The Spirit and the Screen 2: Austin Kamenicky on the Difference between Christ-Figures and Spirit-Figures

second in a series on pneumatology and cinema

Michael Austin Kamenicky is an independent scholar. His work focuses on the intersection of Pentecostal aesthetics and ethics (and sometimes serpent handling). His writing has been published in the Journal of Pentecostal Theology, the Journal of Religious Ethics, and the edited volume The Performative Ethics of Human Flourishing.

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            As observed by Chris Green in the introduction, it is easy to appreciate the delicious irony inherent in the concept of a book on theology and film edited by two Pentecostal scholars. To say nothing of the long road to bring the words “Pentecostal” and “scholar” together, the idea that a holiness tradition once premised on shunning worldly things could have something to say to the quintessential artform of the last century might strike some of our forebears as foreign and dangerous. But such is the power of the Spirit, as is argued often in The Spirit and the Screen. Newness, surprises, and vitality are all hallmarks of her work. While the book's chapters are not solely produced by Pentecostals its pneumatological focus and popular sensibility bear the imprint of this fount.

            One of the first things that struck me upon beginning the book was the selection of films analyzed. While the body of the book opens and closes with two fine essays dwelling on the perennial luminary of the theology and film conversation, Terrence Mallick, in between one finds a potpourri of movies. By placing the likes of Mary Poppins, Wonder Woman, and Moana alongside more cinephilic choices like Rolling Thunder Revue, Lady Bird, and A Hidden Life, the book itself shares a kind of intrinsic populism with the broader Pentecostal tradition. The one who enters the sanctuary arrayed in finery is not given pride of place over others. This itself is a pneumatological statement. The Spirit’s movements are hampered neither by genre nor sensibility, but often make themselves known in unlikely places. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, man nor woman, film not movie.

            This is perhaps why I find the book’s coinage of the term “Spirit figure” to be so exciting. In contrast to Christ figures, who demonstrate narrative similarity to Christ (often through self-sacrifice for the sake of others), Spirit figures share attributes with the Holy Spirit. This way of thinking opens up new and exciting avenues for dialogue between theology and film. Illustrations of the divine character are thus made perceptible in characters who are less overtly cruciform than those who might be called “Christ figures.”

            Of the four essays in the book that focus on “spirit figures,” three focus on women (though it must be said one is a woman-shaped volcano goddess). This already represents a departure from the stereotype of a Christ figure, who is more often than not identified as a male figure (often assertively so. How many of us watched Braveheart in youth group?). The sole male “spirit figure” identified in these chapters, Samwise Gamgee, has often had his masculinity popularly questioned because of his deep love for Frodo Baggins. It appears that shifting to a pneumatological register allows scholars to broaden our gendered notion of what divine likeness consists of. These characters, Wonder Woman, Samwise Gamgee, Abuela Claudia, and Te Fiti, all share DNA with Christ figures (as the Spirit shares the divine substance of Christ). They are all self-giving, they all suffer for the sake of others. But the pneumatological move facilitates our recognition of their divine likeness, marred as it is by patriarchal thinking.

            The perceptibility of this Christlikeness in these “Spirit figures,” however, beckons another conversation, one that will determine the long term viability of the interpretive concept. What are the central defining characteristics of a ‘spirit figure?’ The concept of a Christ figure has relatively concrete implications: an individual who sacrifices of themself for the sake of others. This sacrifice often has a substitutionary flavor. The Christ figure does for others that which they cannot do for themselves. Neo, Superman, ET, and Aragorn son of Arathorn all fit the bill, not to mention various onscreen Jesuses (Jesusi?). Patrological figures are likewise easy to identify. Who could forget Marlon Brando as Jor-El or James Earl Jones as Mufasa, both of whom send their sons as saviors?

            The characteristics of the Spirit, however, are more elusive. Spirit-likeness cannot be so easily telegraphed by having a character stretch their arms wide. So what sets these figures apart from Christ figures? In Steve Felix-Jager’s chapter on Wonder Woman, he identifies the titular heroine’s role as one of inspiration toward love and reconciliation. In contrast to her sidekick, Steve Trevor, who is the film’s sacrificial Christ figure, Diana herself is tasked with perpetually inspiring humanity to moral improvement. Likewise, Lucia M. Sanders’s pneumatic analysis of Samwise Gamgee focusses on his paracletic role. He is the gift bestowed on Frodo that empowers him in his journey. Indeed, in his key scene, he literally bears Frodo up. This supportive vision of the Spirit comes to the fore in its communal dimension in Wilmer Estrada-Carrasquillo’s presentation of Abuela Claudia in In the Heights. Caludia’s role in the Washington Heights neighborhood is one of teaching and reminding, calling its residents to the faith of their forebears in the face of an uncertain future (she herself having faced her own uncertain future). Finally, D. Coleby Delgado’s reading of Te Fiti in as Moana’s Spirit figure portrayes the nature spirit turned vengeful volcano goddess as the Spirit’s convicting presence hovering over creation, calling humanity to responsibility for “God’s body.”

            All of these authors make explicit references to the scriptural and theological characteristics of the Spirit they believe these characters exhibit. Taken together, however, I believe a coherent portrait of Spirit figures broadly begins to emerge, which allows them to be definitively distinguished from Christ figures. Just as Christ figures are premised on substitutionary self-sacrifice, Spirit figures are premised on relational self sharing. Broadly speaking Christ figures intervene so that others do not have to do what they cannot. While Spirit figures make possible for others that which was previously impossible.

            In short, a Christ figure “lays down his life for his friends.” But a Spirit figure gives of herself without diminishment. Indeed, these Spirit figures, Wonder Woman, Samwise Gamgee, Abuela Caudia, and Te Fiti, invite us to participate in a world where our consumerist assumptions about reality are reversed. They reveal that pouring forth oneself does not result in ultimate emptiness, but is rather the very beginning of fullness. As Wonder Woman doesn’t give up on humanity, as Sam carries Frodo up Mount Doom, as Aubuela Claudia bears up her community, and as Te Fiti shares her life with Moana’s island, they emerge more fully alive. And so it is with the Spirit who is poured out on humanity and is not diminished. Rather humanity finds itself brought into her vital fullness, sated with living water, never to thirst again.