I enjoyed the film simply because of Marjoe's "performance." He was a very compelling character, and his moral dilemma was an interesting struggle. As a person who grew up in a church and later abandoned his spiritual upbringing, I could feel for Marjoe in this film. A lot of the ideas of corruption and swindling that I had always considered about some of the Christian faith were made much more apparent in the film. Regardless of your spiritual beliefs, I think this film presents a realistic picture of the treatment of faith in the 1960s and 70s. It was an altogether revolutionary time in this country, and many people Marjoe's age were beginning to break away from their upbringing in very startling ways. Marjoe is just another example of this. It just so happens that his childhood was so extraoridinary that when Marjoe became a pot-smoking hippie, it seemed like such an extreme change.
I did think the film was very interesting for a lot of its thematics, but to be honest, if there had been less of Marjoe, I would have fallen asleep. There were really only a few minutes of interviews, it seemed, and the meat of the movie was just incredibly drawn out scenes from his revival meetings. After the first three or four or twenty(!!!) minutes of each meeting, I wanted them to hurry up and move on! Seriously! I was dying! It seemed like the filmmakers could have alloted much more time to interviews with Marjoe about his childhood because we only got a few snippets of that. It would have been good to hear more from other people, also, instead of just Marjoe. Instead, we just got two or three incredibly drawn out scenes that could have been a fraction of their original length. I think that would have made it a much stronger film.
Then again, it did win an Oscar. But so did Slumdog.
Marjoe is an amazing character, and so were the other preachers. I'm wracking my brain to try and figure out how the filmmakers convinced Marjoe to participate in his own exposé. Just as soon as a thought comes to me [maybe they...], BAM - I'm suddenly dumbfounded at how the OTHER preachers allowed them to film. I can't figure anything out because the scene where the greasy tent-preacher is counting money and snickering loops through my head. What? Why?
ReplyDeleteI agree with Ben when he says the revival footage began to chip away the momentum the film generated in the beginning. In the beginning, I was totally captivated over the thought that this little boy could be real. Then I found it amazing that he'd be a part of a film like this. We went to the revival, and it was very interesting to see him do his thing. Then we went back to the revival, where he did his thing some more. I'm still into it, thinking he is going to really start preaching to these people, and hallelujah I can't wait to see how they react. But he doesn't, he just keeps doing his thing. It was as if we went on a very long detour where the main character became the crowds, before getting back to Marjoe. By the end, the only payoff we get is the words: The End. Well, that, and that one little part where his dad, who may have actually been the devil, says something about how Marjoe was blessed by God. I think he was realizing as he spoke that there was no way history would allow him to be anything but an ass.
In summary, I kind of feel like they blew it. Some kind of resolution was needed, and because of the reflexive style of the film, they had the perfect answer in their own hands. They just had to show what they had to others and let us see that. And what about following up with Marjoe? If he continues to preach, that informs his character. If he gives it up and proceeds to have a lackluster career in film and music, that informs his character.
Leaving the screening, however, I wanted people to see this film. A lot of people. Billions, I think. As Ben said, this film makes clear the brazenly corrupt practices propelling the growth of religious institutions, and it does so in a way that shocks even those of us who have known it all along. Not just a little corrupt, these charlatans may as well be running from town to town selling wonder-tonics. And hell.
Thanks.
Totally agree with Ben and Andrew. Way too many church scenes. Maybe not too many but they went on forever. It was like they just got lazy and didn't bother to interview Marjoe anymore. In my experience, it's a lot easier to just roll the cameras during an event and capture those moments that happen regardless of the film crew's presence. It's much harder to interview your subject and get them to open up. Cop out.
ReplyDeleteIt needed a lot more substance. When did he realize he was a fraud? I wanted to hear about his relationship to the counterculture. What's his new life like for christ sakes? We saw his girlfriend for two seconds but it didn't really give us much insight. And with the lack of Marjoe interview footage going on I definitely didn't appreciate those self-reflexive-just-for-the-sake-of-it moments. Sometimes I think whoever was filming was gay for that dude with the side burns. But I digress...
As some have mentioned earlier, I think some of the strongest points of the film came from the amount of access that they were able to get. It's quite rare that they could have such access to the events, and even more rare that they were able to film behind the scenes from other corrupt pastors as well. Having said that, it seems they got a little too excited about that and gave it too much attention. They introduced what could have been a captivating story about Marjoe in the beginning, but the emphasis seemed to shift to capture what was going on in those churches and revivals rather than with Marjoe. I don't know if it was a personal decision, but the choice to leave out Marjoe's actual confession and the public's reaction, even something as simple as facts at the end, really brought the story down in my books.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I felt like the film was more about the corruption of church and revival events at the time rather than about Marjoe, though I understand that they are linked. They did a great job portraying that, especially with the juxtaposition of the behind the scene with Marjoe and his crew when he's describing how to "work the people" and live footage of him saying the same words for real. It was difficult to watch a lot of the "revival" scenes being a Christian myself, I thought that much of what Marjoe and the other preachers were "preaching" was not even remotely biblical at all. The one part that stuck out to me was when another preacher was talking about how in essence, if you follow God he'll give you a Cadillac..that made me chuckle a bit. I realized through my reactions that they indeed did a great job of capturing that.
All in all, the lack of development of the story was the weakest link in my opinion. Luckily Marjoe is a very compelling character and his voice carries us through the dry moments
The most jarring images, for me, came from the film’s editing. After some research it seems that the footage to make the dvd we saw was restored from deteriorated negatives, which could be responsible for some of the harsh cuts I thought the film contained. I also really enjoyed the minor edit used within the “costume bus scene,” to show the change in Marjoe’s attire from hippie to church revivalist.
ReplyDeleteGoing back to what others have said, I think what most of us can agree on is that the church scenes were extremely long. While I believe this is true, I think rather than shorting them the filmmakers should have found a more creative way to edit them within the few other threads of the story. I can understand how their length is definitely necessary to express the true theatrical quality of Marjoe’s whole stage-show, but after one or two of these long scenes my mind started drifting.
I also noticed a lot of unnecessary handheld camera work to establish places throughout Marjoe’s tour as well as in the scenes involving money. It seemed to me that rather than shooting the advertisement for Marjoe’s events through a car, a much richer image could have been achieved through a few simple shots on a tripod. It was small things like this that really questioned the film’s prestige for me, especially considering that the film garnered an Oscar.
I agree with the rest that the film had too much of the church meetings and not enough character development. Although this may be due to the lack of access to the character. Not only was the church meetings very strung out and endless, it seemed that in the end, it had no real point. At first it was interested and got me pumped up to see what will happen and by the end of the movie, I was still waiting for something to happen. I think it built the audience up and then there was a let down.
ReplyDeleteI think the subject was the strongest point of the film. Unfortunately, very little was shown about the character in comparison to his past. I think it would have been a better structure had they shown the footage (if they are adamant on including the church footage) with Marjoe's voice over through interview shots or something.
Lastly, looking at the camera work and editing made me realize that not everything has to be clean and sharp (although generally preferred I believe). It shows that even if you are lacking in some areas, it can be made up through other aspects of the film.
-Vi
I dug it big time. I felt like the long church scenes were necessary to understand the endurance of pentecostal preachers. I was amazed, as Andrew said, that the other preacher was not shy about counting money in front of the camera directly after they tell people to donate for god. Also, all those people doing the freak out thing in the middle of the sermons, I think that says a lot about the psychological condition of masses in America. So willing to believe in something, hoping so much to be touched by something good, wanting change in life so bad that they go through this super dramatic display of it. It was really weird to me. Marjoe, what a name.
ReplyDeleteI was pretty disappointed in this film. I'm not going to go too much into the aesthetics, because I feel like everyone else did a pretty good job. I agree that there was WAY too much church footage and not enough interviews of Marjoe.
ReplyDeleteI think this film was probably really important during the 70's but by 2009,we get it; there's corruption in the church. When it came out, I can understand why it was a huge deal because there probably wasn't a whole lot of other information about the subject.
I'm looking at this as a Christian, so I have a different viewpoint about all of this, but I'm not going to go into it and bore you all. I understand that there are dishonest people as well as people who seem crazy, and that's unfortunate. No matter what your beliefs about God entail, I felt that the film focused on one vain of Christianity and a lot of stuff gets generalized with this portrayal. Ultimately, I think I would have just liked to see Marjoe's struggle with God and more on why he ultimately decided to reveal himself as a fraud. I think it would be interesting to see him talk about other denominations of Christianity who believe and practice completely different things than the Pentecostals. I also would like to know if his opinions about all of this are the same today.
It seems like everyone was in the same page with me. There was WAY too much of church events, at some point, same as Amanda, I was too like OK I get it. Please, do not show another church event, but then again each event had something important to highlight, and at each event we find something new about the corrupting process and the different venues that the church uses to reinforce the faith in its participants. For example, in one church events, we see that a single piece of red cloth that has no power whatsoever, people rush to get them because they are moved by this emotions. Yet, on the other hand, they are used to generate money. At another event, we have a women being the preacher. That changes perspectives, because most people associate that most of the people that preach would be male, but the doc also raises the point that there is no sex difference in church corruption. And then, I think that the one that I was the most excited about was when Marjoe's dad comes up to the podium.
ReplyDeleteI mean, I was like, "what is going to happen here?". At the beginning of the film we see the mom being the one that push Marjoe most of the time in the performances, but all we hear about the dad until this point was that he literally kept all his money and used it for his own benefit. There was nothing mentioned about their relationship until that point. Which I really liked the suspense.
I don't know if I would say that this one was one of the best docs that we have seen in class. All I can say, is that it has a great intro that captures your attention, for most of the time it keeps you entertain but I do not know it does get repetitive, to the point where at the end, one is like, "Is it close to being over?"...so I would give it 3/5 stars for me.
I really enjoyed watching this documentary—it is one of my favorites from this class. Speaking from a non-Christian perspective, I didn’t approach watching this film as an illustration of the corruption of the church but rather a picture of what can happen to any group of people regarding religion, nationality, culture, or any other form of identity—even school spirit ;) I agree with Daniel in that this points more to a mass type behavior, but I wouldn’t say it is only unique to America. There are definitely similar examples of this that exist everywhere in the world.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, I still noticed the filmmaker’s voice in the telling of this story—sometimes pretty unnoticeably at first too. There was this one scene I was describing to a friend of mine about the female preacher who had a really fancy pendant on her blouse. I told my friend that just as the preacher was asking for people to donate money for charity, the scene cuts to the image of her pendant, making you wonder what she really is going to use that donated money for. And as soon as I mentioned this I thought about the way that segment was edited…was that scene shaped to make me feel a certain way or form an opinion about that female preacher? Or was it really an accurate description of her character? I would never be able to tell for sure I suppose.
Other than that, I thought the main character was amazingly compelling from the beginning, and I actually appreciated the long church scenes as a way of immersing into an unfamiliar environment; those scenes had a certain effect that would probably have been lost if omitted from the film. I also wanted to know a little more about Marjoe’s personal life though as well. But really, the film only had a few shortcomings—I thought it was great.