WEBVTT 00:00:00.640 --> 00:00:10.640 So again, we continue in our series here dealing with uh some of the uh Academy Award nominees for Best Picture. 00:00:10.800 --> 00:00:20.879 I choose those in particular because I think, well, if they're getting nominated, uh, they're being considered kind of relevant and worth talking about. 00:00:21.039 --> 00:00:25.760 So I hope that you are having that same feeling as we go through things. 00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:28.800 Um this one, one battle after another. 00:00:28.879 --> 00:00:32.159 It's the latest film from Paul Thomas Anderson. 00:00:32.640 --> 00:00:37.439 Do we have film people in the crowd, Paul Thomas Anderson fans? 00:00:41.600 --> 00:00:43.359 It's me and Paul. 00:00:43.600 --> 00:00:46.240 And Paul only likes them because they share a name. 00:00:46.399 --> 00:00:47.359 That is it. 00:00:48.320 --> 00:00:49.119 Oh, all right. 00:00:49.200 --> 00:00:51.119 So nobody's seen Magnolia? 00:00:51.280 --> 00:00:52.799 There will be blood? 00:00:53.280 --> 00:00:54.719 Phantom Thread? 00:00:55.679 --> 00:00:57.679 All right, so those are some of his films. 00:00:58.399 --> 00:01:18.400 What I find interesting about him is he really digs into some uh uh unique questions about what it means to be a human being, and he finds these situations where that those questions get really played out, and uh they're intense movies generally, very human but very intense movies. 00:01:18.560 --> 00:01:24.959 Uh some of the uh, well, the title itself in this case of this film, One Battle After Another. 00:01:25.040 --> 00:01:27.120 I I see two levels going on there. 00:01:27.280 --> 00:01:31.680 There's the one that phrase, oh, one battle after another, right? 00:01:32.000 --> 00:01:36.079 We say that when life is challenging, one battle after another. 00:01:36.400 --> 00:01:54.480 But then there's this other subtext where I think we're being invited to look at uh some of our human tendency towards extremism and some of the problems about that, a life that ends up as one battle after another. 00:01:54.879 --> 00:01:59.680 So uh this is a film about a group called the French 75. 00:01:59.920 --> 00:02:05.120 It's a resistance movement focused largely on immigration issues. 00:02:05.280 --> 00:02:08.159 Uh so uh, you know, somewhat relevant for today. 00:02:08.240 --> 00:02:15.680 I'll I'll give you uh uh one picture I wanted to show you here, just so you get a uh a sense of who the main characters are. 00:02:16.000 --> 00:02:22.479 This is Leonardo DiCaprio and Tiana Taylor, Bob and Porfidia Beverly Hills. 00:02:22.800 --> 00:02:30.879 I'm sure her Christian name given to her by her parents at one point, as he he says sarcastically. 00:02:30.960 --> 00:02:34.960 Uh, but these are the two characters, kind of the main ones that get things started. 00:02:35.120 --> 00:02:47.280 They are together in this resistance movement called French 75, and we learn very early on their tactics are very aggressive and very violent. 00:02:47.599 --> 00:02:54.159 Uh then we've also got on the other side Sean Penn playing a character named Lockjaw, right? 00:02:54.240 --> 00:03:02.400 And you can see him, uh, and if you're a Sean Penn fan, like I am, uh really good actor, and he really gets lost in a role. 00:03:02.560 --> 00:03:10.240 In this case, he plays a really bad guy uh as part of the military response to this resistance. 00:03:10.479 --> 00:03:16.080 We learn that his tactics are also aggressive and violent. 00:03:16.319 --> 00:03:23.919 Uh, and we learn that uh he's got a willingness to be manipulative in a way that can be problematic. 00:03:24.159 --> 00:03:30.080 He probably has some mental illness that that plays out, but we won't dig too deep into that. 00:03:30.319 --> 00:03:37.520 Together with these two factions, they form this extremist tension that drives the whole plot. 00:03:37.680 --> 00:03:39.840 It drives the whole theme of the movie. 00:03:40.000 --> 00:03:47.120 And what's interesting is the film really doesn't take sides in this this whole debate. 00:03:47.199 --> 00:03:55.759 It mostly is talking about the inevitable end of such an extremist confrontation and conflict. 00:03:56.159 --> 00:04:14.319 So ultimately, story-wise, spoiler alert, perfidia gets manipulated into giving up her movement and allies uh to the other side, and the resistance ends up having to flee and to go further underground in order to avoid being caught and andor killed. 00:04:14.400 --> 00:04:23.439 Uh so 16 years later, 16 years we find uh Leonardo DiCaprio's character, Bob. 00:04:23.759 --> 00:04:32.560 Uh he is now Paul in his new identity, and he is also with their daughter Willa, who's now 16. 00:04:32.800 --> 00:04:40.319 Uh so we're 16 years into the future, and this is Willa, by the way, young actress that's kind of making her her way in things. 00:04:40.560 --> 00:04:42.399 Chase Infinity. 00:04:42.879 --> 00:04:44.240 Is that a cool name? 00:04:44.800 --> 00:04:45.120 Right? 00:04:45.279 --> 00:04:51.439 That sounds like such a metaphorical name, almost like something from a story, not the actress's real name. 00:04:51.759 --> 00:04:53.360 Chase Infinity. 00:04:53.839 --> 00:05:00.720 Uh but at this point, 16 years later, they're living in this kind of listless, purposeless state. 00:05:00.959 --> 00:05:08.879 Bob is now Paul, as I said, and he's lost any sense of any passion or ambition for what he's going to do in life. 00:05:09.040 --> 00:05:10.800 He's pretty much drug addled. 00:05:11.120 --> 00:05:21.839 Uh the daughter, Willa, has become uh kind of disillusioned, disillusioned with life and uh especially with this father from what he's become. 00:05:22.000 --> 00:05:30.160 Meanwhile, Lockjaw, right, the other, the military response, he's risen in power, risen to become a strong power. 00:05:30.240 --> 00:05:35.360 And not only that, he has found Bob and Willa. 00:05:35.920 --> 00:05:43.279 So the back half of the film is this chase, you know, a lot of adventurous chase scenes. 00:05:43.360 --> 00:05:47.439 Uh, we call it a long-playing final confrontation. 00:05:47.680 --> 00:06:09.279 Uh, but what happens in the journey of this confrontation is Bob ends up kind of finding himself again, maybe not to that extremist end where he starts the film at, but he starts realizing what he believes in again, finding some courage, finding a willingness to fight for things that he believes in, especially his daughter. 00:06:09.439 --> 00:06:23.920 And Willa, she uh it's kind of thrown uh her well, her world gets turned on its on end because she only kind of knew who she was and what had happened uh just enough to be able to stay safe. 00:06:24.160 --> 00:06:31.439 So when they come a calling for her, all of a sudden she realizes she is not who she thought she was. 00:06:31.680 --> 00:06:36.480 And so her challenge then becomes to ask herself, well, then who am I? 00:06:36.800 --> 00:06:42.800 And this struggle to kind of fill that blank spot out and become who she really is. 00:06:43.199 --> 00:06:53.040 Um so without getting too deep into the film, it seems to have this subtext about the dangers of extremism. 00:06:53.279 --> 00:07:11.519 And what we find in the midst of the battle is that there's a lot of damage that's done, and it's largely done to those who drive the extremism, but tragically also to the middle of those and those who are near to those extremists. 00:07:11.680 --> 00:07:14.480 Um, but there is a sign of hope at the end. 00:07:15.040 --> 00:07:16.879 Spoiler alert again. 00:07:17.519 --> 00:07:31.199 Willis has aligned herself with some more legal forms of protest and resistance, uh, and she may have learned how to navigate her sense of social justice and what she is able to fight for. 00:07:31.279 --> 00:07:33.839 Uh so there's your kind of quick run-through. 00:07:33.920 --> 00:07:35.519 It's a very complex movie. 00:07:35.680 --> 00:07:37.600 So uh again, it's provocative. 00:07:37.680 --> 00:07:42.399 It won't be for everybody, but for those who enjoy it, there's a lot of layers. 00:07:42.639 --> 00:07:48.000 But uh we get to the point of thinking, okay, well, what is there for us as Christians? 00:07:48.240 --> 00:07:55.680 How do we look at this story and find something to uh uh get a hold of and see how it speaks to us? 00:07:55.759 --> 00:08:09.360 Uh and to me, it came largely from this way of uh this message about claiming ourselves and our beliefs, even in a time of trial. 00:08:10.319 --> 00:08:16.959 By Bob, Leonardo DiCaprio's character, he abandons what he believes in because they have to go further underground. 00:08:17.040 --> 00:08:18.480 It all blew up on them. 00:08:18.800 --> 00:08:22.000 His uh wife had turned them all in. 00:08:22.319 --> 00:08:30.560 Uh, and so he just becomes this shell of something that no longer is living who he believes he is. 00:08:30.800 --> 00:08:38.000 Willa, again, who had little idea who she is, she has to uh basically take this journey. 00:08:38.080 --> 00:08:46.639 She's forced to take this journey of figuring out who she is and claiming her own life and her own story in the midst of all of that. 00:08:47.279 --> 00:09:01.039 So I wonder um if the message for us, what we can grab onto here, is that in difficult times, we're invited, we're encouraged to do the same. 00:09:01.360 --> 00:09:08.960 We're invited and encouraged to remind ourselves of who we are and what we believe. 00:09:11.120 --> 00:09:15.840 Paul, in the first letter we're working with, the letter to the church in Ephesus, right? 00:09:15.919 --> 00:09:28.080 The Paul's letter to the Ephesians, he star he speaks about this battle that we are waging, and he reminds us that it is a spiritual battle. 00:09:28.879 --> 00:09:34.159 It's the spiritual part of this battle that is the tough thing. 00:09:34.960 --> 00:10:00.879 Here I'm focused in on one of the passages, Ephesians 6 12, for our struggle, and I think it's on a slide, for our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, it's against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. 00:10:02.480 --> 00:10:03.039 Do you see? 00:10:03.200 --> 00:10:09.039 Do you see how he's characterized our opponent or or who we're looking to go against? 00:10:09.120 --> 00:10:14.480 It's not people with guns and uh other physical forms of weaponry. 00:10:15.440 --> 00:10:24.320 We're talking about spiritual challenges, people who are looking to influence who we are and what we believe. 00:10:25.120 --> 00:10:25.519 Right? 00:10:25.679 --> 00:10:40.960 That I think the caution Paul's giving us here is we should have our guard up for those negative and and maybe even dark influences around us, potentially even more than a physical threat. 00:10:42.000 --> 00:10:43.919 What might a dark influence be? 00:10:44.080 --> 00:10:54.480 Well, possibly anything that's pulling us away from being who we feel called to be, being who we feel God has called us to be. 00:10:55.360 --> 00:11:02.080 Maybe it's uh an influence that is telling us we shouldn't trust in God's presence. 00:11:02.639 --> 00:11:07.200 We shouldn't trust in God's justice, we shouldn't trust in God's peace. 00:11:07.360 --> 00:11:10.720 Maybe those are the dark influences we need to look for. 00:11:11.600 --> 00:11:25.519 Maybe the dark influences are the the powers, the in the voices that tell us that we shouldn't be loving a neighbor, that there are reasons not to do that. 00:11:27.759 --> 00:11:44.080 Bob, Leonardo DiCaprio's character, he shows us what it looks like when we lose ourselves, even in times of trial, when we lose our beliefs, when we lose our, to use Paul's word in Romans, our character, right? 00:11:44.240 --> 00:11:52.399 We become this empty husk, this husk that uh uh um just is a loss of self. 00:11:52.559 --> 00:11:53.840 That's a battle. 00:11:54.159 --> 00:11:57.440 We really can't afford to lose. 00:11:59.600 --> 00:12:04.240 Paul speaks of it when he talks about this armor of God in his letter to the Romans. 00:12:04.399 --> 00:12:05.919 Uh did you notice? 00:12:06.080 --> 00:12:08.240 And we I think I preached this last summer. 00:12:08.399 --> 00:12:11.440 Anybody better at remembering what I preached than I am? 00:12:11.919 --> 00:12:15.360 I'm pretty sure I preached this last summer, right? 00:12:15.519 --> 00:12:42.240 And and he talks about uh uh uh uh some of the the things that we take to go into this battle with the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, choose to proclaim the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:48.480 These are spiritual weapons, these are not physical weapons. 00:12:49.200 --> 00:13:00.159 These are the things that that build us up from inside so that we can go and live out what are often battles that we live in this life. 00:13:01.120 --> 00:13:06.720 I think it's clear that Paul's not talking about physical battle, he's talking about the spiritual one. 00:13:07.039 --> 00:13:14.080 Will you let the world around you pull you from what you've come to know about God? 00:13:15.759 --> 00:13:18.799 I think that's the cornerstone question of this. 00:13:20.159 --> 00:13:35.039 While our characters, Bob and Willa, had to be pushed to remember who they are and why they fight, we are invited to proactively assume this spiritual armor. 00:13:36.559 --> 00:13:42.879 We assume it as a way of reminding ourselves of what we believe about the world and about God. 00:13:43.200 --> 00:13:52.960 We remind ourselves of these weapons, or or maybe a better word would be tools that we have to work through life's challenges with. 00:13:54.720 --> 00:14:23.039 Tools like truth, tools like righteousness, tools like the gospel of peace, the word of God, and maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe most importantly of all the tools, the faith that those tools work and the trust that they are what leads us to the life that we're supposed to live. 00:14:24.799 --> 00:14:35.600 In this light, maybe we shouldn't be working so hard to get through our suffering so fast. 00:14:37.679 --> 00:14:42.480 We don't like suffering, we try to move through it as fast as we can. 00:14:42.559 --> 00:14:48.480 But did you notice Paul in the letter to the Romans, he said we we boast of our suffering. 00:14:49.759 --> 00:14:52.000 Do you ever boast of your suffering? 00:14:52.960 --> 00:14:55.200 Stephen does, but he's different. 00:14:58.480 --> 00:15:00.559 Do you ever boast in your suffering? 00:15:00.720 --> 00:15:09.759 I tell you, if you were uh working out and trying to enhance your athletic ability, you might boast in some of that suffering because it made you stronger. 00:15:10.240 --> 00:15:25.600 This is what Paul's talking about, that maybe we need to just focus on whatever suffering we are we have differently, knowing that there's a journey to be had through suffering, which is inevitable for human beings. 00:15:26.000 --> 00:15:32.159 In the case of Bob and Willa, their suffering was the driver for their awakening. 00:15:32.399 --> 00:15:38.320 It's what forced them to remember and become who they are again. 00:15:40.240 --> 00:15:42.720 Paul writes about it in his letter to the Romans. 00:15:42.879 --> 00:15:46.480 He tells us suffering leads to endurance. 00:15:47.600 --> 00:15:54.480 Endurance leads to character, and character leads to hope. 00:15:56.320 --> 00:16:10.480 Let us pray that with life's ups and ups and downs, that we too can emerge with endurance, with the character of knowing who we are and with hope. 00:16:11.759 --> 00:16:12.399 Amen. 00:16:13.519 --> 00:16:14.159 Amen.