Celluloid Sermons: The Emergence of the Christian Film Industry, 1930–1986 by Terry Lindvall, Andrew Quicke (review)

Lindvall and Quicke traced the corpus of filmmaking, and the film-related activities of organizations or individuals who sought to evangelize, preach, teach, provoke, or convert through the medium of 16mm film—otherwise known as celluloid sermons. As the title indicates, the authors focused on the period of 1930–1986. However, they contextualized Christian “talkies” with the purposes, technological challenges, and failures and successes of silent Christian films such as King of Kings written by Jeanie Macpherson and directed by Cecil B. DeMille, 1927. Discussions of post-1986 films such as The Passion of the Christ (2004) serve as the closing bookend to situate the text’s target period along the trajectory of the Christian filmmaking.

The authors focused on the activities of Protestant churches, but included the activities and influences of Catholic churches, clergy, and laymen in the ecumenical crusade against the perceived lack of morals being projected at twenty-four frames per second on theater screens across America. Lindvall and Quicke chronicle the involvement of organizations created to support and manage the Christian film industry, and the roles played by existing Christian and secular organizations. Various forms of support came from companies like Eastman Kodak, corporate magnates, and other wealthy individuals. The appendix, Chronology of Christian Film History, helps the reader to follow the discussion of the overlapping histories.

Readers are helped to appreciate the challenges faced by the Christian film industry in its struggle to utilize film technology for its own purposes and audiences. For example, filmmaker Ken Anderson’s primary aim was effective messaging regarding Christian training and discipleship. He was criticized for “simply producing radio drama on film” (140). Mel White eventually worked on a group of biographical films based on the twenty-third psalm. Though I Walk Through the Valley, based on the life of Tony Brouwer, follows the struggle of a Christian college professor living with terminal cancer. It is one of the first films to record the last year in the life of a dying man. The authors reported that the reality film “horrified and humbled” one viewer as “the brazen camera intrudes on the intensely private suffering of a family watching the husband and father die” (137). It can be argued that such a film would not shock or awe today. Lindvall and Quicke provided numerous examples that demonstrate how several genres resulted from the varied interests of Christian filmmakers. For the Christian film industry there seems to have been a constant struggle between didactic messages verses entertainment. The authors explicate how opening up film studies for Christian students moved Christian films away from this struggle toward adopting Hollywood cinematic techniques and narrative styles that generated more appeal for their audience and created new audiences.

The authors acknowledged leaving out “significant and valuable contributions” made by filmmakers, religious groups, and secular organizations (xiv). However, they hint that there is a “next part” to this story (218). It is an opportunity for the authors to include some of what they have missed in this highly informative volume.