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Last night we watched, on the recommendation of some sweet girls who stayed with us while waiting for the rest of their choir to arrive from the US, the above film.  The girlst went on to do a week at St Paul's Cathedral and a week at Oxford Cathedral (and that was the first I heard that Oxford had a cathedral).

It didn't get off to a very promising start but, with a bit of judicious fast-forwarding of the vainly repetitious and vacuous singing, we were optimistic that it would have, at heart a solid message.

It did.   One of the quotes which sticks in my mind is 'if I had been more intelligent, I wouldn't have had 9 children'.  The scene which finally convinced me it was not a good film was when the simpering Mr Snow (representative of the 'nice guy', whom you can't trust) happened across his intended amongst the trees.  She was naive enough to be duped, by the 'bad guy' (whom you can't trust either but at least you'll have fun...),  into a close-encounter with this worm.  And what was the response of her 'knight in shining armour'?   He told her where to get off, he didn't want anything to do with a 'the kind of girl who lets herself be carried out of the forest by another man...  '.  I almost gasped out loud at this disreputable attitude.

While I was washing up this mng, it occurred to me that this was very much the attitude demonstrated by our first father.   So (the message goes), you might as well throw in your lot with Mr Nasty, at least he's got a spine (of sorts).  Ultimately the message of this (thoroughly 'modern' though dating back to the 1950's or 60's) film is 'you make your own happiness'.  The song 'you'll never walk alone' (remember that echoing round football-terraces?)  typifies the only comfort offered to those in this generation who live and die without Christ.   When I was younger, I have to say, I never found the idea that 'someone' was 'with' you or 'loved' you (where it remained ethereal and you were still stuck up to the ears in the mire, and weeping in the darkness) somewhat hollow.

As an exposure of the emptiness of individuals, and a culture, without Christ, where 'romance' is the highest goal, it was a useful experience.   Unsure whether to keep it for future 'educational' viewings, or just to chuck it out, I'll go on pondering the matter.

The costumes were spectacular - shame we don't wear dresses like that any more (though none of them would have fitted me even if 'we' did!).  The singing was tedious though tuneful - the lyrics clever in parts but nauseating and repetitive.  It is startling to think that the lyrics were composed and sung by people who had much more familiarity with hymn-singing than most of the modern viewers of this film.  That the minds and voices of people trained in singing God's praises should end up presenting such dross, is cautionary.  The morals were abonimably low, the 'church' and 'solid family' were ridiculed and one couldn't help wondering whether 'Bill' - had he ever been born - might still have gained his father's approval had he found that what really made him 'happy' was a career as a serial murderer - but we'll never know that.

Back then, there was a prevailing constraint on what men did when they happened across sweet girls  on a dark night, in a forest.   Because of the relentless pursuit of 'whatever makes me happy' and the abandonment of the practical considerations of the Day of Judgement, we live in a very different world - and Holywood has a lot to answer for turning the culture onto this particular road.

All power to the Christian film-making industry in the coming years - it's about time the Church attempted to recover some of the wide tracts of lost ground.