Movie Mayhem with God: Hapless in the Desert? Maybe not.

Many reviewers, both secular and religious, were letdown with the movie “Last Days in the Desert”. For the secular reviewers, there was the issue of Hollywood whitewashing, which isn't what I’m discussing here. Meanwhile for the religious reviewers, there was the view that this movie had portrayed Jesus Christ as relatively weak-willed, too humanistic in an effort to relate to the audience, not enough depiction on his mental and moral steeliness in the face of temptation, being the Christ he is. Or is there actually a subtle depiction of this?

I had watched the movie as far back as 5 months ago in April, and my initial view towards the movie was that was of feeling lost and confounded, though there was this nagging notion that there’s was something “bigger” which I just couldn't shake it off.  And surprise surprise, it was a secular book aimed at deconstructing common negative myths about singlehood, which imparted me some concepts, which helped me appreciate the movie better (Side-point, loud shout-out for everyone to have a look at the book, “It’s Not You: 27 (Wrong) Reasons You’re Single” by Sara Eckel). In particular, it was this particular passage which had leapt out.

“We get angry when others infer those [negativity] about us, but we all know who the harshest judge is. Instead of trying to justify yourself or make someone else wrong in order to pump yourself up, try doing the completely counter intuitive thing: Let the demons in. Give those deep dark feelings about yourself some breathing room. Take your intellect out of it and allow yourself to feel whatever you've been resisting. Treat those sensations like they're part of a scientific experiment. Normally we treat difficult emotions like a judge or a boss, like punishment for some wrong we've committed... When you no longer fear the feelings behind the judgments, then they become manageable. The demons feed on resistance, so when you aren't afraid of them - when you can simply see them objectively and name them - they have nothing to work with. And when that happens, they very slowly leave.”

Pages 156-158

In the light of re-interpreting the movie with this passage in mind, the movie now takes a whole new and more clarified meaning.

The movie is rather slow moving, showing Jesus’ journey through the desert during that 40 days, his fictional interactions with a random nomadic family. And of course there’s the appearance of the devil, personified in the image of an alter-image. This alterego would purpose latch onto whatever suffering that the nomadic family was going through, as opportunities to get Jesus to question and doubt his conviction and faith.

This is where Father Robert Barron took issue with, what was felt as an over-emphasis on Jesus’ humanism and vulnerability. However, this lack of offense-defense against the devil, seemingly consenting to relentless attack after attack, may actually be a form of Jesus’ deep-rooted self-assuredness.  Of course as the Son of God, Jesus is great enough to easily dismiss the devil. Why waste 40 days’ worth of precious time? Maybe during those 40 days, Jesus was as hapless as we think he was, mistakenly interpreting the inactivity of the movie as such. In fact Jesus had understood that 40 days was a precious opportunity given to him, to be up close and personal with the devil, looking at it squarely in the face, observing it, taking it in fully for what it was, to prepare him for the cross later, as hinted in the movie’s fleeting final scene.

There’s often the talk about the fight or flight mode in human nature. Both are very focused on the “doing”. It seems like I should explore “being” more. Amen.