Movies and Midrash
eBook - ePub

Movies and Midrash

Popular Film and Jewish Religious Conversation

  1. 328 pages
  2. English
  3. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

Movies and Midrash

Popular Film and Jewish Religious Conversation

About this book

Finalist for the 2017 National Jewish Book Award in Modern Jewish Thought and Experience presented by the Jewish Book Council Movies and Midrash uses cinema as a springboard to discuss central Jewish texts and matters of belief. A number of books have drawn on films to explicate Christian theology and belief, but Wendy I. Zierler is the first to do so from a Jewish perspective, exploring what Jewish tradition, text, and theology have to say about the lessons and themes arising from influential and compelling films. The book uses the method of "inverted midrash": while classical rabbinical midrash begins with exegesis of a verse and then introduces a mashal (parable) as a means of further explication, Zierler turns that process around, beginning with the culturally familiar cinematic parable and then analyzing related Jewish texts. Each chapter connects a secular film to a different central theme in classical Jewish sources or modern Jewish thought. Films covered include The Truman Show (truth), Memento (memory), Crimes and Misdemeanors (sin), Magnolia (confession and redemption), The Descendants (birthright), Forrest Gump (cleverness and simplicity), and The Hunger Games (creation of humanity in God's image), among others.

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Yes, you can access Movies and Midrash by Wendy I. Zierler in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Médias et arts de la scène & Histoire et critique du cinéma. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Title
  3. Copyright
  4. Contents
  5. List of Illustrations
  6. Foreword by Rabbi Eugene B. Borowitz
  7. Acknowledgments
  8. Introduction
  9. Chapter 1 The Truman Show: Truth
  10. Chapter 2 Magnolia: Confession and Redemption
  11. Chapter 3 The Descendants: Birthright: Consent versus Descent
  12. Chapter 4 On Memento: Remaking Memory from the Outside In
  13. Chapter 5 Crimes, Misdemeanors, and Sin
  14. Chapter 6 Forrest Gump: Cleverness and Simplicity
  15. Chapter 7 The King’s Speech: Speaking God’s Word
  16. Chapter 8 Stranger than Fiction: God as Author
  17. Chapter 9 A Serious Man: Parables of Jewishness
  18. Chapter 10 Exam: Tests, Trials, and Attachments
  19. Chapter 11 The Hunger Games: In God’s Image
  20. Conclusion Moonrise Kingdom: And the Youth Shall See Visions
  21. Appendix I On the Design of “Reel Theology,” from e-mail archives
  22. Appendix II More Movies and Midrash: Additional Film Resources
  23. Notes
  24. Bibliography
  25. Index
  26. Back Cover