....Hold it. I know what you're all thinking. Just let me get out what I'm going to say before you rip me to pieces.
Yesterday, Fox Faith, the newly formed subdivision of Fox, released its first movie, One Night with the King. Fox Faith is what it says it is - its the producer of faith-based movies. The new movie in question is being touted as "the true story of Queen Esther".
Now, I admit. Out of every story in the Bible, this is probably one of my favorites. Has the potential to be a great movie. Honestly! A peasant woman, outcast by her ethnicity, rises above and saves her country by the virtue of her birth. Awesome epic story idea here, and no one has made a movie on it? Certainly beats all the horror movies out now!
So I sat in it today during break and....nearly fell asleep. It was unbelievable. The acting was atrocious. The story plod sloooowly. And the narration was basically word for word the Book of Esther, without a hint of deviation.
While it's nice to see that the story doesn't stray from the book, on the other hand, it's BORING. And quite frankly, if this is how all of their movies end up, I say Fox Faith should fold now and spare itself the humiliation.
Faith-based or not, IMO, a movie being based on the Bible does not excuse it from the same standards of quality that other movies are judged by. Just because it's "Christian-approved/all-age Christian movie" doesn't make it any better than other movies out right now, like, say, The Departed. It's obviously far bloodier and clearly not an "all-age Christian" movie......but it is loads better due to its plot, its acting and its direction.
Then again, that's my evil liberal movie theatre worker opinion. But what do you all think?
I think it is entirely possible to make Bible-based movies much more exciting without necessarily sacrificing the wide target audience. Sure, it might require it to be notched up to maybe PG, possibly PG-13 at the most, but it really isn't that hard to weave a story from the Bible into a dramatic one.
Partly it might be that they didn't have a big operating budget to start out with, though, to produce this first one. And with time will come experience.
Ooh it sounds interesting. IIRC Esther's story is one of the only stories in the Bible that has a woman center stage, and it's got lots of potential.
Sure, we shouldn't judge movies differently because they're "faith based". But you know, the real reason the movie was boring and adhered to the letter of the book was probably because there would be tremendous bleating from Christian organizations if the producers were seen to be "corrupting" the story.
The take away from this seems to be that the pharisees at large take things far too seriously 
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Christian organizations if the producers were seen to be "corrupting" the story.
I didn't see a whole lot of Christians complaining about The Passion.
Fox News: Making America look stupidier, one day at a time.
~Rico
Fox Faith does not PRODUCE movies, it DISTRIBUTES movies.
That way it gets all the financial gain of distribution without the risk of production costs, meanwhile smaller production companies get a distribution network that can turn their 10 million dollar production into a 15-30 million dollar run.
All in all it's more about business than faith.
Jimro
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What Jimro said about distribution and production of movies in the post RIGHT above mine
....Ok, I was wrong on what exactly Fox's role was, but it still doesn't change the quality of the movie. The distributor of movies should also do some type of quality check for the movies they help to release.
I still think my original point stands - the fact that it is a Christian-geared movie does not neccessarily make it a better movie for the reasons I explained in my first post. You could easily replace "Christian" with anything else if you choose to make a point about it regarding another type pf movie, but my thought is all on quality.
That money is the sole purpose of these movies (and all movies in general now) really does make the situation precarious. The fact that there is a Christian lobby that is basically demanding such movies (I would have to find the link, but I recall how one Christian lobby threatened to sue the MPAA over the PG-13 rating of a recently-made Christian movie) be made to their exact specifications doesn't help it either.
If anyone wants me to see a faith-based movie, let's hope that the following criteria meet:
1) It's a religious holiday
2) I get interested
3) The acting is decent at least
4) There's nothing else that is better than said movie at the moment.
5) Movie critics and other moviegoers give good reviews.
Barring the first criterion, it's how I pretty much look at any movie these days. With the price of DVDs and movie tickets on the rise in the next 2 to 10 years, I expect a great value for my money and time.
OR what Cooks said (in my own way).
Cooki, sorry I didn't mean for my post to seem like I was coming down on you, I completely agree that Fox could do a better job picking movies to distribute.
The problem is that it's not about picture quality, it's about the benjamins. Even a crappy movie will turn a profit under the right circumstances, and Fox is more than happy to provide those circumstances.
However, to a conservative Christian household, a word for word movie of "Esther" is exactly what the doctor ordered. This kinda reminds me of "Family Guy" where Peter gets to direct "The King and I" and totally morphes it into something else...
Jimro
Naah, no harm done, Jimro. But your're right on profit over content, and that does kind of annoy me. It really stifles potential creativity.
What Peter Griffin did to "The King and I", however, is another story entirely. XD
I am an automaton nuclear neo-human android. You may call me... Jesus.
I love Christian media such as books, songs etc. But the only Christian movies that I like are the Passion and Left Behind. The rest are, sad to say it, a snooze fest. The Bible is interesting...the movies just have bad actors that seem like they are reading from a TV screen. 
Plague, pestilience, famine, torture for all enternity. I say, I rather like this God fellow. So deliciously evil. [/stewie]
Cyc, what exactly was the point of linking that? This isn't a division of Fox NEws at all - It's Fox, y'know, big entertainment company? They have more than the news, guys. Grow up. I dislike CBS News, but that doesn't mean I'm going to bash anything on other parts of CBS because of it.
I linked it because it was funny, topical, and didn't deserve its own thread.
Grow up.
NEVER!
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Plague, pestilience, famine, torture for all enternity. I say, I rather like this God fellow. So deliciously evil.
I actually know somebody who believes in and is pro-god, but is also convinced (and likes to back up with scriptures) he is evil and wants to follow the evil god because he's powerful (or he just likes evil). With him it's hard to tell how much of what he says is serious and what's a joke, but when he talks about it he's rather zealous.
Thats weird, and scary. Give him a cookie for me. :3
~Rico
<i>I linked it because it was funny, topical, and didn't deserve its own thread.</i>
I recall that being linked in another thread; it's own MFC thread or the MG thread on Fox, one of the two. Anyway it jsut seemed to me to be pointless and off topic; this topic is about Fox Faith, not Fox News. o.o
It's not his fault Fox News is so blatantly bigoted there's someone on the net to rail them on everything religiously themed topic.
~Rico
Thats weird, and scary. Give him a cookie for me. :3
I'd rather you left me out of this one. :p
Fox News is no more blatantly bigoted than CNN or the BBC.
There are no unbiased news sources.
Jimro
No, see, the BBC focuses on real issues, doesn't waste time talking about stupid crap like how secular other countries are, and doesn't wilfully participate in vacuous right-wing spin. Fox News, on the other hand, actually gives airtime to Westboro Baptists, people who don't believe in global warming, and topics of discussion such as this:
Why are we having this conversation again?
Personally, I have a great affection for CBS News.But I stopped watching it some time ago. The unremitting liberal orientation finally became too much for me. I still check in, but less and less frequently. I increasingly drift to NBC News and Fox and MSNBC.
Former CBS News President Van Gordon Sauter in an op-ed published January 13, 2005 in the Los Angeles Times.
Of course it is.These are the social issues: gay rights, gun control, abortion and environmental regulation, among others. And if you think The Times plays it down the middle on any of them, youve been reading the paper with your eyes closed.
New York Times Public Editor Daniel Okrent in a July 25, 2004 column which appeared under a headline asking, Is The New York Times a Liberal Newspaper?
Most of the time I really think responsible journalists, of which I hope Im counted as one, leave our bias at the side of the table. Now it is true, historically in the media, it has been more of a liberal persuasion for many years. It has taken us a long time, too long in my view, to have vigorous conservative voices heard as widely in the media as they now are. And so I think yes, on occasion, there is a liberal instinct in the media which we need to keep our eye on, if you will.
ABC anchor Peter Jennings appearing on CNNs Larry King Live, April 10, 2002
I think we are aware, as everybody who works in the media is, that the old stereotype of the liberal bent happens to be true, and were making a concerted effort to really look for more from the other, without being ponderous or lecturing or trying to convert people to another way of thinking.
ABC World News Tonight Executive Producer Emily Rooney, September 27, 1993 Electronic Media.
As far as the beeb is concerned...
www.dailymail.co.uk/pages...ge_id=1770
It was the day that a host of BBC executives and star presenters admitted what critics have been telling them for years: the BBC is dominated by trendy, Left-leaning liberals who are biased against Christianity and in favour of multiculturalism.
A leaked account of an 'impartiality summit' called by BBC chairman Michael Grade, is certain to lead to a new row about the BBC and its reporting on key issues, especially concerning Muslims and the war on terror.
It reveals that executives would let the Bible be thrown into a dustbin on a TV comedy show, but not the Koran, and that they would broadcast an interview with Osama Bin Laden if given the opportunity. Further, it discloses that the BBC's 'diversity tsar', wants Muslim women newsreaders to be allowed to wear veils when on air.
At the secret meeting in London last month, which was hosted by veteran broadcaster Sue Lawley, BBC executives admitted the corporation is dominated by homosexuals and people from ethnic minorities, deliberately promotes multiculturalism, is anti-American, anti-countryside and more sensitive to the feelings of Muslims than Christians.
One veteran BBC executive said: 'There was widespread acknowledgement that we may have gone too far in the direction of political correctness.
'Unfortunately, much of it is so deeply embedded in the BBC's culture, that it is very hard to change it.'
In one of a series of discussions, executives were asked to rule on how they would react if the controversial comedian Sacha Baron Cohen ) known for his offensive characters Ali G and Borat - was a guest on the programme Room 101.
On the show, celebrities are invited to throw their pet hates into a dustbin and it was imagined that Baron Cohen chose some kosher food, the Archbishop of Canterbury, a Bible and the Koran.
Nearly everyone at the summit, including the show's actual producer and the BBC's head of drama, Alan Yentob, agreed they could all be thrown into the bin, except the Koran for fear of offending Muslims.
In a debate on whether the BBC should interview Osama Bin Laden if he approached them, it was decided the Al Qaeda leader would be given a platform to explain his views.
And the BBC's 'diversity tsar', Mary Fitzpatrick, said women newsreaders should be able to wear whatever they wanted while on TV, including veils.
Ms Fitzpatrick spoke out after criticism was raised at the summit of TV newsreader Fiona Bruce, who recently wore on air a necklace with a cross.
The full account of the meeting shows how senior BBC figures queued up to lambast their employer.
Political pundit Andrew Marr said: 'The BBC is not impartial or neutral. It's a publicly funded, urban organisation with an abnormally large number of young people, ethnic minorities and gay people. It has a liberal bias not so much a party-political bias. It is better expressed as a cultural liberal bias.'
Washington correspondent Justin Webb said that the BBC is so biased against America that deputy director general Mark Byford had secretly agreed to help him to 'correct', it in his reports. Webb added that the BBC treated America with scorn and derision and gave it 'no moral weight'.
Former BBC business editor Jeff Randall said he complained to a 'very senior news executive', about the BBC's pro-multicultural stance but was given the reply: 'The BBC is not neutral in multiculturalism: it believes in it and it promotes it.'
Randall also told how he once wore Union Jack cufflinks to work but was rebuked with: 'You can't do that, that's like the National Front!'
Quoting a George Orwell observation, Randall said that the BBC was full of intellectuals who 'would rather steal from a poor box than stand to attention during God Save The King'.
There was another heated debate when the summit discussed whether the BBC was too sensitive about criticising black families for failing to take responsibility for their children.
Head of news Helen Boaden disclosed that a Radio 4 programme which blamed black youths at a young offenders', institution for bullying white inmates faced the axe until she stepped in.
But Ms Fitzpatrick, who has said that the BBC should not use white reporters in non-white countries, argued it had a duty to 'contextualise' why black youngsters behaved in such a way.
Andrew Marr told The Mail on Sunday last night: 'The BBC must always try to reflect Britain, which is mostly a provincial, middle-of-the-road country. Britain is not a mirror image of the BBC or the people who work for it.'
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Let us not forget the Reuters "doctored photo" scandals.
I know that wikipedia isn't exactly a scholarly source, but somehow there is even an article on CNN bias... en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNN...ns_of_bias
Jimro
The second picture made me ROFL.
Seriously, what the hell is wrong with these people?
Cycle,
As a side note, the whole science of global warming is pretty dubious. The fact that Fox News acknowledges that there is significant scientific debate on the issue is good reporting, not conservative bias.
Global warming is not holy writ. Which reminds me of the funniest thing I've ever seen in a bookstore, someone put three copies of Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" in the Science Fiction section.
And we are discussing this because you seem to live in an alternate reality where only Fox News is a terrible biased political mouthpiece and all the other alphabet soup news agencies tell only the unvarnished truth.
Jimro
I hold no affection for any American news outlets. I simply find that when it comes to bias and total disregard for real journalism, Fox outclasses them all.
I know that wikipedia isn't exactly a scholarly source, but somehow there is even an article on CNN bias...
Wikipedia has an article for everything, including short busses, which until recently included the following delicious passage:
Because of this second use of the buses, "taking the short bus" or other phrases to that effect has become a pejorative slang term used to imply that someone has a mental disorder or emotional problems. Short buses themselves are also sometimes referred to in a derogatory manner as "retard carts," "syndrome trucks", "tard carts," or "tart carts." In Boston this is referred to by many as a "tahd bus" "Look at dunny there, riding the tahd bus."
I've said it befdore and I'll say it again: If you watch Fox News's primetime, probably you're too far right leaning to notice the right lean.
Note I watch CNN at night.
All news is biased, and it should be (superficial balance is worse), but Fox News definitely takes the mick out of it. I put some of it up to coincidence to be fair, but I was thoroughly convinced after seeing their anchors berate and debate the pro-war, yes pro-war protesters who were their guests, trying to get them to say disparaging comments about the anti-war protesters, while the interviewees wouldn't bite. And of course the anti-war side was not involved in any way. Every microsecond I've had the channel on has only further proven their nature.
Somebody quoted a UCLA study a while back that found that every news organization, even the Drudge report (or maybe it was Savage), has a liberal bias, based on stories reported. This calls into question the intelligence of those doing the study and the idea that there even should be "balanced" news. The news is supposed to be about facts that are out there, and if most stories, even on an intentionally right-wing source, come up as "leftist" then maybe that's because of the facts available, which is especially to be expected with so many right-wingers in the news.
News flash: factual accounts tend to not be politically balanced. If it's revealed that George W. Bush's favorite food is humans, a news station reporting that is not necessarily part of a left-wing conspiracy.
A few years ago, CNN in their reporting and non-reporting seemed to have a horrible right wing bias (nowhere near Fox News) to me and my parents. However, I suspected at the time that this had more to do with money than agenda. Since then, CNN has become more "moderate" IMO, which backs up my theory. Their agenda is ratings. They're rolling with the polls and generally want to put out an inoffensive programming block that won't alienate any major group of viewers. This is pretty bad too, because shocking the public is sometimes the right thing to do.
We'd never see a Murrow/McCarthy type interview on CNN or most news right now, unless the target was somebody 99% of the audience would hate anyway. If it's some unpopular person, watch them get harassed on air. Note the 60 minutes interview of the Iranian president, who, while I'm sure he's a much worse guy than he made himself appear to be in the interview, came out looking classier and more tolerant (this is a holocaust semi-dener we're talking about here) than the offensive interviewer.
Like I said before: this topic isn't even supposed to be about news. I think it's kinda sad that some of the people here train themselves to be so hateful against Fox News, that whenever they hear Fox, they immediately hate it without a second thought.
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I think it's kinda sad that some of the people here train themselves to be so hateful against Fox News, that whenever they hear Fox, they immediately hate it without a second thought.
Who's hating? It's unreasonable to expect that news should be _un_biased (as Vec said), but Vec's point is that the bias in Fox's reporting is so egregiously exaggerated that it's off-putting to even watch. Ultimately though, it's for the viewers to come to that conclusion themselves. I wonder if anyone's ever done a comprehensive survey of public opinion RE media outlets.
Vec asn't who I was referring to.
What I was referring to is that a topic on Fox Faith -a completely seperate section of Fox co, it isn't even related to Fox News - has become "Post How Biased You Think Fox News Is" thread.
SX you know that you can never expect a MG topic to remain on-topic.
I'm certain this topic will soon turn to religion and/or gay rights soon enough, so just sit back and enjoy the ride.
The UCLA report compared media outlets against elected politicians, providing a numerical score.
Altho the report broke down by individual shows instead of just by channel.
Jimro
News is always biased in some way shape or form, regardless of what you do or what you listen to. I used to watch Fox Canada (a.k.a Global) and I got the irriable biases. I don't even read the newspapers anymore. If something is destroyed, if somebody is killed, or if somebody does something great...somebody will tell me.
It's okay to watch biased - my favorite word when they use it is "opinionated" - shows if you agree with the opinion or something. It's just fine. If someone has a TV show they have every right to talk about their opinions, with exceptions for law, FCC, etc. You act like it's a crime for someone with a TV show to speak his/her mind.
My only problem is when they refuse to acknowledge that they are only human, and as such, give slight or not-so-slight bias to the things they are saying. When they start claiming that they're completely unopinionated, THEN it becomes worse.
The trick to biased shows is to extract facts from opinions. A lot of people can't do this.
Now now Bat, I won't turn it into a gay debate until someone takes a cloudephant stab us. :3
~Rico
*stab stab stabitty stab stab stab*
*sits back and awaits the coming entertainment*
Jimro
A person loses an average of 90 strands of hair a day due to natural follicle growth cycles, but this can be aggrevated by stress, genes or other factors.
.....What about movies again? o.o
*whips it out*
We all know the real reason that the movie failed:
The characters weren't vegetables! 
Although I read a news article that the creator went bankrupt...
I would not be surprised if they went bankrupt. The movie was quite terrible, but what probably exaserbated it was the fact that half of the cast comprised of LOTR alumni, Omar Sharif and Peter O'Toole, who were probably paid a good penny for their services.
