Great review WINGCOMMANDER.
Can't believe they got Paul Giamatti to play the dad!
Critique of new JW DVD: These Words Must be on Your Heart.
by WingCommander 41 Replies latest jw friends
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BU2B
The borg seems to be getting more and more out of touch with reality.. How can their cult message reach the heart if they dont even make it realistic or believable. Most JW cannot simplify their lives any further as they already cannot or barely make ends meet. How will the house shown make JWs not just in America or Canada or the UK feel,, how will it make those watching in Latin America or Africa feel? What message is in it for them?
Every video put out by the Society that shows a "modern" JW drama is so unrealistic, corny, stale and damaging in its message. Think of the YPA videos, especially the one with Andre throwing away his talent to pioneer, the Prodigal which just was disgusting with its carictures of non-JWs, the Elder only videos where they "help" the suicidal sister and she bakes them cookies, or where a JW guy knocks up a girl and they tell him to abandon the girl and his child! Really? That is Christian?? Or when the only compassionate Christ-like elder is shot down and nueterd on the JC? Now this! They are truly in la la land. Why not make a video a little more representative of reality.
Any non JW who sees this will see that it SCREAMS cult.. They show nice, stable, kind, balanced, openminded and tolerant non witnesses as evil and bad.. Amazing
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AnnOMaly
Piggy-backing on Wing Commander's review, here are some of my observations. I had more patience with this one than with the highly irritating 'Prodigal Son.'
Yes, the house, furnishings and grounds are what only RICH people could afford and maintain - not those in mere middle management positions.
2.) 1:54 - Jobs are described as an unnecessary distraction from family and religion. Hey WatchTower, not everyone can live in a tent or in opulence like you guys in the ivory towers!The message I got was that the parents were too caught up in their own careers/making money to have meaningful time with their kids, even though there was one family vacation photo on display. The kids were doing their own thing. The father himself said he didn't know what was going on with his kids. Even the 'worldly' fathers in the video were refusing overtime to spend time with their kids (Little League - 'sorry, you know I never miss a game'). Aside from the JW slant, this was a dysfunctional, fragmented family that needed to reevaluate its priorities.
5.) 3:13 - Get a load of this kitchen! Has to cost at least $50,000.00 USD. Since when do normal JW's live in this kind of home? I am STUNNED.
Yep!
7.) 4:25 - I like this kid, his expression and reaction was much the same as me growing up. I hated this mind-numbingly boring shit, and would have wished my parents did something fun with me instead of this crap. Who can blame us? Typical bible-thumping tyrant father using the bible to bash over the kids heads in a vain attempt at guilt.
He didn't come across as a Bible-thumping, tyrant father to me. I liked him. He was, in many respects, a sympathetic character, despite some of the black-and-white thinking he expressed at key moments. He was trying to get the family working together again. It was just that he thought a weekly dose of 'Family Worship' (less 'worship' and more 'family activity with a biblical twist') was the way to go about it.
8.) 5:33 - Mother says, "These teenagers are out of control." Wow, seriously? They look normal and healthy to me. WTF planet are these people on?
No way has he seen 'out of control' with these kids! LOL. Bad attitude, absolutely.
9.) 8:55 - Working on your car in meeting clothes with Elder? Give me a break!
He was in smart-casual wear (not an overall or oil stain in sight either!). Still unrealistic. The elder was in business wear.
10.) 9:28 - Look behind Thomas. There stands a built-in 2-door stainless steel refrigerator, in the GARAGE! Being JW's must be really HARD for this family! This is NOT representative of 99% of the JW's I knew. This house is incredible!
Yep!
11.) 10:15 - Dressed up Elder with no house and no kids (kids left, probably left the Lie as well), has the balls to tell Thomas, "Now who's making excuses?" This is where I would have told this moocher to get the hell off of my property. The audacity of this asshole! Typical Elder mentality though; to talk out of your ass about something you wouldn't know anything about.
The kids are referred to. They helped build the model ark later, remember? The movie makers obviously didn't want any more actors in the cast.
12.) 11:10 - Elder's wife suggesting they mooch of Thomas' family. How typical! What a bunch of freeloaders! Let your own home go, and mooch off the successful, hard-working Witness family. Jehovah provides again! Incredible. The balls these people have.
They didn't mooch. Thomas suggested they could live there rent-free.
13.) 11:22 - Daughter Rebecca has a 2-door convertible Mazda Miata, and pretty new as well. Not exactly a Pioneer-mobile. This daughter is out of control! Satan must be proud. We can also see Dad's $60,000 Volvo SUV in the driveway. These people are WELL-off for sure. No wonder the Elder is hanging around. If they were dirt-poor in a trailer park, this Elder would be nowhere to be found, unless he lived there himself. lol.
My jaw was on the floor seeing the daughter's car too.
15.) 16:15 - Elder tells Thomas, "Think of Family Worship Night as the central fountain of life that your families life depends upon." Wow....just wow. Here, all this time, I thought JESUS was bringing forth life's water free? Here, this WT propaganda video tells me it's Family Worship Night. Shut my mouth!
I hadn't picked that one up. You're right.
19.) 19:30 - Worldy boy speaks of acceptance and tolerance, 2 things the JW.Org knows absolutely nothing about. Then, he is standing in front of a series of books in the library titled, "Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics." Oh, the irony! Has anyone in the Ivory Towers ever read them I wonder?
Well spotted LOL!
22.) 22:05 - I just KNEW that fly hip-hop mongul was going to drop a $500.00 bag of pot right on the counter, boo-yah, Boooyeeeee! Next stop for the Eldest Son: Gold chains, bitches, and ho's! This kid looks like he just stepped out of J. Crew, yet he's hanging with hip-hop producers? Get a clue! This is hi-larious! I think that bag of pot came from the Governing Body's meeting room, cause they gotta be smoking some powerful shit to dream this crap up!
Yeah, I didn't think this scenario worked either :-D
23.) 23:00 - At least the reaction to the ultra-lame new Song Book is spot on!
Hell yes.
24.) 27:30 – Rebecca is made to feel inferior and guilty for even talking to a boy. What century are we living in again? Sickening guilt trip by the father. Rebecca flat out tells her father that the worldly boy is nicer and more open-minded then the boys at the Hall. Bingo! The youth are leaving in droves because the Halls are filled with self-righteous, pompous, self-centered narcissists!
The father had already prejudged the boy because he wasn't JW. I didn't get it. If he really wanted to get the measure of him, MEET HIM!
32.) 43:15 – When lecturing the son of his talents, the father states, “Why lend your talents to what you know is wrong?” You mean, like the WTBTS investing its member’s contributions into stocks of military and tobacco companies? Also, Hedge Funds? The audacity!
There is no middle ground. There's no, 'Hey son, you have a great talent, but I'm worried about this group you're hanging out with. Aren't there other artists/labels you could work with?'
33.) 45:00 – The ultimatum by the father. Incredible. What he failed to mention, is that if after 6 months the son doesn’t want to continue on in the religion, he’ll be disfellowshipped and promptly kicked to the curb by his family. Some “choice.” Pretty sly to leave THAT little nugget of “truth” out of this video.
I was expecting the father to say his son had to leave home if he didn't comply. I was surprised.
34.) 46:00 – No son, you can’t live your life how you want, make your own mistakes, because it affects US. Screw your own desires and life’s ambitions; you are to serve Mother Org. F’ you, Dad! This video is become sadistic with its underlying messages
It's true that your mistakes affect others. There's nothing wrong with that message. You cannot live just for self. But it shouldn't be desires/life's ambitions versus spirituality/morality. Again, a middle ground was excluded.
35.) 48:00 – Here we find out about Thomas’ little brother, who he killed in a car wreck due to his own youthful stupidity, and that of his parents for letting a 16-yr old have a 1969 Camaro 302. What this has to do with Thomas’ son growing up and joining a controlling cult, I have no idea, but it sure is good emotional filler. Ugh. I recall reading somewhere that, “the sins of the father are passed onto the son.”
This was the blatant emotional blackmail part.
38.) 55:50 – No JW girl would say this to a guy. She’d lie, make up something….anything…..to avoid bringing up God in school. She would be the laughing stock of the entire school once it got out if she dumped a guy like this. I don’t know how the actors did this with a straight face.
It didn't ring true. Before that, in the dinner date scene, I agree with the poster (other thread) who said the guy wouldn't have said (paraphrasing in my own words) he had a string of girlfriends and that this relationship was just a stepping stone to better relationships. I guess it was to let the audience know his tolerant attitude was more an 'anything goes,' 'hedonistic' stance. I don't understand why the girl just let the comment about his other girlfriends go.
40.) 58:25 – Wife talks about trusting Jehovah and putting spiritual things first. Then they talk about cutting back, cutting things out of their lives to simplify. Kind of like building that new 5-yr plan up at Headquarters, huh? Those tennis courts, bowling alleys, and Olympic sized swimming pools are putting “spiritual things first & simplifying”, huh? The hypocrisy is astounding. The writers of this video live in a fantasyland. ...
Yep. It killed me when he said, if his wife was unfulfilled because of sacrificing her full-time career to go part-time, she could always do more FS. I was laughing and barfing at the same time!
42.) 1:04 – Hey Marcus, get ready to start your new career in the custodial arts! You are going places, Bro!
None of his misgivings about God's existence or creation were addressed. Somehow Family Worship and throwing himself into 'theocratic routine' would be the magic wand to make all those doubts magically disappear.
What struck me was, at the beginning we were shown a lively, chaotic family; even with all its faults and dysfunction, the family had personality. By the end, the family had become bland; a 'happy ending' commercial caricature which had lost its fire. But then I was always more into 'Roseanne' than 'Cosby.'
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sd-7
WingCommander, your humor is brutally funny. I look forward to seeing this video at home with my family in...I guess another month or so.
Actually, as I think of it, I know at least one of my JW cousins was living in a 5-bedroom house at some point; I guess her husband who is now an elder, I think, makes pretty good money. My aunt's married to a non-JW who worked at NASA and she was a teacher herself, so she was driving a Benz. I guess in their case they were lucky to have a non-JW bringing in the big cash so they didn't have to feel guilty about where it came from. I say all that to say, it's not impossible, you just have to be in certain areas.
Hmm. You know, it's just nice to no longer have to worry about rushing home for the midweek meeting without having had dinner and all. That's one of the biggest bonuses of getting out of it. 'Cause man, was I hungry.
Anyway, I digress. Thanks for the review. I'm still hoping for The Prodigal Strikes Again! to be made, though...
--sd-7
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Apognophos
Well, it sounds like the lesson is that they've been too materialistic, and the video concludes with them "simplifying", and selling the home, right? So it was not about saying, "Here's how the average JWs live." It probably is a message aimed at the first world. Not every video can be applicable to every Witness. There are certainly some families I've known who are reminiscent of this one, in terms of owning lots of nice things and being viewed as "spiritually weak". The message is aimed at them.
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sir82
I recall taking a tour many years back at Bethel. While touring the art dept., they explained how the photos for the magazines would change depending on the country the magazine was to be printed in. E.g., for a preaching scene, it might show a wood house with a picket fence on the American edition, while the African edition might show a traditional mud hut or something long those lines.
I wonder if there will be different versions of this video for different countries?
If not, how will, for example, the sub-Saharan goatherds, or the Paraguayan subsistence farmers, or the Bangladeshi fishermen, react to the idea that even after "cutting back expenses", American JWs will live a lifestyle far more luxurious than the top 0.0001% of the country they themselves live in?
Or won't this video make it over there?
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Pacopoolio
I don't think the worldly boyfriend guy was presented badly/negatively.
I think they put in that "people should date and have sex with who they want and not judge other people for doing it" to scare JWs, because to them, they would think that's the most horrible thing ever since virginity until marriage and one person ever is God's way and everything else is disgusting.
However, in real life, as long as one maintains being safe/careful with it, his attitude is probably optimal and also something a lot of "worldly" people can learn - that up-front promiscuity is perfectly fine as long as you're honest about it, and a good way to discover what you actually want so you don't end up just being with the "wrong" person due to horniness. His progressive nature was pretty consistent throughout, and he would make an excellent person for that girl to date to kind of segue her out of the religion.
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What is Truth?
I plan to avoid watching it, from how it is described so far I am afraid I might end up breaking my TV. I don't want that garbage in my brain.
Thanks for the thorough review WingCommander
WIT?
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Laika
Excellent commentary wing (and Ann) I didn't pick up on Jesus absence and I really should have!
Sir82, that reminds me of the time another JW and I were in a Kenya congregation. The Watchtower was on materialism and my friend answered about 8 times, as over half the Congregation did not have running water and electricity and we were staying in a 4 star hotel down the road I found this very embarrassing. At least I was self aware enough to understand my privilege, but a lot of JWs really are oblivious.
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losingit
I couldn't sit through the video. I watched last year's Prodigal Son video with lots of interest and laughed throughout. I was recently out so everything felt so urgent. I've been out for a little over a year now and I can't read an article in the WT or Awake anymore! It makes me so mad that I want to hurl. I literally get sick. I'm soooooo happy I'm out. I may not have any friends anymore, but I'd rather be alone than introduce this garbage to my brain. I feel sorry for my former friends in the org who ate feeding this dangerous propaganda to their kids. I've wondered if in the future I might have to be their lifeline if they're ever df'd and shunned as a result.