A Bear Called Winnie

Drama 

90 min / 2004

Rating: 7/10

This is the (mostly) true story of Winnie, the bear that inspired A.A. Milne's much loved Winnie the Pooh books. While she lived most of his life in the London Zoon, many don't realize that Winnie was a Canadian bear. So it was very fun to learn how he got from the wilds of Canada to inside the pages of everyone's favorite children's story. 

I think copyright concerns probably kept producers from using the words "Winnie-the-Pooh" but as the film begins, the connection is made, with an adult Winnie being watched by a man and boy who are unnamed, but unmistakable as Milne and his son Christopher Robin.  

"Father," Christopher Robin asks, "why do they call her Winnie? It's a funny hame for a bear. I wonder how she got it"

"Yes, I wonder," his father replies. "I bet it's quite a story."

From there we are taken back in time, and across the ocean to meet a group of veterinarians, enlisted in the Canadian army, riding the rails across the country on their way to the front lines of the First World War. Aside from the bear, the star of this piece is Harry Colebourn, and we're introduced to him just as he wins a sizeable pot of money from his fellow soldiers. But he's not rich for long, as at the next stop, in White River, Ontario, he sees a bear cub chained up. Colebourn uses his money to buy the bear and rescue it. But now that he has it, what is he going to do with it? When he takes the bear back to the train, his regiment adopts it as their mascot and it's named Winnipeg – Winnie for short – after Colebourn's hometown. 

From then on we get to see both Winnie's story and the story of this veterinarian regiment. 

Caution

The only caution concerns what one reviewer called the film's confusion about its target audience. 

It's about the most beloved bear of all time, so wouldn't this be a perfect one for the kidlets? The pacing is gentle, with the tension being mostly of a kiddish sort involving Winnie getting into things she shouldn't, and owner Colebourn, and his friends, trying to chase her down before they all get into more trouble. 

But if this is for children, then why the repeated scenes with the mentally unbalanced, and at one point drunk, general in command? And if it is for kids, then what were producers thinking when they had the young vet Macray, distraught by the battlefield deaths of his friends and animals, grabbing a gun and running off to his death? The violence is muted - we don't see any blood and gore, even in the midst of fallen men and animals and we never see or hear Macray get shot. The violence is of the sort you might find in a Hallmark film (in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if this is on the Hallmark Channel). But you don't kill off charming characters in a children's film. 

So parents need to understand that, despite some appearances to the contrary, this is not one for kids. Or at least not kids who are of the age that they are being read Winnie-the-Pooh stories.

Conclusion

Who would enjoy this? This would be a nice one for mom and dad on a night when they want something quite calm. It is a unique chapter in Canadian history, presenting not just a bear's story, but also showing some of the First World War from a Canadian perspective. There's humor, hijinks, and also a little educational content along the way so all in all, it ranks as quite a good TV movie.

Martin Luther

Drama
105 minutes, 1953
Rating 7/10

What sort of film is Martin Luther? The sort that gets produced by a church, and yet gets nominated for an Oscar – solid theology and high production values paired together. How often has that ever happened?

It does get off to a slow start; the first couple of minutes are more documentary than drama. But when we get introduced to Niall MacGinnis as Luther, his brilliant portrayal sweeps us into the story. We follow along, starting with his tormented time in the monastery, and continue all the way through to his marriage to an ex-nun. MacGinnis captures all the contradictions of the man – even as the Reformer stands before the Diet of Worms strong and defiant he is distraught and trembling.

That's is certainly among the best Christian films ever made.

CAUTION

Though there is nothing in the film that is graphic, some scenes are psychologically intense. On the one hand, I think that would just go over the heads of most children, but for some young sensitive sorts, Luther's emotional turmoil might be too much.

GOOD SOUND IS KEY

This is a black and white film, which is a mark against it in many minds. But if you're considering showing this to your class or to your family, here's the secret to helping them get into it: make the sound your priority! In a dialogue-driven film it's the sound, much more than the visuals, that really matters.

I still remember watching this with my Grade 6 class, years ago. The screen was small - minuscule by today's standards - but this big box TV had great speakers. There was no fuzziness, no straining to understand what was being said - we could all follow it. And after 30 minutes or so, we were all hooked.

HOW IT COMPARES TO OTHER LUTHER FILMS

There are quite a number of films about Martin Luther, with at least a half dozen dramas, and more than a dozen documentaries. The best known is probably the 2003 Luther that played in major theaters, and starred Joseph Fiennes (of Shakespeare in Love fame). It is a wonderful film (and in color!) but marred by an instance or two where God's name is taken in vain. As well, it focuses a little more on Luther's external struggles with the powers that be, and a little less on his own internal struggles. That makes for more action, but less of a theological focus. So the 1953 Martin Luther is the better educational film 

There is also a 1974 Luther that is again marred by an instance or two  of God's name being taken in vain (why do Christian films do that?) and which portrays Luther's action as being motivated more by arrogance than devotion. So, again, the 1953 version is superior.

CONCLUSION

This would make a great film for a dad and mom to share with the family this Reformation Day. I've seen kids as young as 7 enjoy it, though with younger children you're going to want to break it into a few "chunks" so it spread out over two or three nights. But for those 12 an up, so long as they are "forced" to give it a half hour ("No, you can't check your smartphone while watching this") it will grab them.

You can pick up a copy at Amazon.com by clicking here.

And check out the trailer below.

Biology 101

Curriculum / Documentary
2012 / 277 minutes
RATING: 9/10

Solid high school science curriculum resources that aren't tainted by evolutionary assumptions are hard to come by. That's why it was so wonderful to find filmmaker Wes Olson's Biology 101 DVD series.

It proceeds from a young-earth 6-day-creation perspective, but this isn't so much a specifically creationist resource as a solidly biblical one. Olson isn't always talking about creationism and evolution, but is instead in awe of what God has done. That awe shows up in all he says.

Now there are time when matters of creation do come up. For example, in talking about genetics he throws in the quick comment that there are only three people who have not come about by the combination of their parents' DNA: Adam, made from the earth, Eve, made from Adam, and Jesus, made from Mary's DNA and the Holy Spirit. The creationist perspective also comes out in how this look into earth's various lifeforms is broken up. Olson has ordered the segments by what day in the creation week that the organism was made. So, we start with plants on the third day, then look at aquatic and avian creatures which were made on the fifth day, and so on.

It looks good

Production values are solid throughout. There are piles of pictures and film clips of the creatures being discusses, and Olson, as narrator, has a delightfully dry wit. This is evidenced in the many short extra bits of information he includes, such as this:

"Ostriches are the largest birds, standing over eight feet talk, and the fastest two legged runner, sprinting nearly 45 miles per hour. Roadrunners, on the other hand, have a top speed of only 17 mils per hour, chasing lizards and snakes. Coyotes have a top speed of nearly 30 miles per hour, almost twice the speed of a road runner. Just in case you were wondering."

And sometimes it is the extra bits of trivia that serve to make his points more memorable. In talking about recessive and dominant genes he noted how dark hair was dominant over light, and,

"...incredibly the gene for having 6 fingers on one hand is dominant over the gene for having only five fingers on one hand, but practically everybody carries two copies of the five-fingered gene, which is why you almost never see someone who has six fingers on one hand."

Six fingers is dominant? I'm going to remember that. And in remembering it, I'm going to remember the difference between recessive and dominant genes.

Contents

This is meant as a high school biology course. However, it is only 4 and a half hours long, and while it comes with a 118 page textbook (on pdf, stored on one of the DVDs) it is less comprehensive than a high school biology course would need to be. So this would make a wonderful foundation for a course, but other materials would be needed to supplement it. The 9 episodes vary in length from as short as 15 minutes to as long as 44 minutes.

DISK 1
1. Introduction: Defining life and an explanation of organism classification systems
2. Plants

DISK 2
3. Aquatic creatures
4 Avian creatures

DISK 3
5. Land animals
6. More land animials
7. Mankind
8. More on Mankind

DISK 4
9. A brief history of the study of biology, the origins of genetics, and the moral questions involved in remaking our own genome

Audience

The course material is for ages 15 and up, but the content is appropriate for all ages. This focus on all-ages appropriateness does mean the discussion of our reproduction system is done in the broadest of strokes. We learn about how children are a combination of their mom's and dad's genes but no mention is made of exactly how those genes get mixed.

I'd highly recommend this to any Christian high school science teacher – whether they use it in whole or part, there's sure to be lots of it they will want to show their classes. It would also be an excellent supplement for any Christian child attending a secular high school; this is the perspective they'd be missing.

Families with an interest in this subject matter might also find this worth buying. I should note that while I gave this an 9 rating, that was for how it rates as an an educational resource – I can't think of any better. But from a solely entertainment focus, this would only score a 7. If you want to learn biology, this a wonderful method. If you want to be entertained, there are many more entertaining films out there.

You can find out more at the Biology 101 site and check out the 14 minute first segment and introduction down below. The 4-DVD Biology 101 set is $70 US on the website, but seems to be cheaper at Christianbooks.com and Amazon.com.

Chemistry 101 is even better

Wes Olson has also produced a Physics 101 series and a Chemistry 101 series. I haven't seen the Physics 101, but have had a chance to look at the Chemistry 101 series. I thought it was even better. Olson's approach to teaching chemistry is to lay it out as it was discovered – we go through it historically, learning about one discovery after another. I was rather surprised about how much of our knowledge of chemistry has only been discovered in the last 150 years.

This historical approach is brilliant and fascinating. I watched this one simply because I couldn't stop. But at 11 hours long it is a little over twice the material of the Biology 101 series....so I'm not done it yet.

As We Forgive

Documentary
2010 / 54 min.
RATING: 8/10

In Rwanda, in 1994, the unimaginable happened: approximately one million Tutsi Rwandans were killed by their friends, neighbors and fellow church members. As much as fifteen per cent of the population was murdered in just three months. The enormous scale of the evil left the government unable to offer any sort of justice. The jails couldn’t hold the tens of thousands of perpetrators, so the government eventually ended up pardoning most of them, sending them back to their villages, and homes, where they would live right beside the surviving victims.

Justice was impossible. But what about forgiveness? Is forgiveness possible when sins are this monstrous? How does a man who has killed a girl’s father dare go to her to ask forgiveness? And how could she ever find the strength to offer him that forgiveness?

As We Forgive has received all sorts of secular awards, but the story here is an explicitly Christian one. It is a film well worth watching twice, first putting ourselves in the place of the victims, and understanding how it is that God equipped them to forgive. If they can forgive, how much the more so us? And it is also worth watching from the perspective of the murderers. The two men we meet show what true repentance looks like. As one explains, he can never make up for what he has done, but he can try to show his repentance by doing all the good he can for his victims – he is building houses for the genocide survivors.

As you might expect of a documentary on such a grim chapter of history, there are some scenes – of the aftermath of the genocide – that are not suitable for children. But it really is a must-see. If you’ve ever said “I can’t forgive” then here is an example of what God can make us capable of, if we ask Him. Here, too, we see what real repentance involves. It is so much more than words. These men’s actions give evidence of the change that God has wrought in them.

Christian biographies for children - 3 from The Torchlighters

"The Torchlighters" is a series of animated films created by Voice of the Martyrs to teach children from 8-12 about the many people who have been persecuted for their love of God. The animation is consistently solid, and while the topic matter – persecution – is somber, the depictions of torture are quite age-appropriate (though, as I note below, some 12-year-old children may well find The Jim Elliot Story too much).

The three recommended here are highly educational, and reasonably entertaining, or to put it another way children should see these, won't mind seeing them, but likely won't want to watch them again and again. So they are excellent resources for Christian schools, but not ideal for the family video library.

I should note this isn't a blanket recommendation of the series. Several of the other films in the series depict Jesus talking to one of the characters (Augustine, Perpetua) which skirts uncomfortably close to the Second Commandment, and in other cases the biographical target has significant troubling aspects to their theology (the Arminian John Wesley, for example). But these three are well worth watching – the persecution of their Christian brothers and sisters is a topic the Western Church does not pay enough attention to, or pray enough about, so teaching our children is an important step in the right direction.

You can find a preview of these films at their website www.torchlighters.org and watch them for free at RedeemTV.org (though you will have to sign up for a free account).

The William Tyndale Story
32 min; 2005
Rating: 6/10

The strength of this film is in its simplicity. The vast cast of characters featured in the live-action version is, in this animated retelling, cut down to only the half dozen most important. So now even children will be able to follow the story and learn about how Tyndale translated the Bible into English at the cost of his own life.

The Jim Elliot Story

30 min; 2005
Rating: 6/10
 

In 1956, Jim Elliot and his four friends seek out a group of Ecuadorian natives who have never heard the gospel. The missionaries are murdered for their efforts. Years later, when the men’s wives also seek out the natives, and forgive them, their example serves as a powerful testimony to the truth and power of the Good News, and many of these same natives are then converted. Though this is a cartoon it should definitely be previewed by adults as some scenes – specifically when the missionaries get speared – will be too intense for some children (I would say this is for kids 10 or older)

The Richard Wumbrand Story

30 minutes; 2008

Rating: 6/10 

I knew of Richard Wurmbrand as the man who founded Voice of the Martyrs, an advocacy group for the millions of Christians being persecuted around the world. But before he began speaking out for the persecuted, Pastor Wurmbrand was tortured himself, in his homeland of Romania. The Communist government intimidated other Christian leaders into silence or complicity. They wanted Wumbrand to go along too, but at a government-sponsored event Wurmbrand took the opportunity to publicly denounce the state's suppression of the Bible and their denial of God. His stand buoyed up the courage of many other Christian leaders in attendance. It also landed him in jail. As the film makes clear, what he had to endure was dreadful – physical torture and long stretches of solitary confinement – however there too God provided him the strength he needed.

We in the West have no idea what Christians in other parts of the world have to endure, and, because we haven't been so sorely tested, we also have little idea of how God provides all that we need. Of the three films here this is the one I most want to show my own children... when they get a bit older. I want them to see how this man relied on God, and could trust God to provide him all he needed, even in the most desperate of situations.