The following weekend it was screened, not in cinemas, but in 3200 churches across the United States. Monday then saw the DVD release. This is the third film in the Left Behind series which is based on the best-sellers by Reverend Tim Lahaye and Jerry Jenkins.

A brief review/critique would acknowledge that the Left Behind films are well-crafted, although budgets are not large as blockbusters go and this is sometimes evident in the limited special effects. In World at War, it looks as though the global conflagration is confined to the Washington DC area with some explosions and two glimpses of a semi-demolished White House. More attention is given to the musical score and songs by popular Christian composers and performers.
The quality of acting is standard with the screenplay giving the cast some conventional lines about danger and war but also asking them to portray earnest people who are not afraid of expressing their faith in the Lord, in the words of the Bible and in the times of tribulation and the Antichrist. Kirk Cameron is not a vigorous performer and his acting, though genial, is not particularly forceful. Gordon Currie, on the other hand, knows that the devil usually gets the best lines and communicates a diabolical ruthlessness as Nicolae Carpathio. World at War does have the advantage of Louis Gossett Jr as the embattled president of the United States. At best, the movies can be described as generally competent and meeting the expectations of their audience.

But, in an era where The Da Vinci Code is taken as gospel by millions of ‘secular’ readers (which will increase when the movie version is released), what of the theology and spirituality behind the Left Behind series? What of the biblical scholarship?

The issues are not those of mainstream Christians around the world. Rather, they are of immediate interest to more evangelical groups, especially those with a more apocalyptic perspective on the world, that judgment is deserved and may well be coming soon. They see plenty of signs and portents and in 2005 with tsunami, famine, hurricanes and devastating earthquakes in Asia, Africa and the Americas, even more strikingly. For Christians who take their bible literally and for those anticipating ‘the rapture’, the films are even more compelling.

Interpretation of the bible is over-literal. Matthew 24 is explicitly quoted in several of the films. In World at War, Buck simply opens the Gospels at this text, reads a few lines to the bewildered American president and shows him that the signs that Jesus offers to the disciples who ask about the ‘end of the age’ are happening now. Matthew 24:40-41 are key rapture quotations: that of two men in a field, one taken, one left; two women grinding at a mill, one taken, one left. The image and the metaphor, in this interpretation, become the reality.

Nicolae Carpathio (with the help of the United Nations) has destroyed his enemies and controls the now globalised world. He is the Beast of the books of Daniel and Revelation. His power is challenged by the Tribulation Force in World at War. But, with the end of the third film, there is still much more to come.

This takes no account of the original biblical context nor of the literary forms, the poetry and symbolism, of the mentalities and imaginations of the authors. The interpretation is fundamentalist, a literal application of words about events in the past to the present. Clearly a biblical faith listens to God’s word to discover its meaning for our times but appreciates the literary forms, the mentality of the times in order to discover richer and deeper meaning.

While there are some allusions to a forgiving God, the image of God in the Left Behind films is one of a powerful creator but, more, of a powerful judger of human sinfulness. Those who are beloved might be taken up in rapture to heaven, but most people are left behind. By using the natural disasters as signs of God’s judgment, the image of God as an angry, even vengeful, judge is reinforced. In World at War, the president is forced to see the errors of his reliance on the worldly power of Nicolae and the military when his life is threatened and his Vice President is blown up. Pestilence is infecting people, including Bruce and Chloe. The Tribulation Force, a remnant at best, are in the service of a mighty God but a God to whom it is difficult to relate to in any personal, experiential spirituality. Buck’s conversion in the original Left Behind (which is based on rational arguments) comes about very quickly. His converting the president to his faith way of thinking is, once again, too rational and too rapid.

There is one striking episode in World at War when Bruce and Chloe are dying from the menacing pestilence. It seems from out of nowhere, but the ill Chloe produces some bread, some wine and a chalice. Dramatically, this is unexpected and difficult for credibility. However, her inviting the Tribulation Force to share in eating the bread and drinking the wine in Jesus’ name does indicate some feeling for spirituality.

It would be interesting if future movies, developed themes of a more compassionate and forgiving God as well as exploring and dramatising a more personalised living of faith, some devotion and manifestation of spirituality like the Eucharistic episode in World at War.

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