Hollywood Jesus
site designer: David Bruce
site established: 24/02/98
number of hits: 6,778,431 hits as of 05/02/00
The Home Page
In contrast to the Michelle Akers Homepage, Ultimate
Love Page and Stonewall Revisited,
David Bruce’s Hollywood Jesus is
explicit about its evangelical agenda from the first. The title of the site
alone makes the content fairly self-evident, and its description in search
engine synopses reads exactly as its home page does - “Pop culture from a
spiritual point of view”. Despite its explicitly evangelistic agenda, the first
frame of the home page makes several concessions to the visual traditions of
the entertainment industry. When I first encountered this site in September
1999, the homepage generated a festival-like atmosphere, with a bouncing ‘Hollywood Jesus’ logo and flashing
marquee lights, and Bruce’s face and message welcoming visitors to his site
from the top of the frame. This introductory layout was a variation on the newspaper
critic’s column, and recalled the print tradition of entertainment reviewing
that preceded the Internet by featuring the by-line and photo of the
commentator and a key phrase that explains the reviewer’s philosophy. Brightly
coloured graphics filled the frame in a bid to catch the notoriously ephemeral
attention of the average web-surfer. Uneven, capitalized bouncing text formed
the animated title graphic and brought to mind the uneven capitals of the
famous wooden ‘Hollywood’ sign that sits on Mount Lee in Griffith Park,
overlooking Hollywood. The ‘Pop Culture’ sign seemed to reference another
object, one more ubiquitous in the American landscape – the road-side church
marquee, itself a reinvention of the theatre marquee. With the site’s most recent
update in April 2000, this first frame of the homepage has altered slightly.
Bruce’s photo is gone, as is the marquee lighting effect around the ‘Pop
Culture’ sign. The ‘Hollywood Jesus’
graphic has been altered, but remains animated; it transforms itself as the
surfer enters the site from ‘Holy Jesus’ to ‘Hollywood Jesus’. The transformed
title then assumes the same irregular arrangement of capitals that makes it
reminiscent of the ‘Hollywood’ sign. In both the old and the new first frames
of the homepage, the referential elements are self-consciously blended into a
design style that at once states its position as Christian, but inclusive of
mainstream American and Internet-specific representational systems. The
remainder of the homepage description is taken from the sites’ appearance as of
February 2000. Since that time, updates have altered the site in appearance and
content.
Fig.1
Scrolling
down on the introductory frame, the user is presented with about twenty
discreetly sized (eleven or twelve point font) linked options, including
reviews and essays on television, video and art, listings of past, present and
upcoming film reviews by Bruce, and information about Bruce himself.
Immediately below are review icons (figure 11) on which the user can click to
reach the central feature of the web site – contemporary popular film reviews.
Each still is accompanied by the title of the film it represents, and a short
sentence about the nature of the review to follow. Positioned over the nine
current reviews is a highlighted text box asking questions about spirituality,
such as “Are there miracles?” or “What is the afterlife like?”, and answering
them with film titles like “The Green Mile, The Third Miracle, Magnolia”
for the former and “The Sixth Sense, Stir of Echoes” for the latter.
Having these questions and ‘answers’ poised above the review icons creates the
feeling that Bruce advocates looking for the answers to questions about
spiritual or religious belief in Hollywood cinema – a unusual position for a
devout American Christian to take, given the blame-ridden antagonism that is
frequently evidenced between Christian groups and secular media. However, given
Bruce’s interpretation of trends in popular culture, the feeling created by
this positioning is not misleading. I will return to Bruce’s movie reviews and
cultural observations shortly. The home page of the site is quite long, and
scrolling down still further, below the review icons, are more coloured and
bounded text boxes showing lists of award-winning films and top box office
earners. At the bottom of the ‘award winners’ and ‘Top Ten’ section is a link
to ‘More Current Reviews’, where other reviews of current film and video
releases are listed.
The next section, with a bold red heading,
lists “Latest breaking entertainment news”, and features a list of ten articles
of relating to Christianity and popular culture. They are skewed toward Christian-interest, with
titles like, “Jane Fonda Becomes Christian, Husband Ted Turner Separates” and
“Evangelist Billy Graham picks JP2 as Man of the Century”. But there are also
secular-interest items, like “Star Wars Episode 1 Coming to Video in April
2000”. The philosophy of the site is revealed at the bottom of the homepage,
and makes the following claim for popular culture: “It is becoming more
spiritual. It is more God oriented. Television shows, like Touched By An
Angel, are now dealing with issues of God and angels. Movies are being made
around biblical themes, like Dogma, City of Angels, and Prince
of Egypt. Hollywood Jesus is
dedicated to this amazing current interest in spirituality.” This statement is
placed over the final three highlighted articles, each represented by a review
icon. These are “Superman is a retelling of the Christ story”, “The strange
connection between the Cross and Hollywood” and “Great art inspires”. The Superman
article points out the ways in which Superman’s life follows the same pattern
of the mythic hero that Christ’s did: the mysterious, otherworldly origin,
early signs of difference, eventual acknowledgement as a savoir,
sacrificial/symbolic death and return to life. These stages of the mythic or
biblical hero’s development are familiar to those who have read Joseph Campbell
on the subject, and these “Christ-like” parallels permeate fiction. Because of
the prevalence of the stock messianic figure in Hollywood entertainment,
Bruce’s determination to find Christian meaning in Hollywood film is often met
with clear parallels between the life of Christ and the heroes of popular
movies.
The home page concludes with the same set of
interim links that separated the first frame from the film reviews (described
above), a reply form to report technical problems with the site, and a ‘Why Hollywood Jesus’ link that explains
what Hollywood Jesus is and is not
about:
WHAT HOLLYWOOD
JESUS IS NOT. Hollywood Jesus
is not a moral watch dog. It is not a "Christian" rating service. I
have been disappointed by how few Christian sites review films from a spiritual
or even Christ-centered point of view.
WHAT HOLLYWOOD
JESUS IS. It is first and foremost spiritual. It is Christ-centered. It
gives in-depth spiritual analysis of popular culture and especially blockbuster
hits.
This page acts as a sort of ‘mission statement’
for the Hollywood Jesus project, and
includes articles taken from ReligionToday.com, which support Bruce’s
observations about the increase in ‘spirituality’ among various populations and
popular media. The ‘Why Hollywood Jesus’ page reveals the site’s agenda, and
once again evangelistic speech is mingled with secular appeal. The focus is
“Christ-centered” [sic] but the site is “not a moral watchdog”. With this
statement Bruce follows the historical precedent of the Evangelical Church in
which he was ordained; identifying himself and his site with Jesus and a
Bible-based Christianity, while distancing both from the rigidity of
fundamentalism. This statement also appeals to the more moderate Internet-using
public.
As is obvious from the number of links listed
on the home page, this is a fairly large site, and its many internal pages
frequently offer additional links to official movie websites or relevant
supporting articles about film reviews that can be found on the Internet.
Internal pages - film reviews
Although Hollywood
Jesus can be considered a personal webpage created by David Bruce, it
shares characteristics of the organizationally-produced website in that there
are multiple content providers. Bruce’s family (especially his wife Mary Nella
and his teenaged daughter Kathleen) and occasional friends and colleagues
contribute to and help to update the site. Therefore there are sometimes
perceptible differences in review style from film to film, although all reviews
follow the premise of the ‘visual review’. The visual review matches
photographic movie outtakes with simple plot synopses and a Bible-derived moral
commentary, as well as aesthetic assessments of the film’s artistic merits.
The Talented Mr. Ripley is a not a film which would
typically be considered filled with inspirational Christian messages: it
depicts open and repressed homosexual relationships, murder and deceit.
Kathleen Bruce attempts to draw out a morally meaningful message from the film
by interspersing stills from the movie with short plot synopses and Biblical
quotes. In Bruce’s greeting on the home page, he states that Hollywood Jesus “reviews films
visually”. This means that photo stills are used to give a brief synopsis of
the plot, with very short, simply phrased descriptive sentences matched to each
photo (figure 12). The photos are paired, and under each pair is a biblical
message and/or quote which provides a counterpoint to the film’s storyline. The
biblical quote and interpretation paired with the still in figure 12 reads:
Anger, d[e]ception, murder is the pattern in the
Bible's Cain and Abel story, which this film reflects: The Lord said to Cain,
"Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well,
will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is lurking at the
door; its desire is for you, but you must master it." Cain said to his
brother Abel, "Let us go out to the field." And when they were in the
field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel, and killed him. -Genesis 4:6-8
(NRSV)
The review of Ripley portrays the film
as a cautionary lesson regarding greed and self-deception. Underneath the
‘visual review’ is a coloured text-box of quotes (non-Biblical) about conceit
and selfishness. User comments on the film and review follow. Below the posted
comments are links for the user to send in his or her own comments for
subsequent posting or private correspondence.
The review style for Ripley is typical of other
Hollywood Jesus reviews in its visual layout, but not in the frequency
of its use of Biblical quotes. David Bruce writes the majority of the Hollywood Jesus reviews, and his writing
style differs from Kathleen’s (and other contributors) in many ways. In his
review of The Green Mile, Bruce uses the same visual layout for the
title and dates of review (10/12/99 for the original review, 26/01/00 for the
update). But Bruce, perhaps because he is more confident in the content of his
reviews, does not rely on biblical quotes to bolster them. His reviews are entirely his own interpretations of the
film’s spiritual message and biblical parallels, going to far as to annotate
the cast listing with comments about the symbolism behind several character’s
names (i.e., “Tom Hanks as Paul Edgecomb (= combing the edge of life,
eternity)”, “Michael Duncan as John Coffey (=Jesus Christ)”). Bruce also gives
his own, not a studio, synopsis, and three RealPlayer files which feature
studio-produced interviews with the cast and crew about the meaning and
symbolism behind the film’s events and characterizations. After the relatively
short ‘visual review’ there is a lengthy section about the religious symbolism
of various plotlines and characters in the film.
Like most personal webpages, Hollywood Jesus offers linked pages
about the authors. The ‘About Us’ pages introduce the user to David and Mary
Nella Bruce and their children. Both Bruce and his wife are graduates of North
Park University/Seminary in Chicago and are ordained ministers in the
Evangelical Covenant Church[1].
Bruce serves as pastor at the Patterson Covenant Church / “Church on the Move”
in Patterson, California. He is described as having “a background in television
administration” (at NBC-TV), and both Bruce and his wife have experience in
radio and Christian print media. As Bruce’s church’s name intimates, he has had
a very mobile ministry, which has travelled with the Bruce family from
California to Chicago. In Chicago they established transitional facilities for
abused women and children and low-income housing facilities. This section
includes photos and descriptions of the ministry’s projects, as well as photos
of Mary Nella’s missionary excursions to Africa.
Parallels in production and intent
Hollywood Jesus enacts all of the web surfer’s expectations of
a film review site. The site can be effectively compared to sites belonging to
the most popular film review sites on the Net, like Roger Ebert’s review page
for the Chicago Sun-Times (www.suntimes.com/ebert). The similarities in structure
between the two sites are striking. Ebert’s site features links to new and
archived reviews, video releases, classic film reviews, interviews, essays,
Ebert’s bio, and audience participation in the form of film questions submitted
by surfers and selectively answered by Ebert. Hollywood Jesus offers analogous sections on each of these topics,
but elaborates on the traditional methods of communication used in the Ebert
site. Bruce uses the multimedia aspects of the Internet much more integratively
than other reviewers with a primarily print based method of delivery. Where the
Sun-Times/Ebert site is almost entirely text-based, with a few audio files of
interviews attached, Bruce often uses audio/visual RealPlayer files to
supplement his reviews, as he did in his review of The Green Mile. The
April 2000 update of the Hollywood Jesus
site has added to the site by exploring the multimedia possibilities available
to the format. Bruce has added audio ‘wallpaper’ – downloadable music
selections that accompany the surfer while he or she visits the site. Hollywood Jesus now also offers a
downloadable short film, directed by a friend of Bruce, and a range of music
reviews by Bob Messer. It also offers downloadable videos of Bruce lecturing
about advertising techniques at the University of Colorado. With these new
additions, the Hollywood Jesus site
broadens its base of appeal and finds new ways to integrate Christian belief
and popular entertainment.
Hollywood Jesus is innovative in its manipulations
of the conventions surrounding the construction of film review websites and its
reinterpretation of evangelistic language strategies. It has pushed the
boundaries of text-based film review sites and developed into a multi-media
entertainment site. This interactive use of the technology identifies Bruce
within the online social network as technically proficient, just as the site’s
thematic content, layout and links with film studios identify it as a
legitimate entertainment review site. Meanwhile, the strategies underlying
Bruce’s film reviews parallel the strategies traditionally used in the
oratorical performance of sermons. Specifically, prefiguring a film’s events
with biblical figures and events is regularly practiced in Hollywood Jesus reviews. This is easily demonstrated by the reviews
for The Talented Mr. Ripley and The Green Mile: characters in the
former are likened to Cain and Abel, and in the latter to Christ, the Apostles
and other major characters in the biblical accounts of Christ’s crucifixion.
The biblical stories provide the template for the dramatic storylines of the films,
beginning a narrative cycle that ends with the internalisation of these stories
by the web surfer reading the reviews. In Harding’s framework, these stories
engage the reader/surfer by requiring him or her to take part in determining
the meaning of the story told in the review. The Hollywood Jesus
surfer’s identification first with the film’s protagonist, then with the
biblical counterpart, and finally with the judgment rendered on that
counterpart in the biblical narrative, completes the dialogic cycle.
Because of its diverse entertainment content
and use of biblical metaphor in film interpretation, Hollywood Jesus creates an effective aesthetic trap for film and
entertainment enthusiasts as well as Christians. The site is an embodiment of
the principles that make an evangelical website effective: it is simply worded
and inclusive, and has didactic value as a means of communicating the idioms
and imagery of Christian belief. As seen above, it also meets all of the
thematic and categorical specifications of a movie review website. These
factors tie the site and its creator into a membership with two communities.
The evangelical community is the primary association, but membership in the
community of film enthusiasts is equally valid. Like Michelle Akers, Bruce is a
member of both of these communities in the real world, where membership is
ratified by action (making sermons in church and giving lectures at
universities and conferences) and in the virtual world. Online, Bruce’s
associations with both communities are ratified through the links found in his
website, and in other websites that mirror Hollywood Jesus. Links to
film studios and official movie websites indicate membership in the online
social network of reviewers and film buffs, while links to sites like the
Evangelical Covenant Church website indicate religious affiliation and
evangelical intent. As well as having legitimate membership in these on- and
off-line social networks, Hollywood Jesus
is able to establish itself as the locus of an integrative sub-community that
blends two social categories into one, turning film-lovers and Christians into
film-loving Christians. Through the ‘Comments’ postings that are appended to
each review, surfers can become participants in Hollywood Jesus as a social forum. The dominant values and language
of the sub-community defined by Hollywood Jesus are at once evangelistic
in essence and intended to appeal to the sensibilities of a film-loving secular
audience base. Opinions that transgress the norms of tolerance that are
expected on the Internet are rebuked through Bruce’s commentary on audience
responses. Such an instance of censure can be found in postings for The
Green Mile. One respondent wrote the following about possible symbolism in
the film:
…One person commented saying why was "Tom
Hanks" cursed by John Coffey even if not on purpose. I took it as an
allegory of the Jews, who crucified Jesus. Yes, they have not as a whole turned
to Christ yet, but one day a remnant or a group of them will be saved.
Bruce wrote a lengthy reply regarding the
apparent anti-Semitism behind the respondent’s comment responded, “It is
important to remember that no ethnic group is responsible for the death of
Jesus... Jesus was Jewish, his disciples were Jewish, and the majority of the
New Testament was written by Jews”. Like the creators of Stonewall Revisited,
Bruce takes pains to see that no impression of intolerance is communicated
through his website. This is made slightly easier because Hollywood Jesus
is not designed to argue against any particular lifestyle or practice (as are
both Stonewall Revisited and Ultimate Love Page); criticism of
any practice is cloaked in the analogy of the review. When Bruce does make
direct censorious statements, they are usually directed toward intolerance from
Christians. In the review for Tarzan, one respondent protests vehemently
against supporting Disney creations because the Disney Corporation “supports
homosexuality”. Bruce’s response to this is “God loves every Gay person on
earth and Jesus died on the cross for every Gay person…Your comments reflect a
very legalistic morality based Christianity that alienates others, rather than
an attractive Christ-centered love for others that draws.”
Although at odds with the public image of
evangelism in the post-televangelist scandal era, tolerance has become the new
watchword in evangelistic media, and is increasingly portrayed as the truest
expression of Christianity by evangelicals. This interpretation of Christianity
blends perfectly with the dominant value system of the Internet-using public,
and lends credibility to the evangelistic movement as a whole in the eyes of
the secular public.
[1] the Evangelical Covenant Church describes itself in the Preamble to its constitution and by-laws as ”…[Adhering] to the affirmation of the Protestant Reformation regarding the Holy Scriptures, the Old and the New Testament, as the Word of God and the only perfect rule for faith, doctrine, and conduct. It has traditionally valued the historic confessions of the Christian church, particularly the Apostles' Creed, while at the same time it has emphasized the sovereignty of the Word over creedal interpretations. It has especially cherished the pietistic restatement of the doctrine of justification by faith as basic to the dual task f evangelism and Christian nurture, the New Testament emphasis upon personal faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, the reality of a fellowship of believers which recognizes but transcends theological differences, and the belief in baptism and the Lord's Supper as divinely ordained sacraments of the church. While the denomination has traditionally practiced the baptism of infants, in conformity with its principle of freedom it has also recognized the practice of believer baptism. The principle of personal freedom, so highly esteemed by the Covenant, is to be distinguished from the individualism that disregards the centrality of the Word of God and the mutual responsibilities and disciplines of the spiritual community." http://www.covchurch.org/cov/html/history.html, 07/02/00