Just because I found it a deliciously ironic bit of metaphor-mongering, and this seemed like the right thread to put it in, let me give you folks a quote from Navigator, a committed Christian who is a regular poster here and moderator on another board, responding to a question there:
Those damn squirrels used to keep me up night’s, until I started letting out the hellcat.
I’m gunna try fox urine… 
Ogre wrote:
Oh, it’s worse than that. Much worse.
The whole pre-tribulation rapture occurs nowhere in the Book of Revelation at all!
In fact, the idea of a pre-tribulation Rapture wasn’t invented until then 19th century, when a theologian named John Darby took an obscure passage about Christ’s second coming in Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17) – a passage written well before Revelation was penned – and concocted, out of the blue, the interpretation that the events foretold in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 would happen right before the Tribulation in Revelation.
So Left Behind cannot even be said to be predicated upon the Bible.
Unfortunately for all of us that were pulling for it, you are correct. It seems at this point that Cloud Ten’s decision to release to video first was as bad of an idea as it’s seemed all along. As far as I know, the video was the #1 selling video of 2000, beating Toy Story and Green Mile. If the people who had bought the video all been at the theatre Friday, it almost certainly would have been top 10 at least. But, while it IS a better experience in a theatre, it’s a hard sell to make if you already own the product.
Cloud Ten is saying that the biggest problem was they simply weren’t able to open in enough theatres – they ended up with 860-something, far short of the 1500 they were hoping for. Interestingly enough, the film did pretty GOOD in the theatres it was playing in – my theatre sold out tickets the day before the movie, as did many others. But the grand sum wasn’t enough because the competition had twice as many theatres, AND there was that video-first factor as well. They are hoping to forge ahead and hope that word of mouth will cause the movie to rise next weekend. I guess anything’s possible. We’ll see.
betenoir and Polycarp, since I really don’t want to get into a lengthy “Last Temptation” debate, I’ll simply say that you both made some valid points but I still believe Last Temptation goes beyond what you guys said and has some inaccuracies. But let’s save that for another debate.
LOL! LaHaye is brilliant. He had written some of the most intelligent and thought-provoking writing out there on people’s personality types (“Why You Do The Things You Do”) and on marriage (“The Act of Marriage”). Just because you happen to disagree with some of his conclusions doesn’t make him “nuts”.
Sounds interesting, I’ll have to check it out.
I would say that access to eyewitnesses make the Gospels ten times more relevant.
Yup, they’re still available in Christian bookstores. They’re at our Lifeway Store here. You can probably find them online too (try Christianbook.com, the “Amazon.com” of Christian books).
Sorry you didn’t like it! I understand some of your points. I don’t agree with the severity of your comments, but I agree the screenplay could’ve been better, and some of the sideline characters were weak actors. But I would disagree that the movie overall was boring. I found it quite compelling myself. But to each their own as they say.
Having an agenda in and of itself isn’t a bad thing … the issue I had with “The Rapture” (or at least what I was hearing about it) was that it’s agenda seemed to be to paint those who believe in the book of Revelation in a bad light. I may have misunderstood but that’s what it sounded like to me. Yes Left Behind and many other movies have an agenda. Some agendas are good, some are bad.
I don’t have a problem with fiction, but lets put it this way: I loved the movie “Shakesphere in Love”, which is obviously a ficitional account of how Romeo and Juliet was written. What if this movie was promoted as if the story was true, and not fiction? That’s the problem I have with TLTOC.
You know what? I have heard exactly what you just said for years. I have always leaned toward a “post-trib” viewpoint. However I’ve heard good arguments on both sides. You might find it interesting to know that Lahaye and Jenkins’ teaching companion book to the LB Series, “Are We Living in the End Times?”, debunks the “it was invented in the 19th century” thing very convincingly. I was rather surprised. They didnt totally convince me of a pre-trib rapture, but gave me a new respect for that viewpoint that I never thought I’d have.
FoG: Having an agenda in and of itself isn’t a bad thing … the issue I had with “The Rapture” (or at least what I was hearing about it) was that it’s agenda seemed to be to paint those who believe in the book of Revelation in a bad light.
Whereas the agenda of the “Left Behind” series is to paint those who don’t believe in the book of Revelation in a bad light. (And Ben, I think your musings on the effects of this sort of thing form one of the most insightful postings I’ve read on the SDMB.) If it’s gonna be a competition, I don’t think the difference in agenda makes up for the fact that “The Rapture” was infinitely better written, better thought out, and better acted. We won’t get better religious art if we try to excuse its flaws by saying “yes, but at least it’s religious!”
*Yes Left Behind and many other movies have an agenda. Some agendas are good, some are bad. *
Well, that’s candid, at least!
I had said: “Basically, LaHaye is nuts. He thinks the evil humanists are hiding behind every bush and that they are involved in a huge one-world socialist conspiracy to wipe out Christianity.”
FoG replied:
It has nothing to do with my agreement or disagreement – the man is simply nuts. I’m not basing this on hearsay or something I read about him in the paper. I read his book. He is a lunatic. He should be locked up.
Frontline presented an interesting program on apocalyptic thinking a couple of years ago. The Rapture was presented as a 19th century US invention. A fuller chronology of the apocalyptic world view is shown on the following link:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/etc/cron2.html
(Note also the page covering the 1500BCE to 1492 CE period).
The main webpage for their program follows:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/
More than was spent on Ben-Hur? More than was spent on The Greatest Story Ever Told? (Remember to allow for inflation.) Or maybe you don’t, for some reason, consider those to be “Christian features”?
I’ve only seen the TV commercials for LB - The Movie and I’ve noticed something odd: They never tell you what the movie is about, only that it’s “based on the New York Times bestseller.” (If I had never before heard of Left Behind, I might think it was just a low-budget action flick starring some has-been and never-were actors.)
Are they afraid that if they told viewers the movie’s premise that they would actually get fewer customers?
I couldn’t agree more. I and many others will very politely but honestly tell CTP what we think they should do differently next time, believe me!
DavidB, you know you really need to stop holding back and let us know what you really think :). I will not even try to debate this point with you because I know you to be someone who is pretty unyielding in his views. If you really want to believe Dr Lahaye is a lunatic, have fun :).
Perhaps I should say “in recent years”, ie the past 30 years or so. I would simply define a Christian film as a film that has a Christian “world view”.
I disagree … I have the trailer on my PC, and it’s pretty clear … “What if … you knew … this … was about to happen?” as they disapparences and chaos occur, then “Prepare to witness … an ancient prophesy … about to come true” … then “Fear … (clips from film) … Deception … (more clips) … Faith … (more clips)”.
The clips clearly show Bruce saying, “It’s written in the Scriptures, I guarantee it”, and (while staring at the cross) “I knew your message, I knew your words …”.
It’s pretty clear cut to me, WITHOUT giving anything away.
FWIW, the New York Times (surprise, surprise) panned Left Behind, although the review did contain a kind reference to The Rapture.
link (registration required):
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/02/arts/02LEFT.html
Excerpt from review: " …the film appears to become a futuristic global thriller with sci-fi overtones written and filmed in the clunking kitsch style of a 1970’s made-for-television disaster movie. But the dialogue won’t stop making bizarre thudding sounds. International potentates discussing world events are given to straight-faced utterances like, “World peace: it’s been a dream ever since Cain looked sideways at Abel.”
…For all its intimations of fire and brimstone, the film isn’t remotely frightening, and the high-school-level acting doesn’t help. To see the same theme drawn out with visual daring and a genuine sense of awe, try renting Michael Tolchin’s 1991 film “The Rapture.” "
FoG said:
Well, I’ll try to become more of an extrovert.
It’s not a matter of being “unyielding.” It’s a matter of evidence. Have you read Mind Siege? Do you believe there is a worldwide conspiracy of “humanists” to create a socialist one-world government, destroy Christianity, take our children away, throw religious people in jail, etc.?
I remember a very low-budget movie from the 70’s about the Rapture that was also called “Left Behind.” A girl wakes up and sees her father’s electric razor running by itself. Everyone is forced to wear the “mark of the beast” on their foreheads. (Spoiler coming . . .) The girl tries to evade the forces of evil but ends up leaping from a dam (a thinly-veiled allusion to damnation, I presume). An eerie chorus singing “You’ve been left behind” over and over at the end.
Has anyone else seen this?
Come to think of it, there is an atheist-themed movie out there.
Sort of.
One of the big themes in Logan’s Run was that “renewal” in Carousel was a big made-up lie. (“Renewal” was apparently something akin to reincarnation. Supposedly, Logan 5 was the 5th reincarnation of the original Logan’s “soul”, at least according to the Gospel preached by the City’s big bad central computer.)
FriendofGod wrote:
Yeah, but Bruce is also clearly saying these words angrily, as if to say, “My God, my God, why hast thou foresaken me?”. He could be asking God why he wasn’t Ratured with the rest of the True Believers, but if you don’t know the context of the film, he could just as well be a lone man facing personal difficulties by talking to a cross, with his religion being incidental to the plot.
Actually I just heard about this new book recently, and no I haven’t read it. Is is a Christian fiction novel or a teaching book? I’ve actually been curious what it was about.
As for what I believe about all of the above … I think “worldwide conspiracy” is overstating it, but good grief you’d have to be blind to not see all of the individual elements listed above creeping slowly into American culture and life.
There are people out there who want to see a one world government. There are people out there who want to destroy Christianity and throw Christians in jail. Ask those in China who’ve experienced it firsthand during the past century. There have been more Christian martyrs during the past century than in all of church history combined. We aren’t experiencing anything close to that in America today, but there are many people in the good ole USA who would love to see it happen.
Now I am saying this having not read Dr Lahaye’s book. It sounds from your review like he is trying to tie it all together into a global conspiracy. If there is any conspiracy at all, personally I think it’s 100% spiritual-based. But I’ll never reject an idea out of hand until I see evidence one way or the other, so I might just have to read this book.
THAT IS THE MOVIE I’m talking about! It’s actually not called “Left Behind”, its called “A Thief in the Night”, but the theme song is the classic “I Wish We’d All Been Ready” by Larry Normon. The last lines of the song are: “The Son has come and you’ve been left behind … you’ve been left behind”. So that’s where you got that from.
Again, it also clearly shows him saying in another part, “It’s written in the scriptures, I guarantee it”. It makes it pretty clear where he’s coming from.
Okay, but you know that part in the Left Behind trailer where that fighter plane broke formation and fired two missiles? That looked awfully fake to me.
Name one.
Other than the fact that Rayford is presented as flawed, how does this differ from my characterization of the scene?
Incidentally FoG, have you even seen LTOC? After all, it starts with a big statement indicating that it is not making any claims to historical authenticity, but is merely using Jesus as a metaphor. It seems to me that all of your criticisms of the movie are, therefore, a big straw man.
And while we’re at it, what would you do if it became obvious that the Muslim Day of Judgement were at hand?
-Ben
We must be talking about different promos, because I don’t recall seeing any of that in the TV spot.