"Christian" Celebrities Versus Jesus

I read this great article from a website that I follow. Make sure you click on the link below to finish the article.

by Randy Thomasson - Christian Post Contributor

Most Americans were angered by the Miss USA pageant unfairly discriminating against the moral values of Miss California Carrie Prejean. But equally disturbing is the reaction of young, self-proclaimed Christian celebrities who are taking the side of homosexual activist Perez Hilton, who led the attack against Carrie.

The sad fact is, nowadays most of America's youth receives either no Biblical truth or cotton-candy truth disguised as "Christian." Anti-religious government schools and the music that most parents let their kids consume have produced a pagan, go-with-your-feelings youth culture.

Today, the majority of America's daughters - even those in the Church - are being heavily influenced by Hollywood singers such as Miley Cyrus and Heidi Montag, both who say they are Christians, yet hold non-Christian views on marriage. Right now, their pro-homosexual "marriage" values are reaching millions of young people through MTV and other media outlets.

This is something to understand and speak out on. Otherwise, more and more young people in the Church, even those who claim to be strong Christians, will misdefine "love" and "truth" and exchange Biblical truth for their own feelings. Their heart's desire to please themselves and please others will trump any desire to please the God of the Bible.

What follows is not a sordid interest in Hollywood lifestyles; it's a much-needed condemnation of the false gospel and false Biblical standards that are influencing young people. If you're a Christian - and even if your not - please join me in exposing this.

Sixteen-year-old pop star Miley Cyrus, who says she's a Christian and says she loves Jesus, attends the seeker-friendly Montrose Church (part of the Church of the Nazarene), where the pastor believes in easy Christianity, writing "God's truth never changes. He just loves you. It's that simple."

On April 21, Miley wrote this Twitter message expressing her support for homosexual "marriage" to homosexual activist Perez Hilton, who had publicly punished Carrie Prejean for supporting Biblical marriage between a man and a woman:

God's greatest commandment is to love, and judging is not loving. That's why Christians have such a bad rep. Jesus loves you and your partner and wants you to know how much he cares! That's like a daddy not loving his lil boy cuz he's gay and that is wrong and very sad! Like I said everyone deserves to be happy. I am a Christian and I love you - gay or not. Because you are no different that anyone else! We are all God's children! I am not saying this so would be nice on your site though that would be nice jk;) but because the LORD has spoken 'luv cuz god loves.'

Meanwhile, another self-proclaimed Christian in Hollywood, MTV's Heidi Montag, age 22, wrote this Twitter message to Perez Hilton:

God says in the bible that we should love our neighbor and he created us all as equals. I know in my heart that gays and lesbians should have the same government rights that Spencer and I will when we get married. So, yes, this blonde Christian believes in gay marriage and I hope to one day go to your wedding, Perez!!!

This non-Biblical "love fest" kept going. After discovering they both supported homosexual "marriage," Montag twittered Miley, "Let's [meet] up!!!! we should have a bible study!! I love Miley!!!! Jesus loves Miley!" Miley responded, "We should deff. meet up sometime! i think we have alot in common!!!!! JESUS ROCKS! WHOO HOO!"

Do Miley Cyrus and Heidi Montag want to be Biblically-correct like Miss California Carrie Prejean says she wants to be? No, far from it. Despite their claims, Miley Cyrus and Heidi Montag are in stark conflict with Jesus Christ and the Bible.

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Dangerous Calling Trailer

For those who like thriller movies, you'll be happy to know that two brothers (Josh and Jeremiah Daws) down in Georgia have made a Christian thriller. I hope to be reviewing it soon.

Here's the Trailer
http://www.christianfilmtrailers.com/trailers/index.php

Here's the website for the movie.
http://www.dangerouscalling.com/
Comment on what you think about it.

Movie Review: Swing Vote

Movie Review: Swing Vote

Reviewed by Ben Kayser

Plot: Swing Vote takes place during the 2008 elections with two presidential candidates. Incumbent Republican Andrew Boone is in a heated race with Democrat Donald Greenleaf. At the same time, in the small town of Texico, New Mexico 12 year old Molly tries to convince her drunkard irresponsible Dad (Bud Johnson) to vote. Through a series of mishaps her dad couldn’t make it because he lost his job that day and decided to get drunk. Frustrated, Molly sneaks into the polling center and somehow manages to vote undetected. But while she was voting someone accidentally unplugged the voting machine and her vote did not go through. As the evening progresses the candidates are at a dead heat. All the votes are counted and the two candidates are completely tied. Except one vote didn’t go through all of the way, and that would be Bud Johnson’s vote. The officials give him ten days to vote for a candidate. The media finds out and they bombard his home in New Mexico trying to find out his political views. Not having a political bone in his body, he says he has an open mind for either candidate. This leads the two candidates on race to win Bud over. Bud falls for the bribes the two candidates give, going to fancy parties and meeting famous celebrities. But Molly sees through it all and tries to convince her Dad otherwise.

Morals: The first moral to the story was this. Dads need to live up to their responsibility. I felt that the presidential elections were a sub plot, and Buds relationship (or lack thereof) with Molly was the main plot. Bud quickly realized that his self-centered life needed to change to a selfless life.
The second moral to the story was that politicians should not flip-flop on the issues. They really showed the lack of principle many politicians have these days. It was sad (yet funny) to see the Republican moving over to a gay rights position and the Democrat moving over to a pro-life stance JUST to please Bud Johnson.
The third moral to the story was that being apathetic is pathetic. Get involved with politics!



Technical Aspects
Acting: Although Kevin Costner (Bud) and Kelsey Grammer (Andrew Boone) did a fine job. The movie fell towards Madeline Carroll who stole the audiences with her character Molly. Madeline did a fantastic job at convincing the viewers she was real. I have to give a hand to the director Joshua Stern for handling all of the difficult and diverse moods very skillfully.
Screenplay: I felt at some points during the film the flow of the story was choppy and a little slow. But they did a good job at mixing drama with comedy without confusing people. I also liked that they focused more on Bud and Molly rather than the elections. Many screenplay writers get sidetracked into the story and forget about character development.
Soundtrack: John Debney did a great job at mixing his music with the moods of the story. I could even find myself a little teary at a few parts due to the music. For those who don’t know John Debney did the music for the Passion of the Christ. Which is one of the greatest soundtrack albums ever.

The Bad: One of the main problems that I had with the movie was its foul language. Now, I can handle a little swearing. But it’s when they start taking God’s name in vain when I get upset. Even though Molly gets on her dads case for using God’s name irreverently. It doesn’t make up for the usage. (Although it does say something that the writer would put something like that in.)

Conclusion: I was pleased that they ended the movie without endorsing either candidate. We all know that Bud won in the end because he saw his own sin in his life. Because of the language, I can’t recommend this movie without some sort of language blocker (which I have.) It’s sad that you can’t watch a movie these days without dishonoring God’s holy name. Overall, I give this movie a –3 for content and a +1 for worldview.

Christian Filmmakers Contest

The winner of the 36 hour Christian Filmmaker Contest was announced yesterday. Some of the movies were great, some were awful. Click on the link below to see the movies that were submitted including the winner.

If you do end up watching some of the movies. Comment on this post on which movies you liked.

http://www.christianfilmmakers.org/contest/2009-04/

Expelled Clip

Hey everybody. I thought I'd pull up this clip from the movie Expelled. Although the movie wasn't hardcore enough for me. I still enjoyed it and found it helpful.

New Blog

Hey readers. I started another blog more about my personal life.

http://thoughtsfromben16.blogspot.com/

Behind the Scenes

Here is a speech I gave at toastmasters this morning. Enjoy!


Behind the Scenes of a Movie
By Ben Kayser

Movies. Everybody likes to watch movies. Whether you are young or old there is a movie out there that you can relate to. I am going to show you how much work is put into your 2 hours of entertainment. So where does it start?
It starts with the producer. Lets say he’s driving somewhere and then he suddenly slams on his breaks and yells, “I’ve got a great movie idea.” He then writes a short synopsis about the story. A synopsis would be a short description of the general plot of the story. One would sound like this, “Arnold Shwarzenager finds out he is slowly turning into a butterfly, the evil praying mantis man sends out his hoard of butterfly nets to catch Arnold.”
After the general story is laid out, the producer sends it to a screenplay writer of his choice. Several months pass by before the screenplay is finished and is then presented to some financial sponsors.

It then moves into Pre-Production where the producer will cast his crew. The crew can range anywhere between 5 and 500 people depending on the budget.
We all have our favorite directors, producers and cinematographers. But for those who get lost in the titles I will set off to explain the duties of the crew.
As I explained earlier, the producer is in charge of what goes on behind the scenes. But the director is in charge of everything that goes on in front of the camera. The main thing that the director is in charge of is the creative elements during the filming process. The director is always heavily involved with the actors. In a way, the director is the visionary of the film. A director almost has to know every thing about filmmaking. Whether it’s cinematography, lighting, script writing or audio recording the director needs to know how to do it. Trust me, being a director is a lot more than just bossing people around.
Many people may think that cinematographers have a really easy job. Push the record button and point the camera at the actors. Actually, cinematographers have the most technical job on the set. They need to know cameras like the HVX200, Cannon XG A1S, or the Panasonic AG-HPX300. They need to know about the film stock, color filters, how focal length affects the depth of field, aspect ratio and framing. This is just a little bit of what a cinematographer must master.

A day of filming can be very chaotic if the producer doesn’t have a detailed schedule. The crew usually arrives on location a few hours before the actors to get everything set up. The cameras are adjusted, the props are being set and the lights are being rigged. All the while the actors are in the wardrobe and makeup department getting ready. On films like The Lord of the Rings, the wardrobe and makeup department can have hundreds of workers. This can literally take hours. Once the actors are prepped and the crew is assembled they start filming. Filming can be a very long process because of retakes. If the director isn’t happy with the shot then they re-shoot it. Once they get the shot he likes, they move on. A day of filming sometimes takes 14-16 hours of work. That’s a long day.
After filming is done it goes to the film editor. The editor goes through all of the video and sticks it together with editing software. Not only that, but they have to put in proper transitions and fix the color correction. Editing is it’s own art. If the movie is poorly edited the movie can be choppy and very confusing. When you’re listening to a classical piece, you will notice that it flows very smoothly. That is how a film must be edited. If you move from one shot to anther too quickly people will not be able to keep up.
Once the movie is edited in a way where the director approves it moves on to the sound editor. The sound editor must create fake sound effects for things that were not recorded on the set. Things like a punch to the face, a gun being shot off or a person stomping on the floor must be separately recorded. A lot of times they have to record sounds that sound similar instead of actually recording that specific object. Once that is done, it goes to the composer to create a soundtrack.

Once the soundtrack is created the movie then goes back to the production company that sponsored the film. They make deals with the cinemas and then it gets released into theaters. That’s where you come in and spend your $8 to watch the movie.
Now, I don’t have a lot of experience with filmmaking. But for the past 5 years it has been my hobby to study filmmaking. I hope you’ve learned a little and I hope this gives you a little more appreciation for your favorite movie.