Movie Review: "Blue Like Jazz"

Donald Miller wrote a book of the same name, about his experiences as a Southern Baptist from Texas who loses his faith and then runs off to a radically different setting at Reed University in the Pacific Northwest. His father, who has fallen outside of the fundamentalist Christian faith circle, has enrolled him in a free-thinking university, and urges Don not just to settle for the Southern Baptist university that he has been planning to attend. When Don finds himself and his faith in complete crisis, he quite rashly decides to go ahead to the university of his father's choice.

It takes a breaking point, and it comes early in the movie, when he is about to set forth on a new life. The local youth pastor forces Don to wear a traditional Roman warrior costume, to reinforce his faith, knowing some will laugh, but that he will proudly remain a Southern Baptist. Then, there is a piñata in the shape of a cross that descends from above, and Don is given a good whack at it. The children down below are showered with goodies from the cross, obviously symbolic. But when Don finds out that his mom and this same youth pastor, who is married, are having an affair together, Don reaches his breaking point, and this serves as the catalyst for his trek to a whole new world and way of thinking.

Donald first shows his ability to open up his previously narrow world by truly listening, for the first time, to his dad's old records, which represent subversive elements of music. Perhaps jazz might seem surprising to some here, given the legendary excesses and protests of rock n' roll, but jazz remains viewed as "dangerous" and "subversive" by many, and that was the traditional view, as well. So, it makes sense.

Yet, that will seem mild compared to what Don is eventually exposed to. He meets "The Pope", a viciously anti-faithful figure who mocks the Church and the faith of believers relentlessly. There is a lesbian who Don quickly befriends, and who challenges Don's own notions of traditional gender roles. There is a Russian who, no matter what Don does, despises him. Then there is the girl who represents faith itself, Penney. She seems to continually attract Don, yet they go back and forth. Her faith is a bit different, a bit more subtle, and literally a prettier and kinder faith, than the one that Don has grown up under.

That the unquestioned faith of evangelists is a trap, in essence, and perhaps best represents the failings and contradictions of narrow-minded faith, as is often the stereotype, particularly for the South, and most especially for Texas, the land of the "faithful" such as George W. Bush and Rick Perry.

Ultimately, Don chooses faith, but a different kind of faith. His book is often seen as one of the catalysts for the "Emergent Church" movement, a faith that breaks out of the traditionally close-minded approach of strict fire and brimstone, intolerant version of  Christianity for which the South, in particular, has become famous.

This movie is one of increasingly many attempts to show that Christianity can be something different, can be beautiful, but that it tends to be more of an individual thing, in this case. It cannot be represented in automatic like-mindedness, or rather close-mindedness. It is not best suited for mega-churches, and has little place in the political forum, where the fire and brimstone versions of faith seem to make appearances time and again.

Ultimately, this movie does not really show the alternative as it does criticize the faith that Don belonged to. Yet, there are definitely some very interesting and provocative discussions and pointed questions, and humor runs throughout the movie, quite effectively. It is a good movie worth seeing, if one is so inclined. But remember, this is not a feel good movie, or a traditional Christian movie, by any stretch. It is designed to challenge and poke fun provocatively, and comes recommended, but with the realization that it is not for everyone.