Debates are already a spectacle in and of themselves, with enormous drama and emotional investment (some may even argue that that is all they are). But this kind of film has the ability to take us even further into the drama. With slick cuts and its unique visual style, the film brings a whole new dimension to the event and to the argument that was the focus for the tour (“Is religion good for the world?”). Our culture has a clear obsession with the visual over the abstract and it will be interesting to see whether the film can successfully communicate some of the ideas that inspired the exchange in the first place, or whether the medium will swallow the message and engulf those ideas in the foreground of personalities.
The DVD comes out on the 27th (you can preorder now on amazon). You can also pick up the book there that Wilson and Hitchens both co-authored on the same topic. Also worth reading is their email exchange at Christianity Today.
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4 comments:
Hitchens is one of my favorite debaters. Some would call him a master debater.
I'm looking forward to watching this. I've already seen these two clash on youtube, so I'm pretty sure it will be good.
Thanks for the tip about the exchange of emails. I'll check that out.
I saw it two days ago. I am a huge fan of hitchens. His "why Orwell matters" is a great piece of writing. What makes collision so compelling is that his fellow debater Pastor Wilson is also very bright, so you advoid the usally one sided encounters as when it him against ann coulter or some other right wing mouth breather..
I've always actually been more frustrated with the obviously intelligent apologist than the simple minded true believer.
I always end up wondering whether or not they've actually deluded themselves into believing this nonsense, or are they simply charlatans and sophists?
Maybe a bit of both.
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