The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly of Storytelling | The Taxidermy of Hollywood

Survey Link https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdCCSj9URmUSo5YE8JyxCTDo0ESjUKZ7eZMD_SFwmbG10aAsw/viewform?usp=sharing

The Traditions of the Virgin Mary: https://youtu.be/9TkSiOBwo04

Critical Drinker video on Rings of Power: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kquNKboBtJw

Today, we venture into Hollywood. In this first of two parts, Dr. Jacobs uses the new Netflix movie about the Virgin Mary to explore the many pitfalls that Hollywood falls into when trying to create a movie for Christians. He’ll also get prescriptive. Who can fix these problems and how? 

All the links: 

X: https://x.com/NathanJacobsPod

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0hSskUtCwDT40uFbqTk3QS

Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-nathan-jacobs-podcast

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thenathanjacobspodcast

Substack: https://nathanajacobs.substack.com/

Website: https://www.nathanajacobs.com/

Academia: https://vanderbilt.academia.edu/NathanAJacobs

00:00:00 Intro 

00:00:24 Take the survey 

00:02:57 The IP problem in Hollywood 

00:11:59 Hollywood, Faith, & Propaganda 

00:29:00 Hollywood doesn’t know how to make these movies 

00:41:41 Background on Dr. Jacobs and the Mary movie 

00:45:24 Choosing Protestant, Catholic, or the Orthodox versions of the Mary story

00:50:12 Mary and Joseph: To romance or not to romance? 

00:54:21 Mary’s early life in the temple 

00:57:39 The Netflix approach to Satan in their movie 

00:59:38 When writers rip off other writers 

01:04:42 Back to Satan in the movie 

01:06:32 Inexplicable story changes 

01:11:40 Filling in the gaps in biblical storytelling 

01:18:08 Honoring the worldview of the source material 

01:29:14 Girlbosses subverting the men 

01:35:59 Cringe :/

01:45:31 How to make a successful organically Christian movie 

01:55:30 The myth of secular neutrality 

01:59:35 Depth in storytelling (Tolkien vs. Lewis)

02:13:00 The Hollywood taxidermists 

02:26:04 Can Hollywood self-correct?