I have this graphic novel, CHIP KALDERON - SCIENTIST, SOLDIER, SORCERER, which also has a screenplay draft version. Although I do believe a lot in the potential of the character and story, it´s constantly concerned me that it deals with hard issues of science vs. faith, reason vs. supernatural and so on. If it were a small budget indie flick script, I´d just go for it, but I conceived it as this sci-fi-fantasy thing that can´t really be done the way I envisioned it without a large budget. Now, issues are not really new in blockbuster movies, there´re a lot of social and political comments in Nolan´s Dark Knight Trilogy, even the new Captain America one, but then again these are properties with a built-in fanbase that knows and enjoys those undertones in the source material, plus religion always seems like a particularly delicate topic to handle. Now, my story doesn´t necessarily take an atheist - or theist, for that matter, approach -, if it has a message it´s that faith and reason are not necessarily incompatible. I wonder, do I stick to my guns, or do I try to make the approach less direct, like I make up a sci-fi spiritual belief like The Force so it doesn´t feel like a direct comment on Christianity, for instance?
Screenwriting : Approaching controversial issues in a blockbuster kinda screenplay by Alex Winck
Approaching controversial issues in a blockbuster kinda screenplay
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The message that "faith and reason are not necessarily incompatible" sounds like just the sort of comfortable approach the big studios take to issues of religion.
I suppose. I´m a fairly agnostic person myself, so it´s still a sincere approach.
God's Not Dead is faith-based. A very safe investment these days. Agnosticism-based is a thornier business.
My approach questions, but doesn´t really dismiss faith. I don´t think a person of faith, at least not the extreme kind, would be offended by it. It´s more cowardly execs afraid to putconsiderable money into this kinda thing that worries me.
Just as an example, Guillermo Del Toro had a hard time convincing execs to do Hellboy, some wanted him to call it Heckboy, even make him just a guy in a coat, and if you see the movie, at the end of the day it´s still a good vs. evil story, just the good guy is a demon who happened to be raised by a good man who taught him right and wrong.
Faith and reason are different paths to the same thing. Could it be something that doesn't exist? Could it be leading to something we can never know, like what makes up a Quarck?
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Or one is a cul-de-sac, depending on your point of view. But calling them different paths to the same thing is definitely a blockbuster-friendly way of putting it.
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I also believe that science and faith are not mutually exclusive. The best films don't wrap it up in a neat little package. Present the questions and the issues...all sides...and make us THINK.