated and harassed her. The abuse came to a head when Weinstein allegedly threatened to shut down Hayek’s pet project—the movie Frida (which, at the time, was in the middle of production)—unless she agreed to add a lesbian sex scene ...

The only thing that shocked most people in the film industry about the Harvey Weinstein story was that suddenly, for some reason, people seemed to care. That knowledge alone allowed a lot of us to breathe for the first time in ages. These are the heartbreaking words of writer/actor/director Sarah Polley in her New York Times piece The Men You Meet Making Movies . Polley continues: I’ve grown up in this industry, surrounded by predatory behavior, and the idea of making people care about it seemed as distant an ambition as pulling the sun out of the sky. Polley’s testimony, among countless others, has saddened and sickened me, though it also gives me hope. It appears that we as a society may be growing more serious about dealing with sexual violence. Open secrets are becoming more open and less secret, and that is good. I applaud the bravery of women (and men) who have shared their #MeToo stories in an effort to affect change. At the same time, we must focus on more ...

It is near impossible to adequately address a controversial topic in one blog post. Take one (fairly) recent entry: A Tale of Two Sexual Assaults on Jennifer Lawrence . There is much I could have said but didn’t. And by leaving many things unsaid, I inevitably left the door open for people to hear things I did not say. Based on feedback I’ve received, I want to clarify and strengthen my argument by examining three items: 1) the underlying message of the movie Passengers , 2) the controversial language I chose, and 3) human agency—in particular, female agency. Please be forewarned that the following material contains spoilers for the movie Passengers. THE MESSAGE OF PASSENGERS In a work of art, the message and/or worldview of the artist(s) is shown not just in the story that is being told, but in the way the story is being told. The storyteller’s method is part of the message . And the general consensus among critics is that sexual exploitation is the inescapable...