Lifeway and 'The Blind Side:' Another Side to the Story

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Lifeway and 'The Blind Side:' Another Side to the Story

By Eric Metaxas , Christian Post Guest Columnist

August 3, 2012|9:58 am

A few weeks ago, I told you that, in my opinion, Lifeway bookstores made a big mistake when it removed copies of "The Blind Side" from its shelves.

While I knew that some, perhaps many, Christians would disagree with me, I was surprised at the attention the commentary received, both within and without the Christian world.

Now, I still think that the decision was a mistake. But a friend of mine has shown me there's a bigger issue surrounding the story, and in fairness, I think it's important that you hear about it.

That friend is Mark Joseph, a film and record producer in Hollywood. Writing in The Huffington Post, Mark gave us a behind-the-scenes view of how things work out there.

While Mark took issue with my criticism of Lifeway (after all, he wrote, Baptists should be "entitled to carry whatever product they want for whatever reason they want"), his main point went the heart of the Hollywood culture.

"Why," he asked, "do corporations like Warner Brothers, which produced 'The Blind Side,' keep filling their movies with words that millions of American filmgoers say they don't want to hear at the movies and don't want their kids to hear and emulate?"

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[Guest shiloh357]

I was really moved by "Blindside" and was happy to know that in playing the role she did, Ms. Bullock felt that it changed her views of Christianity and Christians. This is movie is true story abougt a woman who changed a young man's life and how he changed her life, as well. It had some profane words, but these are real people. I don't approve of that language, and would have preferred they not be there, but I was able to look past those things to really see what the movie was about. The words were sparse, and it is not like the characters simply spewed a chain of profanity all throughout the movie.

It is a great movie and might not be appropriate for young viewers, so I can understand why they were pulled from Lifeway Stores.

[Zemke]

A different movie and story but the actor who played George Bush in "George" said, in an interview, his views about the christian perspective on morals and society in general changed during his study leading up to shooting the film. It seems he hung out with the Bushes a little and they were surprising. The interviewer tried to dig further into social issues and what exactly changed in his thinking but he just smiled, you could hear the smile on the radio, and refused to go down that line of questioning.

I believe the interviewer was Terry Gross, "Fresh Air," npr.

Hollywood life style is profanity, I caught about ten minutes of a roast for George Cluney once and I'd say 60% of the language was gutter trash talk,. The woman that roasted him was worse than the guy I tuned in on and eventually turned her off. It was nuts. The worse gutter talk I've ever heard and everyone was slap laughing. It's the culture of show biz I believe. Once a gypsie actor always a gypsie actor no matter how big the bank account or fancy the trailer.

[Guest]

Quote from the article:

In the end, Mark Joseph says the real question is not why Baptists are behaving like Baptists, but "why Hollywood studios aren't behaving like capitalists, and selling more product by either getting rid of the bad words to begin with or making alternative versions available to consumers like those represented by Lifeway who want great stories without the words that offend their deeply held religious beliefs."

And that's a fair question.

Good question, and one that bears thinking about. The Hollywood crowd is messed up, but in the same way that all humans are messed up -- they need our prayers because they need Jesus. I'm not making a blanket statement and saying that everyone in Hollywood is bad, either. There are some believers in the industry and they need our prayers too, that they would continue to stand for the Lord where they are. There is a spiritual battle going on and many in the film and TV industry are decieved to the point they are willing to sacrifice money to their "cause." It would make sense to many from a purely money making point of view to give the consumer what they want and make alternative versions of a movie available but they don't - because they have an agenda they want to push and the media is a poweful tool to that end.

At least that's those are the only reasons I can come up with, any way.

[The_Patriot21]

I loved the blind side very moving. Thought it was very clean to, there was some mild language, but very mild I thought.

[appy]

Lot of people keep saying they don’t want to see or hear bad language or violence in movies, but yet at the same time will buy tickets to see R rated movies. The ratings are posted on posters, newspapers, etc. . . for a reason. When one purchases a particular movie ticket, it tells the movie industry what your interested in. It is what sells. They look at the money made from tickets sales to tell them whether a movie was successful or not. Like any other business, they make a product for the purpose of selling.

The ratings are available before tickets are sold, so if you buy a ticket to an R rated movie, you can’t fault the movie industry, they did their part of warning you well in advance. If you will notice, whenever a movie is a flop, they don’t make a sequel to it. All businesses are in the business of making money, not making a product to give out for nothing.

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Edited August 8, 2012 by little brown church