Creeking More In The ATL (with your host Nate Creekmore) Episode #13

I'm not from Atlanta, but I live here, and (because I live here) people who don't live here ask me, "Creek, what's Atlanta really like?"  I don't know what Atlanta is really like, but if you'd like to know what it's like for me, I invite you to sit back and enjoy another episode of "CREEKING MORE IN THE ATL (with your host Nate Creekmore)"!!!

[Signs and Wonders]

In the city of Atlanta, as in every large American city, sometimes there are protests.  Some of those protests are massive and mammoth and monumental.

...and then some of them look like this:

Every few weeks or months, you'll see a group of people sitting in front of a business with one of these Fill-In-The-Blank Stock Protest Banners propped out in front of them.

No one is making a speech, there are no bullhorns, no catchy, rhyming chants, no police, no signs asking you to honk, no one is marching or even standing.  Mostly there's just a lot of sitting.  And boredom.

I'm not even sure what they want me to do exactly.  Boycott?  Write to my congressman?  What, precisely, is so shameful about this company/organization in particular?  The sign gives me no answers.

But if I'm being honest, this is probably the kind of protest I could get on board with.  My mild (self-diagnosed) agoraphobia would make participation in a large protest untenable, but something as laid back and genial as this would be completely feasible.  Nobody is being shot by police or vigilantes or disgruntled nihilists, nobody is talking about looting anything, nobody is burning any tires.  It's just an affable bunch of folks sitting down, hanging out, holding up an innocuous sign.   Heck, you could bring the whole family out to this one, make it a nice Sunday afternoon protest/picnic.

And speaking of signs, as you make your way through the distinctive residential neighborhoods that make up Atlanta and the greater Atlanta area, you might notice that some neighborhoods have an overabundance of these signs:

I don't guess there's anything too abnormal about a private property sign, but when I see them in every yard (some yards having a multiplicity of signs) I begin to wonder what's going on.  Would people otherwise just come right into the yard and start having a party?

Would they take things?

Or is this just the best way to keep Walmart from building one of those increasingly ubiquitous neighborhood stores right on your driveway?

And what about those signs, those billboards, that keep showing up along 85?  The ones that look like this:

Actors and models and talent for Christ?  Jesus Christ?  What does he want with actors and models and talents?  I looked through the gospel accounts to see if Jesus ever had anything to say about it.  Maybe it was in one of his sermons...

Nope.  Nothing.  Not even John's gospel had anything to say about it.  Actually, Jesus did mention talents at one point, but I think he was talking about money.  Is that what these billboards are talking about?  Actors and models and money for Christ..? 

I decided to look at the rest of the New Testament to see if maybe one of his apostles had anything to say about acting and modeling and talenting for Jesus...

I couldn't find anything (...there might have been something in Revelation, but if there was it slipped right past me.  I've never been very good at Revelation...).

...

I should stop.  I'm being unfair and dishonest.  The people behind these billboards are probably very nice people who have read the Bible at some point and they probably noticed, as they read, that Jesus never had anything specific to say about acting and modeling and talenting.  They probably looked over at Hollywood and, even though they love movies and advertising and talent shows, recognized that there was no place for them.

And so they decided to make their own facsimile of the world of acting and modeling and talenting; they get to pretend to be in Hollywood without actually (committing the sin of) being in Hollywood.  And as Hollywood aspires(*cough*) to make art, this strange parallel world aspires to make... I'm not sure what they're trying to make, actually.  Their movies tend to have names like Courageousness and Nonflammable and they are less films than they are pamphlets, which is great if you like your movies to be pamphlets.  But if you don't like your movies to be pamphlets, they can be hard to sit through.

I think they're kind of in a bind, these actors and models and talents.  If their intent is to evangelize the unbelieving masses, their inability to communicate in a recognizable language (and their penchant for reducing the search for meaning in the midst of meaninglessness into a farcical caricature of human experience) keeps their message, true or false, at an unreachable distance.  How does one depict depravity when one is not allowed to depict depravity?  How does one make a compelling propaganda film?  Why have we all agreed that these kinds of movies are the only ones that can correctly be referred to as Christian films?

And what exactly is a Christian film?

Can you watch a movie like Pinocchio without recognizing the repercussions of sin and the grace of redemption?  Or how about It's A Wonderful Life?  Isn't it all about the sanctity of each individual human life?  Groundhog Day has more than a touch of the book of Ecclesiastes (and Ephesians) with a man who samples all things to no effect (until he finally begins to redeem the time).  What of the conversion of selfishness into selflessness as depicted in Casablanca?  What of the divine, self-sacrifice of City Lights?  Do you prefer a film that depicts Christ more directly?  How about The Gospel According to St Matthew (the one that came out in 1964)?  The Thin Red Line takes its ideas about seeing right out of the book of John.

Maybe the movies (and ads and whatever talents make) made by the people behind the Actors And Models And Talent For Christ aren't really meant to be Christian movies at all.  Maybe they're not turning matters of faith into paint-by-numbers screenplays in order to make Christians with actual problems feel like irredeemable failures, maybe they're just doing it to give themselves a safe place to play with all of their beautifully talented actor friends.  And if that's the case, play on!  But maybe take a second to clarify your billboards.

 There you have it foks, another exciting episode of "Creeking More In The ATL (with your host Nate Creekmore)"!  Be sure and come back for the next installment wherein someone tells me that AMTC somehow has nothing to do with the production of Christian movies and that I maybe ought to take a second to do some actual research next time.