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Home , Charles Jarrott, Christian film industry, Daryl Duke, Edwin Carewe, Gladys Aylward, Hugh Hudson

Missions and Jamie S. Scott

e are all familiar with the phenomenon of the “” city children like the film’s abused New York newsboy, Little Wfilm, but various kinds of movies—some adapted from Joe. In Susan Rocks the Boat (1916; dir. Paul Powell) a society girl literature or life, some original in conception—have portrayed a discovers meaning in life after founding the Joan of Arc Mission, variety of Christian missions and . If “Jesus” while a disgraced seminarian finds redemption serving in an give us different readings of the kerygmatic paradox of divine urban mission in The Waifs (1916; dir. Scott Sidney). New York’s incarnation, pictures about missions and missionaries explore the East Side mission anchors tales of betrayal and fidelity inTo Him entirely human question: Who is or is not the model Christian? That Hath (1918; dir. Oscar Apfel), and bankrolling a mission Silent movies featured various forms of , usually rekindles a wealthy couple’s weary marriage in Playthings of Pas- Protestant. The trope of evangelism continued in big-screen and sion (1919; dir. ). Luckless lovers from different later made-for-television “talkies,” social strata find a fresh start together including musicals. Biographical at the End of the Trail mission in pictures and documentaries have Virtuous Sinners (1919; dir. Emmett depicted evangelists in feature films J. Flynn), and a Salvation Army mis- and television productions, and sion worker in New York’s Bowery recent years have seen the burgeon- district reconciles with the son of the ing of Christian cinema as a distinct wealthy businessman who stole her . In a related development, father’s invention in Belle of New York various denominations make use of (1919; dir. Julius Steger). The Day of film in proselytizing, and missions Faith (1923; dir. Tod Browning) has a and missionaries also figure in edu- reformed reporter join forces with a cational videos. mission worker to perpetuate a de- ceased philanthropist’s philosophy, Missions in Silent Movies “thy neighbor as thyself.” In 1924 two films featured urban Although many silent pictures have American missions: in The Bowery been lost, their story lines remain, and Courtesy of Hershenson/Allen Archive (dir. Colin Campbell) a New stills have often survived. These films York evangelist risks his own repu- depict a variety of missions and missionaries in both domestic tation to help an errant lawyer fulfill his responsibilities to a and foreign fields. On the home front, evangelicals battle urban neighborhood girl and their baby; and in By Divine Right (dir. Roy poverty and American frontier savagery. The widely recognized William Neill) mission workers wed after the male protagonist filmEasy Street (1917; dir. Charles Chaplin), for example, captures invokes “divine power” to heal the injured child of a crooked the sentiments of a generation of pictures. In this classic, the Hope politician competing for ’s affections. The Mission’s beautiful organist inspires a down-and-out Chaplin film Fool (1925; dir. Harry Millarde) sees a ’s sweet- to join the police to bring order to South ’s slums. The heart marrying a millionaire’s son, though she and her father- renamed New Mission dominates the film’s closing sequence, as in-law eventually come to realize that true happiness lies in the church bells accompany the on-screen apothegm: “Love backed missionary’s life of service, not the millionaire’s self-indulgence. by force, forgiveness sweet, / Brings hope and peace to Easy In When Danger Calls (1927; dir. Charles Hutchison) an honorable Street.” Similar sentiments infuse other films set in London’s fire inspector rescues the philanthropic sponsor of an inner-city slums. In The Gift Supreme (1920; dir. Ollie L. Sellers) a mission mission from corrupt politicians, and in Good Morning, Judge (1928; singer wins over a disapproving father by giving blood to save dir. William A. Seiter) an idle spendthrift turns crime-fighter to his son, her lover, while a huge inheritance prompts a minister win the heart of a mission worker. As in these , true to quit a fashionable parish and open a mission in the Limehouse love and everlasting joy await self-assured benevolence also in district in Madonna of the Streets (1924; dir. Edwin Carewe). In the comedy For Heaven’s Sake (1926; dir. Sam Taylor), in which a Recompense (1925; dir. Harry Beaumont) young lovers return- wealthy playboy defies family and friends to finance a storefront ing from World War I medical service in South found an mission and marry the evangelist’s aptly named daughter, Hope. urban mission, and in The Black Bird (1926; dir. Tod Browning) Silent films portraying American frontier missions usually end a crippled criminal mastermind becomes a mission director to happily as well. The early shorts The Mission Waif, The Mission atone for his misdeeds. Father, and The Mission in the Desert, all produced in 1911, depict American cities preponderate in silent pictures featuring successful missions in the American West. In Sky (1921; dir. domestic missions, especially New York. An Edison Company King Vidor) a muscular Protestant evangelist finds love taming one-reeler, Land Beyond the Sunset (1912; dir. Harold M. Shaw), adventurers and civilizing the natives of the Canadian Northwest, portrays the Fresh Air Fund, a mission created in 1877 by the while an indigenous rebel and his mission orphan wife accede to Reverend Willard Parsons to provide summer holidays for inner- the governor’s mansion in The Diamond Bandit (1924; dir. Francis Ford), though a Roman Catholic loses his life helping the Jamie S. Scott, Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies, Research Institute for native South Americans in their fight for freedom. the Advanced Study of Humanity, University of Newcastle, Newcastle, Aus- Numerous silent pictures represent missions and missionar- tralia, teaches courses in religion and culture. He is the editor of Religions of ies in more exotic-seeming locales as well. In The Mystery of the Canadians (Oxford, forthcoming). Poison Pool (1914; dir. James Gordon) sub-Saharan cannibals, a

July 2008 115 giant python, and a poison pool fail to quell the love between a which the heroine leads a double life as aspiring evangelist by young missionary and a diamond prospector wrongly accused day and frolicsome flapper by night, and the more unforgiving of murder. In Always in the Way (1915; dir. J. Searle Dawley) an Sadie Thompson (1928; dir. and Raoul abandoned runaway reunites with her natural father in the United Walsh), soon remade as the talkie Rain (1932; dir. ), States after Zulus kill her missionary stepparents, and in White in which a hypocritical missionary preaches moral- Hands (1922; dir. Lambert Hillyer) a reformed sea salt helps a ity to a prostitute servicing American servicemen then rapes her Saharan missionary’s daughter, a drug addict, and a mysteri- himself. Later she marries a marine, and the missionary commits ous child called Peroxide return to civilization. Love’s Wilderness suicide. Other less than sympathetic portrayals follow. On the (1924; dir. Robert Z. Leonard) tracks the trials of true love between domestic front, small-town America serves as the backdrop for a medical missionary and an aristocratic ingenue from Louisiana confidence tricksters posing as evangelists in the comedy Tillie via Africa and Canada to the French Guyanese penal colony of and Gus (1933; dir. Francis Martin), while Elmer Gantry (1960; dir. Devil’s Island. A Daughter of the Congo (1930; dir. Oscar Micheaux), Richard Brooks) remains a classic depiction of the evangelical which was criticized for racial typecasting, posits mission educa- marketing of in the American Belt. Missions in tion as the salvation of a beautiful mulatto girl rescued from Arab foreign fields also receive severe treatment. InEast of Borneo (1931; slave traders by African-Americans of the Tenth dir. George Melford) a medical missionary serves as drunken Cavalry, who are keeping the peace in Liberia. court physician to an island despot, while in Return to Paradise Other exotic settings include , India, and Turkey. A film (1953; dir. Mark Robson) a puritanical evangelist browbeats that is tragic in outlook, Red Lantern (1919; dir. Albert Capellani), Pacific islanders, a theme reiterated inHawaii (1966; dir. George tells of a mission-educated Eurasian girl who finds her affections Roy Hill). Paralleling the aspirations of a zealous missionary and spurned by the son of an American evangelist, styles herself as an obsessed inventor, The Mosquito Coast (1986; dir. Peter Weir) the Chinese Goddess of the Red Lantern, then commits suicide confirms the perilous futility of blind fanaticism, a tragic theme when her prophecies supporting the fail. In Eve’s humorously rehearsed in Eversmile, New Jersey (1989; dir. Carlos Leaves (1926; dir. Paul Sloane) adventurous lovers oblige a mis- Sorin), which tracks an itinerant dentist’s evangelical resolve to sionary to marry them as he reads psalms to the Chinese bandits bring the Eversmile Foundation of New Jersey’s “dental conscious- they are fleeing, while in Streets of Shanghai (1927; dir. Louis J. ness” to the darkened souls of Argentina’s Patagonia. At Play in Gasnier) a mission serves as a battleground between American the Fields of the Lord (1991; dir. Hector Babenco) dramatizes the marines and Chinese warlords. An Indian prince becomes an destructive tensions between fundamentalist Protestant and Ro- Anglican missionary in The Rip-Tide (1923; dir. Jack Pratt), then man Catholic missions competing for the souls of the indigenous abandons Christianity to marry an Indian princess, while in The Niaruna people in the jungles of contemporary Brazil. Arab (1924; dir. Rex Ingram) a Bedouin Muslim falls in love with Numerous talkies maintained the good repute of missions an American missionary and prevents the massacre of a Christian and missionaries, however, both in home fields and abroad. Do- community in Turkey. mestic evangelism remained a popular film vehicle in the 1930s. Several silent pictures were also staged in the South Pacific. Madonna of the Streets (1930; dir. John S. Robertson) features love A Woman There Was (1919; dir. J. Gordon Edwards) dramatized and intrigue at a mission on ’s Barbary Coast, while a doomed romance between a young English missionary and The Miracle Woman (1931; dir. ), inspired by the story a South Pacific princess, and Godless Men (1921; dir. Reginald of Aimee Semple McPherson, sees a blind man’s trust transform Barker) has father-and-son pirates fighting to the death over the a disillusioned minister’s daughter from a sham revivalist into a fate of a missionary’s ward after the father discovers that the genuine evangelist. In Soul of the Slums (1931; dir. Frank Strayer) ward is his long-lost daughter. In Infidel (1922; dir. James Young) a framed convict falls in love with an inner-city mission worker, an actress rejects her Christian upbringing, then rediscovers her forgoes revenge upon his accusers, and dedicates his life to her faith when forced to choose sides between shady fortune-hunt- cause. Impersonating an evangelist in good faith brings unfore- ers and hospitable missionaries, while in The Ragged Edge (1923; seen blessings in (1936; dir. ), but in dir. F. Harmon Weight) a missionary’s daughter rehabilitates Arctic Manhunt (1949; dir. Ewing Scott) fraudulently posing as and marries a wrongly accused alcoholic fugitive. An equally a missionary to indigenous Alaskans fails to save a former con- sobering scenario informs Where the Pavement Ends (1923; dir. vict from perishing in melting spring ice. Other American films Rex Ingram), in which a missionary and his daughter return include Apache Rifles (1964; dir. William Witney), in which love home after his battle with a bar owner for the souls of native for a half–Native American missionary cures a cavalry officer’s islanders ends in the publican’s death, and the daughter breaks prejudice toward Apaches; and the apocalyptic Bells of Innocence the heart of a native chieftain, who then commits suicide. In (2003; dir. Ali Bijan), which drops evangelists who are flying The Marriage Cheat (1924; dir. John Griffith Wray) a missionary to Mexico into the middle of the desert, where they provides an island home for a traveler and her newborn when battle the forces of evil. A few films dramatize English home mis- her womanizing husband drowns in a storm, while in Breed of sions as well. Benevolent missionaries save a young thief in The the Sea (1926; dir. Ralph Ince) a disgraced divinity student turned Supreme Secret (1958; dir. Norman Walker), a preachy picture set pirate strikes a deal with an unscrupulous trader to guarantee a in London’s docklands and rereleased as God Speaks Today (1965); safe environment for the twin brother of the former in order to and the comic The Missionary (1982; dir. ) finds found a mission on an island in the Java Sea. a veteran of the African fields involved in sexual shenanigans with a wealthy benefactress when assigned to a slum mission Missions in “Talkies” for prostitutes in Edwardian London. Other favorable images appear in pictures portraying over- In the late 1920s, films called talkies developed the more nu- seas missions and missionaries. Once again, Africa, China, and anced range of attitudes toward missions and missionaries that the South Pacific prove popular settings. InTrader Horn (1931; dir. was foreshadowed in silent pictures like the light-hearted Just W. S. Van Dyke) the passing of a dedicated missionary inspires Like a Woman (1923; dir. Scott R. Beal and Hugh McClung), in adventurers to good deeds in Africa, and the death of a British mis-

116 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 32, No. 3 sionary in German East Africa prompts the romanticized World gees from the ravages of cholera and a Mongol warlord. A later War I action of The African Queen (1951; dir. ). In the variation on these themes, Shanghai Surprise (1986; dir. Jim God- ten-minute one-reeler Kid in Africa (1932; dir. Jack Hays) children dard), revolves around the efforts of a missionary nurse to obtain play stereotyped colonial roles, including that of a missionary. black-market opium for wounded Chinese soldiers during the Several films feature medical missionaries: Japanese occupation in 1937. (1952; dir. Terence Fisher) has a London Harley Street physician Different dramas characterize mission talkies set in the South swap duties with his brother, a medical missionary in Africa; Men Pacific islands, many taking advantage of their remoteness. InThe Against the Sun (1953; dir. Brendan J. Stafford) features romance Vessel of Wrath (1938; dir. Bartlett Cormack and Erich Pommer) a between a medical missionary and a surveyor building the first carousing remittance man attempts to stem a cholera outbreak to railway from Mombassa, Kenya, to the Ugandan interior; and earn the love of a pious evangelist in the Alas Islands, a Dutch White Witch Doctor (1953; dir. Henry Hathaway) contrasts kindly outpost in the South Pacific, while a remake called The Beach- Christian medics with colonial speculators trying to hoodwink comber (1954; dir. Muriel Box) transfers the action to the Welcome hostile Congolese tribesmen into revealing the whereabouts of Islands, a fictitious British colony in the Indian Ocean, where the remote gold deposits. Missionaries also question mineral couple is sentenced to death by a tribal leader for failing to cure exploitation in Jungle Drums of Africa (1953; dir. Fred C. Brannon), his daughter. In On the Isle of Samoa (1950; dir. William A. Berke) a twelve-part serial feature reedited for television as U-238 and the a fugitive gambler crash-lands on an uncharted Samoan island Witch Doctor (1966; dir. Fred C. Brannon), in which a missionary’s where a missionary persuades him to return to civilization to daughter teams up with uranium explorers against spies, lions, face the . Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957; dir. John Huston) and African tribes. Similar themes occur in stages a love affair between a shipwrecked Beyond Mombasa (1956; dir. George Marshall) American marine and a Roman Catholic and Thunder over Sangoland (1955; dir. Sam nun on a Pacific island during World War II; Newfield), which combines three episodes of a low-budget version of this film appeared the television series Ramar of the Jungle (1952). later as The Nun and the Sergeant (1962; dir. A missionary’s daughter tries to make an hon- Franklin Adreon). The Last Flight of Noah’s Ark est man of an American confidence trickster (1980; dir. Charles Jarrott) tracks the efforts in Mister Moses (1965; dir. Ronald Neame), of a missionary to colonize a remote island while African-American evangelists return with various animals, a place occupied by two to their West African tribal in The Color Japanese soldiers still fighting World War II, Purple (1985; dir. ). while Nate and Hayes (1983; dir. Ferdinand Fair- Talkies continue to reflect the status fax) pits a young missionary couple against of China as a mission field, especially for swashbuckling pirates. Angel in Green (1987; Americans during the years of China’s War dir. Marvin J. Chomsky) sees an American of Resistance against Japan (1937–45) and its Army Special Forces Unit training a Roman civil wars (1927–37 and 1946–50). In The Right Catholic sister and her island flock to defend to Love (1930; dir. Richard Wallace) a possessive themselves against terrorists whose raids have father sends his daughter to China as a mis- killed a missionary priest and decimated the sionary, where she finds love after all, while island population. a missionary’s naive son returns to South Asia provides settings for a few from China seeking a wife and instead dis- Courtesy of Hershenson/Allen Archive good missionaries, while still others are covers a career as a political reformer. West of depicted in locations as various as Haiti, In- Shanghai (1937; dir. John Farrow) ends with a Chinese warlord donesia, and South America. If steamy relations among India’s sacrificing his life to enable an evangelist to marry the American colonial elites include a mission runaway in oilman of her dreams, and Shining Victory (1941; dir. Irving Rap- (1939; dir. ), Black Narcissus (1947; dir. Michael per) ends with a refugee Czech psychologist leaving for China Powell) dramatizes the efforts of nuns of the Saint Faith Order to as a medical missionary after losing his wife and research notes transform a Himalayan potentate’s former pleasure palace into in a fire in . Medical missionaries make a World War II an Anglican convent, school, and hospital. In the aftermath of love triangle in China Sky (1945; dir. Ray Enright), while in The India’s independence an evangelist’s blind daughter distracts a Amazing Mrs. Holliday (1943; dir. Bruce Manning) an evangelist mercenary from running guns to Ghandahari rebels in Thunder in smuggles Chinese war orphans into the United States. the East (1953; dir. Charles Vidor). In White Zombie (1932; dir. Vic- A few films feature Roman Catholic missionaries. InThe Keys tor Halperin), by contrast, a missionary helps to save a beautiful of the Kingdom (1944; dir. John M. Stahl) a priest hones his pastoral young woman from living death among Haitian zombies. Using skills before returning to Scotland to minister to troubled youth, Spain’s sale of areas of Brazil to Portugal in 1750 as an allegory and in The Left Hand of God (1955; dir. Edward Dmytryk) American for Latin American tensions in the 1980s, The Mission (1986; dir. sisters provide shelter to a downed American mercenary pilot Roland Joffé) examines relations between indigenous and non- posing as a priest who had been murdered, to avoid capture indigenous interests in the contrasting attitudes of two Jesuit by Communists. In Satan Never Sleeps (1962; dir. Leo McCarey) , one an idealist who preaches peaceful native resistance, priests flee Red soldiers with an unlikely trio: a village girl, her the other a reformed slaver and fratricide who abandons his vows infant son, and the Communist commander who raped the girl, and leads armed opposition to European aggression. Based on fathered the boy, but now as a family man rejects Communism. World War II events, Paradise Road (1997; dir. ) The Sand Pebbles (1966; dir. Robert Wise) sees the gunboat USS recaptures the will to survive of European women who were San Pablo rescue occupants of the China Light Mission caught caught fleeing Singapore by the Japanese and were then interned between warring factions up the Yangtze River, and in Seven in Sumatra, among them a British missionary who helps to form Women (1966; dir. John Ford) American evangelists shelter refu- an a cappella ensemble to keep spirits high.

July 2008 117 Several talkies offer more ambiguous or even negative depic- Catholic missionary priests in conflicts between Europeans and tions of missions and missionaries, both at home and abroad. In samurai for control of sixteenth-century Japan. Forbidden Territory: Laughing Sinners (1931; dir. Harry Beaumont) a Salvation Army Stanley’s Search for Livingstone (1997; dir. Simon Langton) updates captain rescues a suicidal nightclub singer who turns her talents the (1939; dir. ), to urban evangelizing. She relapses, but the captain leaves the which dramatizes American reporter Henry Morton Stanley’s 1871 ministry rather than lose her. In So Evil My Love (1948; dir. Lewis expedition to find the Scottish missionary in Allen) a missionary’s widow falls under a villain’s spell in a ship- central Africa, events that are also captured in the documenta- board romance and commits murder, repenting only when her ries David Livingstone (1936; dir. James A. Fitzpatrick) and Great lover double-crosses her. In Black Robe (1991; dir. Bruce Beresford) Adventurers: David Livingstone, to the Heart of Africa (1999; the earnest efforts of a Jesuit priest to convert Huron natives in dir. Robert Corsini). seventeenth-century Quebec lead to his spiritual humbling and their falling easy victims to longtime enemies, the Iroquois, while Films and Videos in Christian Missionizing in The Apostle (1997; dir. Robert Duvall) a Pentecostal preacher builds a new congregation among Louisiana’s rural poor before It is important to note that Christian organizations also make being jailed for having previously killed his wife’s lover, a use of film, often for overt missionary purposes. Many bio-pics at their affluent Texas church. Also set in Louisiana, The Reap- (biographical pictures) and documentaries bring evangelists to ing (2007; dir. Stephen Hopkins) sees a lapsed missionary turn the screen. The rare In the Land of the Setting Sun; or, Martyrs of skeptical professor of theology, only later to recover a sense of Yesterday (1919; dir. Raymond Wells) tells of the origins of the the supernatural when apocalyptic horrors threaten the rural Cayuse War (1848–55) in the murder of Marcus and Narcissa community of Haven. Whitman, American Missionary Board evangelists who in 1836 Other such films take place overseas. The Congo serves as the brought agriculture, literacy, and the “White Man’s Book of setting for The Sins of Rachel Cade (1961; dir. Gordon Douglas), in Heaven” to Waiilatpu, on the Walla Walla River in what is today which a downed World War II flyer impregnates a medical mis- Washington State. Other early examples are the Belgian silent sionary, who then seeks solace with a spurned colleague when picture Missionaires italiens aux Indes (Italian Missionaries in the the flyer leaves. InThe Nun’s Story (1969; dir. ), Indies) (1932; dir. Raphaël Algoet) and The Call (1938; dir. Léon which also takes place in the Congo, a sister forsakes the veil Poirier), a celebration of Charles de Foucauld (1858–1916), who after Nazis kill her father and her superiors wastefully redirect gave up a family fortune to serve the Touareg people of the her medical skills from Congolese natives to European colonials. Sahara as the Trappist “Brother Charles of the desert.” Abuna Elsewhere, in The Bitter Tea of General Yen (1933; dir. Frank Capra) Messias (1939; dir. Geoffredo Alessandrini) serves as propaganda a Chinese general prefers suicide to dishonoring an American for Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia by glorifying the efforts of the missionary’s fiancée who captures his heart, and inEthan (1964; Capuchin Franciscan Guglielmo Massaia (1809–89) to convert dir. Michael DuPont) an alcoholic missionary priest dies defend- Galla Coptic to the Roman Catholic Church, while ing the Filipino woman he loves. An evangelist’s nymphomaniac films like L’Élite noire de demain (The Black Elite of Tomorrow) daughter adds spice to the lives of Europeans seeking Oriental (1950; dir. Gérard De Boe) and others document European mis- enlightenment in Bali (1970; dir. Ugo Liberatore), while in Oscar sionary activities in various other foreign fields. The 1950s also and Lucinda (1997; dir. Gillian Armstrong) an Anglican priest falls saw the bio-pics Battle Hymn (1956; dir. Douglas Sirk), about Dean in love with a nineteenth-century Australian businesswoman, E. Hess (b. 1917), the American “flying parson,” who bombed then wagers that he can safely transport her glass church into German orphans in World War II and then saved Korean ones the interior. In Dancing at Lughnasa (1998; dir. Pat O’Connor) a in the Korean War; The Inn of the Sixth Happiness (1958; dir. Mark missionary priest, gone native after twenty-five years in a Ugandan Robson), about Gladys Aylward (1902–70), the English mission- leper colony, returns to Ireland in 1936 to remind rural Roman ary who saved Chinese children from the invading Japanese in Catholics of their pagan Irish roots. 1938; and Molokai, la isla maldita (1959; dir. Luis Lucia), about A few musicals and made-for-television movies also feature Damien de Veuster (1840–89), the Belgian Sacred Heart priest missionaries. The musicals include remakes of the silent picture who worked with lepers on Molokai, ’s so-called island The Belle of New York (1952; dir. Charles Walters) and Miss Sadie of the damned, a life that was revisited in Molokai: The Story of Thompson (1953; dir. Curtis Bernhardt), a bowdlerized version Father Damien (1999; dir. Paul Cox). of Rain. In Down Among the Sheltering Palms (1953; dir. Edmund Later bio-pics and documentaries include Mission to Glory: Goulding) a missionary and an American army captain try in vain A True Story and Kino, the Padre on Horseback (both 1977; both dir. to prevent the troops from fraternizing with South Pacific island Ken Kennedy), about the seventeenth-century Southwest mis- girls, while in Guys and Dolls (1955; dir. Joseph L. Mankiewicz) an sionary Father Francisco “Kino” Kin, who mediated between the incorrigible New York gambler takes an innocent Salvation Army Spaniards and the Apache; (1981; dir. Ken Ander- worker to Havana on a bet, returns in love, then risks losing the son), about James Hudson Taylor’s Shanghai ministry; Choices girl by using the mission for a high-stakes crap game. of the Heart (1983; dir. Joseph Sargent), about Jean Donovan, the Among made-for-television films, a missionary finds his Irish lay missionary murdered in El Salvador in 1980; The Law of vocation among the natives of northwest Canada in I Heard Love (1989; dir. Penelope Lee), about Jackie Pullinger (b. 1943), the Owl Call My Name (1973; dir. Daryl Duke), while in Valley of the English lay missionary whose work with heroin junkies in Mystery (1967; dir. Joseph Lejtes) South American natives prevent ’s Walled City led to the founding of the St. Stephen’s a manic missionary from sacrificing the survivors of an airplane Society for drug addiction; and Mama Luka Comes Home (1989; crash; another mad missionary finds shelter in the jungles of dir. Crawford Telfer), about Helen Roseveare (b. 1925), the Eng- South America in The Lost World (2001; dir. Stuart Orme). An lish evangelist who was beaten and raped during the Congo’s evangelist tries to reform a womanizing drunk in Wilson’s Reward Simba Rebellion (1964) but returned in 1966 to renew her medical (1980; dir. Patrick O’Neal), which is set in the , and the mission. (1981; dir. Hugh Hudson) is notable for miniseries Shogun (1980; dir: Jerry London) implicates Roman contrasting the stories of , a Scottish athlete and later

118 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 32, No. 3 New from J. Dudley Woodberry

What practices is God blessing in raising up groups of Jesus followers among Muslims? And how shall we understand Muslim peoples and their access to biblical witness? In recent years, workers from a growing number of organizations have begun to discuss such questions. Their initial insights were refined by a broad group of workers in a consultation in the spring of 2007, further analyzed in subsequent months, and compiled in this volume. From Seed to Fruit presents the most recent J. Dudley Woodberry is Dean worldwide research on witness to Christ among Emeritus and Senior professor Muslim peoples, using biblical images from nature of Islamic Studies at the School to show the interaction between God’s activity and Intercultural Studies at Fuller human responsibility in blessing these peoples. Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. He has served with his wife and three sons at the Chrsitian Study Centre in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, and as a pastor in Kabul, Afghanistan and Riyahd, Saudi Arabia. Order online: www.missionbooks.org/fromseedtofruit 2008 Library | 405 Pages ISBN 13: 978-0-897908-003-1 Retail: $20.99 Our Price: $16.79 3 or More: $11.54

Includes a CD-ROM of supplemental resources on global trends and fruitful practices! missionary whose devotion to God drives him to compete in the Out (2003; dir. Jerry Jameson), which pits a medical missionary 1924 Paris Olympics, and Harold Abrahams, a wealthy Jew who against Colombian drug-runners. The Church of Jesus Christ of runs to claim equality for his people. Latter-day Saints (LDS) has backed numerous films, from shorts Other films in these includeLight in the Jungle (1990; like the early Worthy to Stand (1969; dir. Judge Whitaker) and dir. Gray Hofmeyr), about the medical missionary Albert Sch- the more recent Dear John (2004; dir. John Lyde) to features like weitzer; Zamperini: Still Carrying the Torch (1992; dir. Michael O. Saints and Soldiers (2003; dir. Ryan Little), which dramatizes the Sajbel), about Louis S. Zamperini (b. 1917), a hero of the 1936 exploits of a former Mormon missionary during World War II’s Berlin Olympics and World War II who builds a ministry among Battle of the Bulge (1945), and Suits on the Loose (2005; dir. Rodney the young, the elderly, and athletes after being converted at Henson), in which posing as Mormon missionaries leads two ’s first crusade in San Francisco in 1949; Obstacle juvenile delinquents to confront their dishonorable past. Also to Comfort: The Life of George Mueller (1805–98) (1997; dir. Ken part of the , such events as the San Antonio Connolly), about the “father” of over 10,000 English orphans, Independent Christian Film Festival and the itinerant Christian whose Scriptural Knowledge Institution for Home and Abroad Film Festivals of America provide venues for proselytizing pic- trained and funded independent Baptist missionaries; and St. tures. Mormons also fund the annual LDS Film Festival. Patrick: The Irish Legend (2000; dir. Robert Hughes), a made-for- Christian educational institutions also promote visual mis- television reconstruction of the life of Eire’s patron saint. The Other sionary material. For example, a Web site of Southern Nazarene Side of Heaven (2002; dir. Mitch Davis) lionizes the young John H. University (Oklahoma City, Okla.) lists the missiological film Groberg (b. 1934), an American Mormon missionary to Tongan resources available in the university’s media center, categoriz- islanders in the South Pacific in the 1950s. Particularly poignant, ing materials under the headings “Cultural Anthropology,” Beyond the Gates of Splendor (2002; dir. Jim Hanon) documents the “Compassion Issues,” “General Interest,” “History of Missions,” murder of five missionaries by Waodani natives in Ecuador’s “Linguistics,” “Religions of the World,” “Strategy of Missions,” Amazon basin in 1956. The feature filmEnd of the Spear (2005; dir. and “Theology and Biblical Basis of Missions” (http://home. Jim Hanon) re-creates this story, while both pictures stress the snu.edu/~hculbert/videos.htm). Secular videos used in public eventual conversion of the Waodani and reconciliation between education also sometimes feature missions and missionaries. the families of the victims and perpetrators. Made for television, Such videos vary in focus, from the global reach of Christianity: Mother Teresa (2003; dir. Fabrizio Costa) celebrates the Albanian The First Two Thousand Years (2001) to the regional concerns of Roman Catholic nun who founded Missionaries of Charity and The Pacific Century (1992), the ninth episode of which counts mis- won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 for her humanitarian work, sionaries among American “sentimental imperialists” in Asia, while The Black-Bearded Barbarian of (2006; dir. Susan Papp) to the denominational preoccupations of Get the Fire (2002), a pays tribute to George Leslie Mackay, the Canadian missionary U.S. Public Broadcasting Service Frontline program on Mormon who became a national hero in Taiwan for his prophetic opposi- missionary work. tion to the 1885 head tax. Christian organizations are often directly involved in pro- The movies described here certainly do not exhaust the catalog ducing and distributing films and videos celebrating missionary of films and videos relating in some way to missions. Take, for accomplishments. Early on the scene, for example, Wycliffe Bible example, what we users of English call “foreign-language films.” Translators funded The Good Seed (1986), which portrays the mis- I have mentioned several hagiographic portrayals of celebrated sionizing of the Tzeltals in southern Mexico and of the Payas in Christian missionaries, but numerous fictional depictions also the mountains of Colombia. More recently, New Tribes Mission exist. In the Italian-Spanish Encrucijada para una monja (A Nun at released The Taliabo Story: The Search for the River of Eternal Life the Crossroads) (1967; dir. Lucio Fulci), for example, natives rape (1997), which details the conversion of the inhabitants of a remote a missionary nun, who must then give up her baby to remain Indonesian island. InterVarsity Christian Fellowship markets in the order or abandon her calling to become a single mother. videos of the plenary addresses at Urbana, its triennial student The Swedish Djungelaeventyret Campa-Campa (Jungle Adven- mission convention. Some early titles of these videos include ture Campa Campa) (1976; dir. Torgny Anderberg) dramatizes Declaring Christ as Lord in the City (1983), Helen Roseveare: Moti- tensions between Campa natives and a missionary priest who vation for Missions (1987), and five others, all produced in 1990: abducts two children from a home in the Peruvian Amazon to Hope for Creative Access Countries, Hope for Racial Reconciliation raise them as Christians. Bawa Duka (1997; dir. Dharmasiri Ban- in Mission, Hope for the Cities, Strongest in the Broken Places, and daranayake) explores the disruptive social and cultural effects of Students in World Mission (1990). British colonial missionizing in early twentieth-century southern In a related development, Christian cinema has blossomed Sri Lanka, while the Swiss-German-French Flammen im Paradies as a distinct industry. Styled as the film ministry of Evangeli- (Fire in Paradise) (1997; dir. Markus Imhoof) ends in tragedy after cal Baptist Missions, for instance, Harvest Productions focuses a wealthy bride and a woman sailing to marry a missionary in on the role of the Bible in conversion, tailoring shorts to local late colonial India swap identities aboard a luxury liner. Such markets in several languages, with captions for the deaf and pictures suggest possibilities for comparative studies in mission hearing-impaired. Typical of Harvest’s extensive list, the films history, theology, and film. Other religious traditions also include Yes and Goodbye and A Dream Begun dramatize the lives of Sonny, what we might meaningfully call a missionary impulse, which Laurie, and their son Brad, an American missionary family intent would merit further research. Movies projecting different takes on evangelizing in contemporary . Even more ambitious, on such varied religious phenomena as Jews for Jesus and Jews the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association’s for Judaism, Muslim da‘wah and Islamic jihad, Hindu shuddhi (WWP) produces and distributes feature films as missionary ve- groups, the Hare Krishna movement, Zen Buddhism in the West, hicles. Its Road to Redemption (2001; dir. Richard Vernon) adopts and Soka Gakkai could open doors for comparative studies in the conventions of the for Christian outreach, while religion, mission, and film. other releases explicitly portray evangelists, such as Last Flight

120 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 32, No. 3