Posted by Helen on: 12.27.2007 /
We watched this movie on Christmas Day (it was someone’s Christmas present).
This movie (in my opinion) more successfully conveys some concepts that are claimed to be core conservative Christian values than conservative Christianity does.
The movie is about a fake college set up by high school graduates who were rejected from all the real colleges they applied to. They create fake acceptance letters to satisfy their parents. They create a website, renovate a building and hire a Dean to make the fake college seem real to parents.
The fake college website says ‘acceptance is one click away’ and because that button actually works hundreds of other high school graduates show up to attend the fake college.
In a pivotal scene, the originator of the idea is about to tell them it’s fake and to all go home. He looks around at all their excited faces and realizes how much it means to each of them that somewhere was actually willing to accept them. And instead of telling them it’s all over he keeps the college going.
There’s a Bible verse I liked a lot as a Christian because it says Christians are ‘accepted in the beloved’ (i.e. Jesus). But to be accepted you have to believe stuff which is hard for a lot of us to believe. There’s a condition. Christians tell me it’s ‘one click away’, as it were, which sounds easy enough, but for me and lots of other people that’s not reality.
For me this movie better represents the idea of, if you want to be accepted, you are, period, no conditions, than the ‘gospel’ which requires me to believe things I am not able to commit to believing.
The fake college allows people to pursue their individual passions and strengths. According to the Bible Jesus was very much a person who did that - he didn’t try to ‘fit in’ - and so following him should also be that way. Yet in the conservative Christian subculture I’m from there was a lot of pressure to fit in and do things the way other people thought you should. You weren’t following Jesus unless the way you were doing it met with the approval of whoever was your spiritual leader.
I haven’t heard any conservative Christian critiques of this particular movie but I’ve heard plenty in general. Enough to know it’s very unlikely they praised this movie for being better than they are at embodying values they claim are theirs.
I’m so glad I’m away from a subculture which seems unable to recognize that it’s best values are already incorporated in the culture around them. (In my opinion) they criticize what they should be affirming and in doing so, further alienate themselves from the rest of society.
This probably isn’t true of everyone in the subculture but it’s often true of the people in it who ‘represent it publically’. Based on what I hear and read.
Comment by: joe
1 12/27/07 9:37 AM | Comment Link |Sounds interesting Helen - I’ll look out for it.
Surely the/a point is that no matter how empowering the fake college is, it is still ultimately fake and degrees earned are presumably worthless.
But then, maybe the point is that the kids learned more by renovating the building than they’d learn in school.
Curiously, I had a dream last night about a ‘fake’ High School for kids who are considered worthless losers by all the other schools.
Comment by: Helen
2 12/27/07 11:01 AM | Comment Link |Joe, that’s a good point.
As the movie progresses, the students who started the fake college decide to apply for accreditation, so that degrees earned there aren’t worthless. To get accredited they need to persuade the state board of education that their unorthodox methods deserve accreditation. Anyway if you watch the movie you’ll see how that goes.
This movie is idealistic and leaves lots of questions unanswered if you take the idea of student-led education seriously. I don’t think it sets out to be super-serious; it’s more of a feel-good movie. It includes various exaggerated caricatures.
But I do like the idea of a place where those rejected everywhere else are accepted. It seems to me that according to the Bible, Jesus accepted people everyone else rejected. He challenged people but he didn’t set conditions that were impossible for some people to meet then reject people who didn’t meet them. Maybe some people read the rich young man story reads that way but we don’t know what happened except in those few minutes. It’s only a tiny piece of that man’s story.
Comment by: David H
3 12/27/07 5:33 PM | Comment Link |Jesus seemed to believe that if you accepted people that they might change their perception of themselves and others enough to have change become an organic process that grew up within them as opposed to just another hierarchical framework forced down from above. Jesus seemed to believe that love, rather than a rigid interpretation of laws (aka rules), was the critical ingredient in a system that fostered growth (both spiritual and in how people act).
I am often told it is important to remember there are absolutes (like right and wrong); that Jesus didn’t throw out the law; that if I don’t have standards than I am so wishy-washy as to be of no use to anyone. Yet Jesus seemed to cut a lot of people a tremendous amount of slack around those same issues. The Prodigal Son was accepted while still covered with pig dung. Tax collectors, prostitutes and religious leaders were often embraced with no indication anything was asked of them. Even the Rich young Ruler was loved though he couldn’t change at the time.
The Christians I grew up with seem to want everyone to buy into the institution, the courses of study, the entire framework — before they will be loved. They may be willing to accept you after you become acceptable (or at least make noises about knowing that you don’t deserve to be accepted). Jesus didn’t seem to demand repentance first. He offered grace, love, acceptance to most right of the bat (there were some religious leaders who apparently just rubbed him the wrong way). One wonders why modern CHRISTians have such trouble doing likewise.
Comment by: Ben
4 12/27/07 6:25 PM | Comment Link |That’s a concept that has always intrigued me. Starting with a fiction, and creating a reality out of that fiction. David Brin’s The Postman (great book, atrocious movie) was the first time I remember encountering the theme. I may have to check out this movie.
Comment by: Robin Z
5 12/28/07 10:58 AM | Comment Link |Funny, I thought The Postman was a poor book and a fairly decent movie. I agree, though - Accepted does sound intriguing.
Comment by: Pat
6 12/28/07 1:32 PM | Comment Link |Ooh, sounds like a really good one, Helen! I’m adding it to my blockbuster list.
I’m with you in that oftentimes the culture expresses the values of Christian faith better than the Christian subculture does.
Comment by: Rachel
7 12/29/07 8:47 AM | Comment Link |Helen, several months ago I read the book “Take This Bread” by Sara Miles. (Here is my review.) At Sara’s church, St. Gregory of Nyssa in San Francisco, they have a wooden altar that was custom-made for their community. It is inscribed with the words, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” I love that!
Comment by: Eliza
8 12/29/07 11:19 AM | Comment Link |Looking up info on this movie online, it seems on the surface to bear more resemblance to “Animal House” than to other movies in which one might find Christian themes.
Which makes me wonder: are there other movies which seem like pure (lowbrow) entertainment on the surface, but which have themes of acceptance, redemption, etc, which be apparent to discerning viewers (like Helen!)?
Comment by: Pat
9 12/29/07 11:31 AM | Comment Link |Ooooh, sounds like a fun game :-)
I can make a case that the movie Office Space is about redemption and forgiveness, and has a nice scene at the end about our sins being erased and forgotten…
Comment by: Anthony
10 12/31/07 8:56 AM | Comment Link |I saw that same movie a long time ago. I viewed it as simple, mindless entertainment - not to be used as a mirror of comparison with the life and/or death issues of where a person will spend eternity. Accepting Jesus as Lord (being born again and becoming a member of the Christian family) never has meant that we are PERFECT or that we had “arrived” or that we are “all that”. What is does mean is that we recognize that we have a need that we nor the anything in the world can meet - a need for eternal salvation - and that we accept what Jesus did for us to meet that need. It means that we commit to a life of pursuing Him/Jesus and that we will be - as long as we are on earth - a work in progress. Sometimes it is - sadly - a matter of two steps forward and 3 or 4 or 5 steps back - but the most important thing is that we keep striving to move forward. However, no matter how tortuous our personal journey might be - it does not negate the fact that there is 1 absolute standard that we look to - and that is the Word of God. In our journey - we do not have the right to move “the bar” lower to make our efforts more “acceptable”. The Word does not change - but we have the obligation to allow the Word to change us.
Comment by: joe
11 12/31/07 10:00 AM | Comment Link |I think you’ve illustrated Helen’s point quite neatly, Anthony (if I understand her point accurately).
What she hears from Christianity is a checklist of beliefs that one must believe ‘to be saved’.
I have to say that her explanation of what she noticed from the film sounds much more like the Way of Christ than yours. In hers, people for all the wrong reasons broke the rules, yet discovered that they’d learnt something positive and lifegiving in the process.
Which is remarkably similar to a parable of Jesus. I’ll let you work that one out for yourself.
Christianity is emphatically not a bunch of lines in the sand which you believe in order to be ‘born again’ and inherit eternal life. Even a rudimentary analysis of the words of Jesus shows that is not the case.
The kingdom of heaven is not something we go to when we die, but something that exists in the here-and-now (or else is totally meaningless). Jesus did not wait for Zaccheus or Peter or Paul to reach theological perfection or be ‘born again’.
Finally, I believe you are ascribing qualities of God to the bible, which I don’t accept. Only a God of love makes meaning out of the universe. If my reading of the bible suggests that God is not love, then it is wrong. I must always measure it against that standard.
Comment by: Rachel
12 12/31/07 10:25 AM | Comment Link |Joe, I recently listened to an interview with the theologian Luke Timothy Johnson in which he lamented how intellectual and propositional modern Christianity has become. He made this simple, yet profound statement: “Information is not transformation.”
Comment by: Helen
13 12/31/07 3:45 PM | Comment Link |Thanks everyone for your comments.
Anthony, I guess I’m different from you. I can’t turn my brain off when I go to a movie and be ‘mindlessly entertained’. I’m continually seeing themes in movies which interest me.
Comment by: shane
14 01/2/08 2:29 PM | Comment Link |“Lars and the Real Girl” is a 2007 movie about a guy that purchases a sex doll. You would think the film would be raunchy, however, it turns out to be an innocent parable about love and acceptance.
I believe a lot of Christians make the mistake of believing that Jesus’ message is, “If you obey the rules. . . vote like me. . . dress like me. . . talk like me. . . and think like me, THEN you will be accepted.” That’s not the Gospel - that is religion.
The power of the Gospel is that Jesus loves and accepts me even though I’m sinful. Jesus didn’t base his acceptance of me on my ability to obey. Therefore, I can’t base my acceptance and love on people’s ability to obey either.
If we are proud or harsh towards others then we are probably guilty of basing our acceptance with God on moral standards that we believe we have fulfilled. This is religion at its worst. I think I will spend a lifetime trying to remind myself of Jesus’ message that even though I’m flawed and sinful Jesus loves and accepts me.
Comment by: Helen
15 01/2/08 4:37 PM | Comment Link |Thanks Shane - I’m glad I’m not the only one who sees love and acceptance themes in unlikely-sounding movies.
I still have the problem that Jesus doesn’t accept me unless I believe in him (so I have been told). That’s not an easy condition for me - in fact I’m not even sure it’s possible for me.
Comment by: Pat
16 01/2/08 6:09 PM | Comment Link |I’ve been looking at this for quite a while now… and it’s interesting to me, as a Christian and a sometime-leader-in-the-church, that Jesus seems to welcome EVERYBODY, but really only criticizes the religious leaders.
Of course, some of those he welcomes he encourages to ‘go, and don’t sin more’; but I’m amazed (it’s scandalous, really) at how welcoming Jesus is to those who society saw as outcasts. And how often those who thought they were religiously righteous, were the target of Jesus’ condemnation.
Comment by: Helen
17 01/2/08 6:48 PM | Comment Link |Thanks Pat - I also noticed that.
Comment by: David H
18 01/7/08 7:34 PM | Comment Link |Saw “Accepted” a few days back and was pleasantly entertained. The gag reel gave most of its footage to Lewis Black. It’s been awhile since I heard one so funny who was unrighteously incensed.
Perhaps Helen primed me, but I was quite struck by the theme of acceptance and how it transformed the people at that little fake school. Perhaps it doesn’t bear up under a detailed theological analysis, but there is something spiritually true there: people caring about you for who you are helps you become a better person.
What struck me most deeply, though, was the counterpoint of the kid trying to get into the fraternity at the real school. Fraternities have always seemed a strange type of institution. In order to join you must allow your “brothers” to torture and humiliate you. The conceptual basis seems to be that you can all trust each other after because you have a shared experience. Having grown up with someone who tortured and humiliated his children, I don’t find trust to be the likely reaction to those things. You might come out of it stronger, but that also seems unlikely if you part of the process is you will eventually end up doing the same horrible things to others while being cheered on by your “brothers.”
I won’t say there is a parallel to the church in the fraternity. But I certainly found it a fitting and accurate counterpoint in the movie. On the one side you can define yourself, which may not result in a great job or affluence or any wordly gain, but you might end up a better person. On the other, there is humiliation and the over-powering push to conformity in order to try and gain socially acceptable things like success and riches. Or, as the stars of “Accepted” say:
Bartleby Gaines: Uh, Dean Lewis why don’t you tell them a little bit about the philosophy here at south Harmon?
Uncle Ben: Look, we throw a lot of fancy words in front of these kids in order to attract them to going to school in the belief that their gonna have a better life, and we know that all were doing is breeding a whole new generation of buyers and sellers, BUYERS AND SELLERS! Pimps and whores, PIMPS AND WHORES! and indoctrinating them into a life-long hell of debt and indecision!
DO I HAVE TO SPOON FEED IT TO YA? look, there’s only one reason that kids want to go to school… To get a good job. To get a good job with a great starting salary.
Comment by: Helen
19 01/7/08 7:42 PM | Comment Link |Thanks David. I’m glad you enjoyed ‘Accepted’.
I thought the counterpoint was very effective too, although I didn’t say much about it.