Agora

Film has the potential to be so engrossing perceptually for the viewer-auditors that the medium can
engage the human condition at a deep, unconscious level. At that level, the subconscious protects us in
the games we so seriously play. If done well, film-making crafts a coherent and complete story-world
into which the voyageur can be temporarily lodged before returning to the ordinary world that now
looks somehow different. The subtle perceptual change can result from part of the viewers
subconscious having been made transparent, or realized, while in the films story-world. As concerns the
religious domain, I contend that the medium has only touched the surface in holding a mirror up to
ourselves. This is not to say that more anti-religion movies, such as Last Temptation of Christ, are the
answer; neither are more palliative, apologist films, like The Ten Commandments and The Greatest Story
Ever Told, the way to greater self-awareness for homo religious. On account of their un-questioning,
one-dimensionality (even when viewed with 3D glasses!), these films are more alike than their
respective leitmotifs would suggest. Most importantly, none of these films raises penetrating questions
that assume the validity of the other side. Agora does. The film evades easy categorization as anti-
Christian or even anti-religion, and is thus able to effectively touch on the human condition beneath its
denial and hypocrisies. My question here is how Agora transcends the predictable patina of reactionary
films enough to widen our collective consciousness at the expense of hypocrisy and denial at the
expense of the true spirit of religion. The key revolves around both subjecting religion (and particular
religions) to critique and drawing on religion to supply an anchor. That is to say, religion is both truth
and its antithesis.
From: http://thewordenreport-film.blogspot.com/2014/05/agora.html