Engaging Culture

Rating:  

I had a great time watching “The Lovely Bones” last night, it was a full house. The acting was superb and the imagery of the film was amazing. Susie Salmon (Saorise Ronan) is kidnapped and murdered. What would be the tragic end of another movie, is just where the story really begins. The glimpse into the suffering of a family and a community at the loss of one of its children was very well done. I could feel the emotions of the father desperate for answers and the mother on the brink of despair.

The entire story was narrated by the dead Susie. After her murder, she “feels like life is leaving her” and she awakes in a gorgeous setting, “alone in her own perfect world.” We come to find out that she is not in heaven yet, she is in what the film calls, “the in-between.” And her job in this place/state is to forget all about her former life. Until she can leave it behind, she can’t progress to heaven. The place that she found herself in was described as, “not heaven and not the other place but a little bit of both.” The other place could refer to hell or Earth, we are not told which.

In reality, there is no place like that. No place of atonement or forgetting. The Christian has no need to make atonement or forget, Because Jesus has made payment in full and he will wipe every tear from our eyes. This would be an amazing film if Susie found herself face to face with the glory of God (though then the question of her faith would have to be answered since it wasn’t even brought up in the film) and she easily forgot all about the troubles of the world as she was completely fulfilled and made whole, transformed by the love of her Savior. Then the rest of the movie could have been about how the family coped with the loss, revenge, anger, drunkenness, denial, etc.

The most interesting scene of the film, from a social standpoint, was when the villain got his comeuppance. The theater burst into applause and cheers at the vindication, the justice, that they saw on screen. It was proof positive that no one really believes that truth is relative. We may claim to be “tolerant” and not judgmental. But every person in that theater was intolerant of the aberrant behavior of the villain. However if a “good person” were to have a similar fate, people would cry out, “Injustice! Where is God! Why do bad things happen to “good” people?” It takes biblical revelation to know that there are not “good” people. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and salvation is only found in Jesus Christ. Apart from him, we all are bad people who deserve to go to “the other place.”

From a Christian point-of-view, this movie could have shown a crowd of un-believers that justice belongs to God, and life and death are in his hands. They could have seen that there can be hope for life after death. And it could have given caution to those who believe themselves to be “good” people, that salvation is found in no one but Jesus.