I will say, there's definately some shorting lights on Arononfsky's set.
Okay, okay. Let's start with an interview with Stephen D. Greydanus.
Okay, okay. Let's start with an interview with Stephen D. Greydanus.
It just tried to show the generations upon generations of war, of warfare, and weaponry, and violence, man against man violence, and you know, I mean, it's interesting because there been talk about is this an environmental message film? It's not. We have had to define what is the wickedness of man, because that's the only clue we were given when we read genesis, was that God was upset because of the wickedness of men. (Exclusive)
Aronofsky sees the "wickedness of man" primarily as destruction of the natural world, the world of creation. However, he seems to make it very clear in this sentence, this is not an environmental film.
However, in an interview with SlashFilm, before the film even began, he said,
However, in an interview with SlashFilm, before the film even began, he said,
It's about environmental apocalypse, which is the biggest theme, for me, right now for what's going on on this planet. So I think it's got these big, biig themes that connect with us. Noah was the first environmentalist. (Many Times)
Aronofsky makes it very clear that the "biggest" theme for him is an environmental one, not man's wickedness, not mercy vs. justice, not God's character. It's about Noah's environmentalism, pure and simple, a blatant contradiction of what he told Greydanus after the making of the film.
Now, this could be understandable. Themes and motifs change. Artists see ideas rise in the making of their work which changes their entire conception of what they're doing, making, creating, etc, many times over the life of a particular piece. Art is nothing if not fluid and dynamic in meaning.
However, there's more.
"'Noah' is the least biblical biblical film ever made," Aronofsky told the New Yorker when asked about alternate cuts pissing off the religious dissenters. "I don't give a fuck about the test scores. My films are outside the scores." (Many Times) Noah to Aronofsky is, apparently, not very biblical. I don't know how else you could interpret this statement. However, in an interview with Greydanus, again, said
Now, this could be understandable. Themes and motifs change. Artists see ideas rise in the making of their work which changes their entire conception of what they're doing, making, creating, etc, many times over the life of a particular piece. Art is nothing if not fluid and dynamic in meaning.
However, there's more.
"'Noah' is the least biblical biblical film ever made," Aronofsky told the New Yorker when asked about alternate cuts pissing off the religious dissenters. "I don't give a fuck about the test scores. My films are outside the scores." (Many Times) Noah to Aronofsky is, apparently, not very biblical. I don't know how else you could interpret this statement. However, in an interview with Greydanus, again, said
We treated genesis as the word of God, as complete truth. We were tying to bring that story to life so we didn't want to contradict anything. We wanted to represent everything that was there and let it inspire us to tell a dramatic story with themes the ideas that are in there. (Exclusive)
Here, with Greydanus, Aronofsky treats the Genesis account as "the world of God, the complete truth," seemingly a far stretch from the "least biblical" reading he could have done. He expounds on his methods later in another interview with The Atlantic.
It's impossible tou nderstand what [Noah's] times are because there are ofour chapters in the bible. It's just important that you don't contradict any of it and that you study each word, and study eachsentence, and try to use and extract as much juice out of that to be inspired to turn it into a vision that represents the spririt of it all. That's the goal. (Many Times)
Taking the Bible's account literally and not contradicting it is, again, very high on Aronofsky's obligations. Studying "each word" of the text is important to Aronofsky and, I'm assuming, remaining true to it, a very different sentiment, it seems, than making the 'least biblical biblical film ever made."
What we have here is, as any good fundamentalist would put it, a seeming contradiction in Aronofsky's motives. When talking to secular sources, he's unapologetic about his film's unbiblical nature. But when talking to the religious audiences, through Greydanus' columns, which I'm sure he knew, his film is based in Genesis as the word of God.
However, there's a way of making sense of this. In his interview with Greydanus, Aronofsky and his writing partner Ari Handel talk about their Jewish tradition's method of exegesis.
What we have here is, as any good fundamentalist would put it, a seeming contradiction in Aronofsky's motives. When talking to secular sources, he's unapologetic about his film's unbiblical nature. But when talking to the religious audiences, through Greydanus' columns, which I'm sure he knew, his film is based in Genesis as the word of God.
However, there's a way of making sense of this. In his interview with Greydanus, Aronofsky and his writing partner Ari Handel talk about their Jewish tradition's method of exegesis.
AH: In the midrashic tradition, you see things like that are clues. A story like that is mystery, a cluse that invites you to look fo rmeaning.
DA: Within our tradition, as being Jews, a long tradition of thousands of years of people writing commentary on it, where literalism is a different school and people actually look at it for clues and try to apply it to lives now, and to your present, and so for us in our tradition, there isn't anything we're doing that's sort of out of line or out of sync, but within that, I think you don't want to every contradict what's in there.
In the midrash tradition, the text is what the text is. The text exists and is truth and is the word and it is the final authority, but how you decide to sort of interpret it, you have that possibility to open it up and open up your imagination to be inspired by it.
AH: And there's puzzles into here, with meaning to be found.
In Aronofsky's tradition, the text is infallible, but is only the starting point for interpretation. The text is the word of God but is also open to be used as the stepping stone for incalculable imaginative detours which, though they remain true to the foundational text, explore myriad different possibilities of filling the holes, rounding the story arcs, explaining the characters and ideas in the texts, etc, all purposed toward imbuing the text with contemporary meaning for our lives today. It's like an ice berg turned upside down: you begin with a small foundation on with you build a mountain of meaning and narrative.
Doesn't sound that much different that popular conservative exegesis, does it? I'm thinking Ben Hur or
So, when Aronofsky says it's the "least biblical biblical movie ever made," the "least biblical" part of it he's talking about is this mass of further interpretation he's piled on top of the four Genesis chapters of the text which, if you didn't watch close enough, he did remain true to.
There you go, fundamentalists. Proof that seeming contradictions can be made to make sense. Your turn to do it with the Bible, which has yet to be done.
However, I will say this. Aronofsky has a bad case of double-faced PR. When talking to secular journals, his mouth is far more loose, his vehemence against fundi detractors much less censored, and he tends to emphasize different facets of his films for different interviewers to make different people happy. He hasn't made it easy for people to see his real motives with invective outbursts and seeming contradictions and shifts of purpose, or whatever explains his change in preferred themes. With some of these contradiction, it's little wonder some of the conservatives see him as an atheist greyhound out to rip the shreds out of their poor, innocent baby foxes in the Christian field.
Alright, moving on. Talk to you Monday.
Doesn't sound that much different that popular conservative exegesis, does it? I'm thinking Ben Hur or
So, when Aronofsky says it's the "least biblical biblical movie ever made," the "least biblical" part of it he's talking about is this mass of further interpretation he's piled on top of the four Genesis chapters of the text which, if you didn't watch close enough, he did remain true to.
There you go, fundamentalists. Proof that seeming contradictions can be made to make sense. Your turn to do it with the Bible, which has yet to be done.
However, I will say this. Aronofsky has a bad case of double-faced PR. When talking to secular journals, his mouth is far more loose, his vehemence against fundi detractors much less censored, and he tends to emphasize different facets of his films for different interviewers to make different people happy. He hasn't made it easy for people to see his real motives with invective outbursts and seeming contradictions and shifts of purpose, or whatever explains his change in preferred themes. With some of these contradiction, it's little wonder some of the conservatives see him as an atheist greyhound out to rip the shreds out of their poor, innocent baby foxes in the Christian field.
Alright, moving on. Talk to you Monday.