Speaker 1: The Todd Herman show is one disapproved by big pharma
technocrats in tyrone Sabrian ware from the high Mountains of
Free America. Here's the Emerald City XI Todd Herman.
Speaker 2: So I'm joined by writer, the omnipocent, omniscient, omniscient, the omissions,
the omniscions huge presence in YouTube. He's a filmmaker and
as you can see, heze a young man dressed far
better than the old man, deeply to my embarrassment, but
created a provocative video stating that Chris that that horror
films are Christian, that may be more Christian than other films,
and writer joins us, thanks for coming on. I appreciate you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm pumped to be here.
Speaker 2: Awesome, Thank you very much. Let's start with some framing
in this because I always I want to make sure
sure that we are using the same terms. How do
you define a horror movie?
Speaker 3: Well, there's two things. There's I think when people think
of the word horror movie, they think of mainstream, secular movies.
And that's obviously the main objection people will have when
I say Christians should be making horror movies, and so
people will probably be thinking of you know the sau
series where it's gore porn. Yeah, and they'll be thinking
of movies like I'm thinking of American horror story where
it's just over the top, completely blown out of proportion,
just demonic stuff. And so that is not what I'm
advocating for. And so what I'm talking about when I
say Christian horror is I'm talking about a reframing of
the way that horror has been approached. And so I
think as Christians, we have probably more than anybody else,
the ability to be able to talk about darker things
because we have a foundation by which we can do
it upon. So God talks about dark things in scripture,
and so that's kind of where I made this connection
of where since God is able to talk about the
dark things, we should also be able to do that
in art. But the way that it's currently being done
needs to be reframed.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you get approached by people who will push
back Scripturally. It was interesting to me because there's some
commonality given what I do and what you do, and
a lot of people will go to you. With Philippians four,
verse eight, find their brothers and sisters, whatever's true, whatever
is noble, whatever's right, whatever's pure, whatever's lovely, whatever is admirable,
if anything is excellent or praise worth. They think about
such things and people hit you with that, and you respond.
Speaker 3: How well? I respond by saying, well, first, when God
is saying those things, it kind of reminds me of
when he's talking about God has not given us a
spirit of fear in two Timothy. But he's not saying
that we shouldn't be afraid, because fear is a natural
part of being a part of this world. So what
he is saying is to take confidence in me. I
am your confidence, and so through that fear and through
that pain, I will walk through with you in that pain.
And so then coming back to Philippians four, verse eight,
it is I would also say, it's like it is
also true, lovely and good that God talks about Sodom
and Gomorrah and the depravity that we see there in
scripture with those men and the things that they were doing.
And so it's kind of like that is the other
side of the truth.
Speaker 2: It is to.
Speaker 3: Complete the whole picture, you need to talk about the
dark things as well as the good things to get
a complete picture. And so kind of like by ignoring
the dark things and saying we can't talk about it,
we can't look at it, we can't illuminate it. We
are talking about half truths. And so I think that
we need to be able to approach the darker things
to get a whole picture, because that's what God does.
Speaker 2: That's well said, This well said. Remember when the Sound
of Freedom came out, And do you know how difficult
it was for them to get that movie made? I mean,
it was delayed something like two years. And then do
you recall the insanity that the left had to leap
in and say, oh, this is hyperventil ing. There's no
such thing as this form of this trafficking. That's not happening.
This is a right wing fever dream. And yet the
people at Angel Studios persisted in that they made the movie.
The movie was a worldwide hit, and it has legitimately
changed discussion around Hollywood and around trafficking and children. And
do you remember that fantastic line in that movie, God's
Children are not for sale. It was a really cool
way to bring the Gospel into this in a gentle
and yet potent way. So Angels Studios is participating in
changing culture and They've allowed us to become part of this.
Do you know the movie King of Kings? The King
of Kings. It is an animated program about the life
of Jesus Christ. And this program is for families and
young people. And I've talked to guys who are in
ninth grade and they love this. They think it's one
of the best explanations of the Lord that there is.
Alex is watching it, I'm watching it. We're both going
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us change culture with these guys. I really really am
thankful for the invitation from them. So let me dive
into a specific film. It's one of the few films
I've seen where the audience was silent for silent and
it wasn't because there was an depreciation of the film.
There's two times this has happened. One was the secular
movie and I can't remember the name of the film
Bork was in. It's the only film she's ever done
and it was a musical that ended in this shocking way.
And I was in Seattle and people said, we looked
that up, Alex. She's only done one movie, Brooke, and
the other is that Dancer The Dark. Dancer the Dark,
and the filmmaker created that to be polarizing. You either
love the film or you hate the film, and it
was walking out of there. We talked about that film
for weeks, the horror film and maybe you don't think
it counts as Horror is the Passion of the Christ
by Mel Gibson. And I know people who watched that
and were deeply bothered because they said, hey, this was
violence porn, and I guess I disagreed. I was floored
by the amount of violence that was in it, that
they got away with using air make and that it
was that. I loved the movie, but man, at the end,
just like everybody else, I couldn't speak. Do you think
that's do you think that's Christian horror? And if so,
do you think it's horror? Do you think it's Christian horror?
Do you think it was well done?
Speaker 3: I remember watching that movie having the same reaction as
you is. Yeah, No, it's completely blew me away, just
the visceral nature of seeing the crucifixion. And I think
even mel Gibson was like, we didn't even show all
of it because it just would have been too much.
So but even the depth that they went was insane,
and I would say, looking back, yeah, I guess you
could say it definitely tapped into the horror aspects with
I think especially of like the Garden of Gethsemane when
and then there's Satan who's portrayed as this pale woman
with and it's like very weird. And then there are
some demonic encounters there as well. When Judas he you know,
he turns Jesus in and then he's walking around and
he's like, what have I done? And then you know,
these children walk up to him. It kind of appeared
like they were demons disguised as children to torture him
and oppress him, be like you've done bad things. Now
you're in trouble. And so I think, looking back when
I saw that, that definitely was like, Okay, whoa, Okay,
that's intense. Yeah, but I think it conveys the gravity
of the situation in a way that other Jesus movies haven't.
Speaker 2: I firmly agree, and it's forever more changed how I
talk about Christ and the Cross that and then realizing
as I'm matured in faith that it wasn't quote just
the physical torture that he had, the wrath of God
sort in these cups poured out upon him not just
for sins past, but every sin that we're ever going
to commit. And the way they treated Christ's body, while
remarkably gross and violence and Gibson did a good job
of that you think about the wrath of God coming down.
So what's another example for you that informs your recommen
you're a filmmaker. You've just made a short film, and
we'll link to that in the show notes to make
sure people. I would love for you to support writer's
work and to examine if you love it, share with people.
But what's another film that you think express is this?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 3: Hmmm, well, that's a tough one because if I pick
a certain film, there's there might be a divide I
would say, I would I would say this. Films that
tell good stories will naturally have to borrow from the
way that God tells stories because He's the master storyteller.
And the way that he tells stories, it has you know,
has the beginning, it has an end. Not I'm not
talking about just like you know him or like history
as a whole, like how he is just the storytelling
how there's an arc, there's a character arc, and how
he pulls us in and even with Jesus and his parables,
he weaves in the truth and the narrative through uh
these visual visual ways. You're imagining it and you're going
through it, you're experiencing it and so in order for
a story to be good, it has to follow certain patterns,
and that's how God conveys stories. Even I'll use an example.
I'm reading about David right now, know, and the and
his his whole journey, and I'm being wrapped up in it.
It's like, holy cow, the twist and turns. It's amazing.
And so you're seeing David beginning from a nobody becoming
a somebody and being pursued by the enemy Saul, and
you see this beautiful friendship he has with Jonathan, and
then you see how Jonathan dies, and I'm reading that
and I'm like, not Jonathan. They have this beautiful friendship
and it's just and it's like, it's amazing how God
is able to hook you into this beautiful story. And
so even I would say kind of like going off
on a tangent here. But when people look at secular
movies and they you know, I know, some Christians are
probably a bit more weary of that than others. They'll say,
you know, maybe we shouldn't watch secular things because I think, me,
when I look at films that are good, a lot
of them are secular. Because faith based movies aren't really
getting traction, and they they don't follow the storytelling system
that God has placed out for us. And even just
storytelling in general, we think of the hero's journey or
an anti hero and a negative character arc where it's
going from good to worse, and we see the consequences
and fallout, and so faith based media doesn't fall that.
Faith based media kind of goes away from that because
they're trying to convey a certain message. And I think
conveying your message is great as long as it doesn't
overpower the story and you tell it through the story.
You think of here's a good example of a film, Braveheart.
So with Braveheart you're thinking of William Wallace and how
he's this kind of he is, this nobody knows about him,
this highlander dude just out doing his thing, and along
come the English and they are raping, they're pillaging, and
this guy's like, Okay, we can't take this crap. We
need to rise up and defend ourselves for God and
for our fellow countrymen. And so we see this amazing
journey of William Wallace rallying his fellow countrymen and fighting
against the Englishman. And so through that story we see
not only God's providence of the scotsmen getting and gaining
their freedom, but we also see the effects of William
Wallace himself and just his personal journey with Christ, and
also with the experiences in the film. His wife dies,
his brother, something happens to his brother, I believe, and
he's going He's experiencing all these traumatic events and yet
God sustains him through that. And so we can see
on the wide scale and the individual level, how this
story is able to connect with us personally. And I
think that's I think it no matter if it's a
Christian film or secular film, if it follows that and
is able to emotionally bring us into the experience kind
of how God does in scripture, then that is a
good story. And so bringing it back the examples that
I use are mainly from secular people because they're the
ones that are doing that work. It's not perfect because
they don't have the worldview that we have, but they're
the ones doing it because faith based media has gotten
into their own bubble and said we're not gonna do
that stuff. We're going to preach the message and we're
going to talk about Christ instead, yep. And so as
a resu continue.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you're proposing that Christians need to invest in
the horror genre, yes, and that we shouldn't ignore this,
and I agree. You know, we've ignored a lot of
things in society. And Satan he loves a vacuum, right, yeah,
you know, science of horrors a vacuum. Satan loves a
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Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: And I so when you're talking about Brave Heart, I
would say this is not just because of a descendant
of William Wallis. Ah'm I get that's true story, But
that scene where he is dying and he's being unalived
in a super violent way in Brave Hearts at the
end and he comes upon peace, and you see that
the faces of his friends and the crowd who are watching,
and they're there with him, and he's laid out and
he's being destroyed. And then he sees his wife, and
his wife was unlived in a really cold and brutal way.
And this is clear that she's that she's been allowed
to come there by God. Uh and he has this
peace and he is in fact, of course it's not
it's not an accident that he's laid out as a
you know, in the form of a cross. I don't
know how many people get that imagery, you and I do.
I saw that as imagery. I know that mel Gibson
is a Catholic man, and I know he's also gone
way off based sometimes it be the first to admit
that drinking, et cetera, and being in Hollywood to do
that to you is that when we as Christians invest
in this, is that overt enough for an audience that
is not Christian that they don't under I mean, they
might be ethnically Christian if you know what I mean,
or accidentally Christian or Christian by tradition, but certainly don't
know the Gospel and absolutely don't have a world. A
Christian worldview is that enough of God's word? Is it
enough to suggest his presence? Or do we need to
have scripture and God's word in these films in your mind?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I think there are the two extremes. There
are kind of with faith based where they've one side
of the pendulum where it's all scripture references that I
don't know why, but every faith based movie as a
church scene, there's a girl, there's a dog or something
like that, and then on the other end it's like, Okay,
we're gonna only focus on the art. There's no message whatsoever.
And so I think either extremes are not beneficial, so
we need to be somewhere in the middle, or I
mean there's even a bit of leeway, honestly, because certain things,
certain films are going to tackle different aspects. So if
you have a stronger message, that's totally fine, as long
as it's not we're going to teach people about Jesus
and just have the story on the sidelines. So that's
when there's problems, and then you lose the character arc,
you lose the value from just like the hero's journey.
That's when you lose people's investment and they're kind of like,
while you're preaching at me, so I'm not really interested
in what happens next. And so that's where if the
message overshadows the actual storytelling, then there's an issue.
Speaker 2: You use the example. And it's interestingly another Jim Cavisa
movie and The Sound of Freedom. Now that's interesting to
me because I didn't recognize that as a horror film.
We promoted it on my radio program and podcasts, and
so I guess, full disclosure, we got paid to do that.
But I still love the movie. I didn't recognize it
as horror, but I'm curious, ay you do. And b
I'm trying to recall the film if I felt that
faith was really clear in that I mean, And so
I mean, you tell me, because you use the example,
do you think that has enough faith in it to
help bring people to Christ? And why do you think
it's a horror film?
Speaker 1: Well?
Speaker 3: I think first I used that as an example because
the way when I'm tackling horror, I have to kind
of bring it around to the presuppositions, because people immediately
have issues with portraying darkness. And so I used that
film as an example, not because it's horror per se,
but because the concepts used in it are very taboo,
very dark, disturbing, and when we are talking about films
like horror that use darker aspects, I think it helps
to be able to compare it to something that people
are able to see more clearly, because horror as it
is today is definitely more obscured and definitely a little blurry.
So using Sound of Freedom, where it's talking about the
protection of children who are being trafficked and having to
destroy the evil men that are doing these things, I
think it makes the message very clear that this is
not just gore porn or this is not like being
disgusting for the sake of being disgusting. They have an
obvious message in there, which is, you know, we need
to protect these kids, we need to defend them at
all costs. But the way they do it is through
this man who is discovering all these things and going
on these operations to try and rescue these children. And
I think through that it's kind of like how God
is the ultimate protector and provider. This man is kind
of embodying that and being like, I'm going to protect
these kids. I need to protect them at all costs,
And so you see his journey through that. And one
of my favorite lines from that, which I just thought
it was so awesome, was one of the one of
the guys just asking them, hey, why are you why
are you doing this? You know, they're at a at
some sort of underground place in Mexico, and he's like, well,
God's children aren't for sale, and so yeah, even through
like even through all that, you can see, yeah, this
is a Christian guy, Christian dude. But it's nowhere in
the film preached at you. It's just kind of like,
this is just who this character is.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So that was a tagline for the film too, right, Yeah, yeah, goosebumps.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I got to interview the director of that movie and
that was very interesting, and he's he's seen a lot,
clearly seen a lot. I guess I would have liked
to see maybe more, just maybe one example or two
examples of prayer in that. And you know, it's all
always easy as a non filmmaker to go, oh, you
should have done this, and I'm probably wrong. I want
to talk about The Walking Dead. But first, and I
don't know if you've seen this movie, Nefarious, so that's
based on the and I we'll call the nefarious plots,
and that was Steve Deese's book. Now to me and
I see this describes as screw tape meets hannibal lecture.
I've never seen that before. That's exactly right. Not necessarily
horror because I don't know that there's much bloodiness in it,
But to me, that was perhaps maybe the most effective
thing I've seen at really explaining spiritual warfare from the
point of view of a demon and a great twist
ending we won't give away, but your response to that movie,
you think that was effective and well done. And I
don't know if you classified as horror.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, it's kind of edging into that territory maybe, uh,
psychological horror or at the at the very at the
very least like a thriller. Yeah, I think, uh, there
there are some parts that I think you could tell
that it was a bit of a on, a bit
of a shoe string budget or or some of the
things kind of like could have done that a bit better.
But I would say what the film mastered was the
dialogue from the demon. It was there's some of those
parts gave me chills. It was it was amazing. The
actor who played the part, he's great, And then they
also did such an amazing job of making you feel
bad for the guy who's possessed, and you you can
see like he's being he's going to eventually you know,
he's on death row and he obviously doesn't want that
to happen because you can see. Actually it's kind of
like then it's the negative character arc where he went
from uh this one, you know, point A and slowly
going down because he allowed this, He opened a door
for the enemy, and now this demon has possessed him
and he's doing things that he doesn't want to do
because he's invited that demon in. And so I think
from that perspective where you're really getting inside the head
of the person who is possessed, was very bone chilling.
And just the dialogue between the two guys, between the
investigator and the demon, Yeah, it was phenomenal.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And there's a and I won't give it away
because a lot of people have not seen it. There's
a twist in the end where you're very very happy
for one of the characters, very very happy they're saved,
but then are they And because Satan doesn't give up,
he'll come back on another form of attack. Hey, maybe
I'll use your pride. Last time I used your fear,
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So let me talk about then the Walking Dead, because
I saw you use this image in the video that
we've shared with people where you make the case that
the horror genre should be Christian, that we should be
investing in this, and it's a nice of case you make.
I started to watch The Walking Dead because some family
members were and I thought it was going to be
violence porn period zombie porn, and there was clearly some
of that. I mean, it's very bloody, very gory. But
I found myself in about the fourth or fifth season
when they be when they started to introduce some moral
dilemmas and then the character Nagan, who I rate as
the greatest villain in sort of episodic TV history for
many reasons. But there was this discussion with Rick Grimes
of as they were building the quote New World, will
my mercy or my wrath prevail? And this was in
regard to Nagan, who was this terrible villain, great beautiful
acting job within a beautiful but very effective, great acting job.
And they've they've captured him and he's in jail and
there's talk of hey death row and and Rick Crimes
has this discussion with his friends and with himself, and
it seems to me, by the way writer, it seems
to me he's having it with God because he's having
in visions and dreams, and he's given prophetic vision. He
sees the future where Megan raises his son, not Rick,
and he offers that thought, will my mercy or my
wrath prevail? And that's something that we who fear the Lord,
we better keep that in mind, because the Bible speaks
of the last days and that wrath is going to
be poured out. Those of us in the Book of
Life one way or the other, pre trip, post, et cetera,
were saved. But what do you make of the movie
The Walking Dead? I mean, it's clearly horror. Rather the
series The Walking Dead, it's clearly horror.
Speaker 3: I think, yes, yeah, it really is. It's the reason
I got turned onto that series was my parents introduced
me to it because they said there are some amazing
sitch situations that the characters go through that provoke you
to wrestle with it and to try and figure out
what you would do with that situation. And so as
you're experiencing this with the characters, I would point to,
like the first two seasons especially, you're experiencing all of
these situations with the characters, and you're having to experience
the pain and experience the situation of this is a
difficult decision. Do I make it or do I not?
Or is there another alternative? And so what the series
did masterfully is they are forcing you to wrestle with
this yourself. And so what they could have done is, Okay,
Rick Grimes is encountering this little girl who's a zombie.
If she bites him, he's dead. But and then they
lecture about it. But that's not what they do. They
play it out and Rick Grimes he's standing there like,
what do I do. I have a gun, I need
to defend myself, but this is a little girl, and
so you're wrestling with that alongside him, which I think
is masterful because now you're experiencing what he's experiencing, and
even from a neurological level. Sarah Murray, who did a
TED talk, she did a good job of talking about
the psychological aspects of it, where you are physically experiencing
it with the person on a psychological level and you're
connecting with them emotionally. And so that's one reason why
storytelling is so powerful and why I pointed to Walking
Dead is because you're literally experiencing it with the characters
step by step and so when they go through a breakup,
you feel the pain. When there's a villain, you feel
the terror.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I would point to some other moments in
this series where where Rick and the team they defeat
a series of very bad people and they go to
a place that's called, Oh, it's the train state that's
been they've been promoting to the world as a sanctuary,
and that had a name for it. It's terminous, terminous.
And they go to this train station and oh, it's
protected and it's fenced and people have food and it's
civil and they go in, they break in, you know,
recon and it turns out, of course, this place is horrible.
It is at that point the worst evil you've seen.
They con people to come in, they make them comfortable,
and then they unlive them, and then they consume them.
And they come to realize this and they're just about
unalived in a terrible, terrible Holocaust type way. They get out,
of course, but they get out violently, and they get
help from without, you know, you speak of the hero's journey.
They were in the darkest cave, they got help from without.
They escape, and then they they're confronted by the guy
who ran that place in a church, and it is
in a church where Ricky in a brutal fashion on
a live as the leader of that you know that
that movement, And as a viewer, I'm looking at that rider, going, Okay,
that's it. That's they've defeated the the evil somewhere not
far from there, not long. They took their skills they
developed in defense of themselves and they became mercenaries. And
this is when they met the people at Hilltop and said, sure,
we'll give you some food, but we need you to
neutralize this enemy called Megan. And they went in and
they did that at night to people sleeping, and that
was the turn. Now you're going to see the biggest
evil you've ever seen in the form of Megan, who
enjoys being evil. And to me, that was so much
God's messages. This was righteous. These people were cannibals. That
was righteous. Your son was just about destroyed by these men.
And rick did a very violent thing with his teeth,
and that was righteous. But that was not righteous. You
snuck into a room and you unlive people. And so
I can talk to full of Christians about this and say,
this is an examination of us in a way absent
God trying to build our own world. But was there
anything from that that you took to be faith affirming
in that series as you're pointed to it by your
parents and as a well developed young Christian man, was
there anything you took out of that to be affirming
of our faith, our common faith in Christ.
Speaker 3: Well, when I think of how here's one of the
things I think of, which is the way that Rick
pulls everyone together in a sort of team, in a
sort of fashion, which I think you could say parallels
to how we as Christians need to pull together to
be able to make the kinds of films and stories
that people will Enjoyah. So I think that might be
a bit of a more abstract example, but I think
some of these little details in shows like this there.
I'd say that for me that show was very more
and much more on a personal level where I'm seeing,
like identifying with Rick and he's kind of in this
new world where it's like there's all these new terrors
and dangers, and especially connecting with his son and connecting
with his wife and going through that with them. I thought,
as like the family unit. I think for me, the
journey together as a family that they had was one
of the most powerful things as they're going through these experiences.
And I won't give spoilers, but you know, there's some
very tough things that eventually that Carl has to do
and in order to like defend the people around him,
and and there are some, you know, there's some very
terrifying moments. And so I think on a very personal level,
it's affirming to see these people going through this Ernie.
You're growing with them, you're experiencing the trials and errors
that they're going through, and as a person, you're developing.
Speaker 2: And so yeah, yeah, I was gonna point to one
thing because you just remind me this, Carl. There is
a scene in one of the in one of the
episodes where a character is called to sacrifice a limb
of his son. Do you remember what I'm talking about it? Okay,
I'll just give it away. It's a Rick is is
Meagan is going to make Rick cut off Carl's hand?
And okay, okay, and and and and that was so
well acted. And I've heard this story that they were
up for like forty eight hours and the guy who
played me Egan was constantly picking on the guy who
played Rick Grimes, you know, pushing him, being rude to him,
staying in character, really just annoying him, and everybody was exhausted.
But I've said to Christian friends, watch that and then
step back and think about God and his son quote.
I mean, all Rick had to do was cut his
son's hand off, that's all. And then everybody lives and
he couldn't, I mean, and Karl was trying to talk
him into it. And then take that to the bigger
picture of God's son and what Jesus went through and
what that must have done to God the Father to
be doing it, and then we as we believe in
the try and God having it done to him. That
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slash todd. Let me ask you about your work, because
you're a young man clearly, do you feel God called
you to be an I don't know that you're just
gonna be a horror filmmaker or thrillers or maybe there's
other genres you want to pursue, but a do you
feel God called you to do that? And be how
did He call you to do that? If that's the case,
if you did feel like the Lord called you to do.
Speaker 3: That, yeah, I do feel God has called me to
be a filmmaker. I'm also a musician, so it goes
hand in hand. And yeah, I think as as someone
I see kind of the trajectory of faith based media,
and I'm thinking that there's definitely a gap. There's a
huge gap, actually, and that gap is between faith based
media and then secular media. And so there's a wide
range of things that we have yet to do as Christians,
and especially you know, pointing to Hollywood with them going downhill,
we have an opportunity, I would say, I mean definitely
at this time, and then also in the next ten
years and onward, we have a great opportunity to be
able to enter into the space like we never have before,
because people are looking for stories and characters that they
can connect with, and faith based media, for the most
part isn't providing that, and Hollywood isn't for the most
part providing that either. And so we have an opportunity
to make shows like Thinking of the Matrix, Walking Dead, Braveheart,
all of the great movies that you think of. There
are Christian arts who can make those one hundred percent.
One person said in my comments that Christians are out
of creative juice, when obviously that's not the case. There
are people like Mel Gibson who are creating these amazing
movies that have made hundreds of millions of dollars, if
not billions, And so I think by telling a good story,
that's kind of like he has made a lot of
money by making a good story, and so people when
they connect with those stories, it will be profitable and
you'll be able to see the fruit of that story.
And so I think we have a huge opportunity here.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I'm going to close off with one thing,
and that's about the the Amazon series The House of David.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So that's done phenomenally well to me in my wife
it was a slow start. We were I think three
episodes into where we finally said, okay, we're buying in.
And there's a fair bit of violence in that movie,
and there's there they portrayed the giants you know in
science fiction any way, and I think it's personally for me,
it had great effects. It didn't seem cheaply made. It
was I thought high production value. I thought high story value,
and exploring the life of David. As you've been reading
a if you watched that and b do you think
that's a good indicator for faith based movies.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've seen it, Yeah, and I'd say it's definitely
on the right track. I'd agree with you. The first
you know, three episodes is kind of it was a
bit slow. Yeah, there are some The main thing that
I didn't like, probably about the first episode was the
way they positioned God and and it's kind of like
saying from what I recall it was their God or
a kind of like lower yes yes. So that annoyed
me a bit. It was like, just frame it how
it is, don't do the don't do the thing, whereas
like their God as if it's like some other thing,
you know, as if there is another Yeah, right, So
that was that was That was one of the things,
is like, I don't like that. But then later on
they kind of switched their tune kind of, so is
that was? That was the only that was I mean there,
I suppose there are a few other things you could
nippick about, but the way they positioned God in the
first couple episodes, that is it got me.
Speaker 2: Oh oh uh, let me just out for your opportunity
to tell me what's what people see in your short
film that you've made and been inspired to make and
pitch us on that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So the short film is an experimental exploration of
a story that I'm currently developing. Where I wanted to
see because I haven't really seen other Christians do this
is what is it like to be inside someone's head
when they are going through demonic oppression? And I wanted
to see kind of He starts out on one level,
and because of his belief system and the things that
he thinks he cannot do, he slowly degrades because he
has no light of Christ in his life, and he
has because he doesn't know Christ, and because he's actively
choosing against Christ, he is degrading and he has no
other way to go but down. And so I wanted
to explore that and be able to show kind of
a cautionary tale of what happens when you open a
door to the enemy and you have no way to
close it. So that's, in a nutshell, that's what it's about.
Speaker 2: Do we ever have no way to close it?
Speaker 3: No, there is a way to close it. But this character,
because the way I wanted to explore it was he
actively chooses not to turn to Christ. He actively chooses
and you know, this could be it's not going to
be like and here's the part where he reads the
scripture verse maybe, but you know it's like there's no, yeah,
there's no. A horse comes charging in.
Speaker 2: Kind misunderstood old pastor with the guitar and.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you tune right there. Jesus is now with you. Yeah.
I think kind of with Tolkien, how he wanted to
stay away from the overt stuff. I kind of want
to tell things more symbolically. So yeah, So I think
if you can experience with the character and you see
maybe the light in kind of a symbolic way, just
kind of coming in and pushing away the shadows, then
you can see how because he is able to because
well not just because he's able, but because God has
invited him and he is choosing to walk with the Lord,
he is now able to overcome the darkness. But in
this series he doesn't, and I wanted to show the
consequences of that. Good.
Speaker 2: Well, right, I appreciate you coming on, and it's good
to know their young man serving the Lord in this
way and that I think it's pretty clear that God
calls you with a passion for this and the talent
for it, and I agree with you if she'd invest
in that space and appreciate you coming on Tod Hermit Show.
Speaker 3: Thank you very much, right yeah, my pleasure.
Speaker 2: This is a Todd Hermit show. Please go well, be strong,
be kind, and make the affirmative choice to walk in
the light of Christ.