 |
| He could have called ten thousand angels, or just picked up an Uzi. |
by Ben Howard
What would a Tarantino movie about Jesus look like?
Though I’ve never asked myself that question, I’m certainly
enthralled by the premise. What would an excessively violent revenge fantasy
centered on the Messiah look like? Well, to be fair, The Left Behind series
answered that question a few years ago, but now SNL has given it a shot too
(and they’re actually trying to be funny)!
Last Saturday night, SNL ran a fake trailer for a new
Tarantino movie called Djesus Uncrossed starring Christoph Waltz as Jesus H.
Christ (the H is silent) and Brad Pitt as St. Peter (assuming that St. Peter
was like Brad Pitt’s character in Inglorious Basterds).
If that description in addition to your knowledge of
Tarantino’s aesthetic gives you an idea of what this fake trailer might look
like I want to assure you that it is exactly what you think it is. It. Is. Awesome!
Jesus exacts his revenge on Pilate, on the Roman soldiers,
on random indiscriminate people who happen to be in the palace. Essentially, he
does everything that Jesus’ disciples expected him to do in real life back when
they thought he would lead them to a violent and glorious revolution, except
here he does all that with machine guns and machetes.
The joke of the sketch is obviously the revisionist history
revenge narratives that have formed the center of Tarantino’s last two movies,
Inglorious Basterds and Django Unchained. When he's done a revenge fantasy
for the two great modern travesties, slavery and the Holocaust, how is Tarantino’s
take on the crucifixion that inconceivable?
 |
| Sword-wielding Jesus looks slightly less loving |
Of course, this sketch has elicited outrage in the
conservative Christian community from many who believe that this depiction of
Jesus is blasphemous. It’s rather obvious that I disagree, but I am interested
in why so many find it to be so offensive.
A few weeks ago, Larry Shallenberger wrote an article for
Relevant that was titled, “Why Aren’t Christians Funny?” He makes an
interesting argument that being serious and often humorless is safe, because
real humor comes from places of vulnerability, from the edge of what the things
we’re comfortable with. As a result, we get sermon anecdotes and illustrations
and jokes we’ve all heard about 100 times, but we still instinctively know to
feign laughter.
But real humor pushes us to the edge, and in so doing it can
critique us in profound ways and make us uncomfortable. If a serious
evangelical were to take the time to laugh at the violent Jesus of Djesus
Uncrossed would that eventually make them question the violent justice and
vengeance that they ascribe to God? What would it mean if they laughed?
This is not a wholly evangelical problem. It is a problem
that inhabits all people who take themselves too seriously. I’ve had my fair
share of run-ins with liberal and progressive Christians who have found my
rather tongue-in-cheek attitude towards much of life to be distasteful. Serious
people do not want to be made to question themselves for they have invested far
too much in the things that they think are so very serious.
Laughter has no place when you’re valiantly trying to defend
your ideology.
I wish, very badly, that Christians would stop taking
themselves so seriously. I wish they’d be willing to laugh at things that make
them look ridiculous. I wish they were more self-deprecating. Laughing together
turns strangers into friends and friends into family.
I don’t think laughter can change the world, but I think
love can, and I think laughter helps us all to love each other a little more.
Peace,
Ben
You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology.
Contact us at onpoptheology [at] gmail.com.
No comments:
Post a Comment