My Joseph Smith film collection

[_Trevor]

As a holiday treat for all of you, I have created a short list of the movies that have offered me the greatest insights into the career of Joseph Smith. Undoubtedly your lists will be different, and some of you will probably take issue with mine, but such is life. I hope you enjoy my picks and think of the connections with Smith that I found therein when you watch them (again?). The list is numbered, but not to indicate any special order.

1. The Usual Suspects (1995) [spoiler warning]

In this film a group of criminals is brought together to pull a big job for a shadowy Hungarian mafia lord named Keyser Soze. For me, the Joseph Smith moment is when the customs agent, played by Chazz Palminteri, suddenly realizes that the sole surviving member of the gang, Verbal Kint (played by Kevin Spacey) had strung together his story from odd bits of information scattered around the office in which he was being interrogated. Whenever I think of this scene, I imagine the talent it would have taken to compose the Book of Mormon.

2. The Brothers Grimm (2005)

This Gilliam film makes the Brothers Grimm into a couple of con artists who stage exorcisms using props and actors to create the apparitions that they subsequently get paid to dispel. I am reminded of the cons run by treasure seekers in Joseph Smith's day, which included faking such apparitions in order to string along a paying customer or bring a bogus treasure quest to a seemingly credible end.

3. The Hoax (2007)

Richard Gere plays Cifford Irving in a Hollywood version of the true story of Irving's attempt to hoax a major publishing house into paying him around a million dollars for an autobiography of Howard Hughes. Aside from the fact that the center of this hoax is a text people were anxious to believe in, there is a wonderful scene in which Irving stages an appearance of Hughes, which predictably fails when according to plan the helicopter carrying "Hughes" (really Irving's partner) pulls away from the heliport just yards away from landing. Irving then tampers with the diagram of the heliport and blames the man who was assigned to set it up with having blown it. Here I am reminded both treasure quests, in which failure to get the treasure was blamed on a someone breaking ritual silence (once again, according to plan). I am also reminded, for some reason, of the loss of the 116 pages. Also, it is interesting that in the helicopter incident everyone was so anxious to see Hughes and wanted to believe in his coming that they convinced themselves it was Hughes absent any real evidence that the man was in fact Hughes. This reminds me of how people are so anxious for evidence of the divine that they often fabricate it out of the tenderest threads. It also helps me understand how easy this makes a con man's job.

4. Elmer Gantry (1960)

A flim-flam artist/salesman named Elmer Gantry falls for a devout female evangelist named Sister Sharon Falconer. Although lacking genuine belief from beginning to end, Gantry becomes a dynamic and charismatic preacher and an indispensable part of Falconer's revivals. Here I think of Joseph Smith as a possible non-believer, who is nevertheless very talented at playing prophet and does so primarily for his own benefit, and sometimes that of those around him. My take on the ending of the film is that Gantry continues to play his role, but that he never genuinely believes in what he is preaching, except to see a certain utilitarian value in people believing some fictions.

5. Memento (2000)

A man suffering short-term memory loss (he can't form any new long-term memories) uses a brief of notes and tattoos to hunt down the man he thinks killed his wife. The problem is that at various points he deliberately edits his notes to rewrite history and mislead himself in the future. His commanding fiction (the search for his wife's killer) remains the same, while the actual ends change time and again because of his deliberate efforts to mislead himself. Here I am reminded of Joseph Smith's changing accounts of his experiences, and, more globally, of the reconstruction of Mormon history today to suit religious ends instead of scholarly ones. What is important to follow in this game of shoddy history is not history itself, but the motives and needs of the present that shape 'faithful' history.

I may recall more later, but this is good for now. Happy holidays to everyone!

[_Gadianton]

The FOX series The Shield has been nominated. Blixa fleshed it out like this:

Think about the early Mormon "Strike Team," all the in-fighting in the early leadership, people getting kicked out, making nice with Vic/Joe and being let back in. Rigdon as an Aceveda wannabe. The Strike Team as a "sealed" group with secret "doctrines." It almost plays out as a one-to-one allegory.

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes: Tomatoes invade the earth and wreak mayhem. Their plan explodes by the discovery of a song. Like EV's hitting the streets in SL, the song is played over bullhorns and loudspeakers. However, just like the faithful sticking their fingers in their ears, one giant tomato discovers earmuffs and becomes immune to the truth.

Caligula From Amazon: The rise and fall of the notorious Roman Emperor Caligula, showing the violent methods that he employs to gain the throne, and the subsequent insanity of his reign - he gives his horse political office and humiliates and executes anyone who even slightly displeases him. He also sleeps with his sister, organises elaborate orgies and embarks on a fruitless invasion of England before meeting an appropriate end.

Had Smith and Caligula traded places historically, they would have done the same stuff. And the apologists could no doubt rescue Caligula using the same lines of reasoning they do for Joseph Smith.

[_Trevor]

Caligula From Amazon: The rise and fall of the notorious Roman Emperor Caligula, showing the violent methods that he employs to gain the throne, and the subsequent insanity of his reign - he gives his horse political office and humiliates and executes anyone who even slightly displeases him. He also sleeps with his sister, organises elaborate orgies and embarks on a fruitless invasion of England before meeting an appropriate end.

Had Smith and Caligula traded places historically, they would have done the same stuff. And the apologists could no doubt rescue Caligula using the same lines of reasoning they do for Joseph Smith.

To add to the comparison of Joseph Smith with Caligula, this Roman emperor dressed up as a god and demanded worship. Maybe not an exact parallel, but not far off either!

[Guest]

I thought of another to add to my Smith-list of films that help me think through issues of Joseph Smith's life and personality:

The Prestige (2006)

In this film two magicians, each trying to out-best the other, pull out the stops and commit their entire lives to beating the competition. Whenever someone questions whether a person could devote his or her entire life to performance, I now think of this film. Every life is a kind of performance, but some are more consciously molded than others. The supreme magician or conman lives a role. Joseph Smith could keep up the performance. I don't doubt it.

[_Doctor Steuss]

I was expecting to see The Godfather II in your list.

I know it was you William Law. You broke my heart...

[_Trevor]

I was expecting to see The Godfather II in your list.

I know it was you William Law. You broke my heart...

Have to admit that the Godfather films never crossed my mind.

I am also a staunch defender of William Law, whom folklore has condemned as a would-be assassin of Joseph Smith (which he was not).

[_Doctor Steuss]

Have to admit that the Godfather films never crossed my mind.

I was thinking about drawing a Luca Brasi/Porter Rockwell parallel, but unfortunately Luca shaved his locks at some point ended up with the fishes.

I am also a staunch defender of William Law, whom folklore has condemned as a would-be assassin of Joseph Smith (which he was not).

I’ve admittedly fallen into that folklore at one point (of him being a “would-be assassin.”) If anything, I’ve more-or-less come to the revised opinion of seeing him as someone who believed in the Book of Mormon (and continued to affirm said belief), and the initial prophet hood of Joseph, yet felt that the Church was being led astray by a fallen prophet.

I was toying with using Phelps, or maybe even Ezra Booth… unfortunately I couldn’t think of anyone who exactly matched Fredo.

[_Trevor]

If anything, I’ve more-or-less come to the revised opinion of seeing him as someone who believed in the Book of Mormon (and continued to affirm said belief), and the initial prophet hood of Joseph, yet felt that the Church was being led astray by a fallen prophet.

Well, since Law was deeply opposed to polygamy and tyranny, I have added sympathy for him. I have a difficult time blaming anyone for being angry when Joseph Smith spent so much time lying to people about his sexual practices. I don't think there was a time from puberty on when Joseph wasn't sleeping around, polygamy or no (just my suspicion). But if I had bought into his moral protestations about his staunch monogamy only to find that he was marrying the wives of other men, I would have been furious too, and would have believed I had been duped or he had gone astray.

But, anyway, it has been too long since I last saw the Godfather movies to comment adequately on it.