Surprised by Oxford

[osprey_archer]

Confession time: I couldn’t resist Surprised by Oxford because the premise promised lots and lots of beautiful shots of Oxford, and in this respect the movie absolutely did not disappoint. In the post-screening Q&A (attended by the director, two producers, the lead actress, and the woman who wrote the memoir on which the film is based), one of the producers commented, “It’s hard to get an ugly shot of Oxford,” and he was extremely right.

Otherwise… well, look, I am simultaneously the perfect audience and the worst possible audience for this film. I love Oxford, I love the Inklings, I love C. S. Lewis in particular, and yes, the title is 100% a reference to Lewis’s memoir Surprised by Joy, and yes there is a pivotal moment in this film where Caro’s love interest/intellectual antagonist Kent takes her to a bookstore to dramatically introduce her to that book.

But I’m also not a Christian, and while it’s clearly possible to write a conversion narrative that appeals to non-believers (see above my love for C. S. Lewis, who is continually writing conversion narratives), for me this movie doesn’t quite manage it. The love story and the conversion narrative are too intertwined. Is Caro converting because she loves God, or because she loves Kent? Unclear.

Or, conversely, perhaps the love story and the conversion narrative are not intertwined enough. If Caro and Kent spent less time clanging against Caro’s emotional unavailability and more time having meaty intellectual arguments about the existence of God, there would have been more substance to both their relationship and Caro’s conversion.

Having said all of this - I do admire the movie’s ambition. It’s trying to do so many things, and it might have worked better if it had pulled back and tried to do less, but there is something to be said for being an ambitious mess rather than a small, safe, forgettable success.

Comments

[sovay]

The love story and the conversion narrative are too intertwined. Is Caro converting because she loves God, or because she loves Kent? Unclear.

Have you read the memoir to know if it's clearer in non-movie form?

(I too would have been surprised by Oxford if my experience of it entailed converting to Christianity.)

[asakiyume]

Your parenthetical made me laugh. "Oxford! Come for the history, the architecture, the --SURPRISE!! YOU'RE CHRISTIAN NOW." It would need to have the equivalent of biological hazard signs or radiation signs posted around its perimeters to warn off people who are very happy with their non-Christian state, thank you very much.

[osprey_archer]

I hadn't even heard of the memoir till I saw the movie. I expect it is clearer, partly because it has more space to lay out its story, and also because "and then I read this book and it was a turning point!" is perhaps easier to portray with full dramatic force in a book than in a movie. You can only imbue so much drama in the visual of taking a book from a shelf!

I suspect this it not the standard Oxford experience these days - not that it was in the days of the Inklings, either - but probably even less so now.

[luzula]

I briefly passed through Oxford in June this year (did not convert to Christianity, though)! I was sad that I didn't have time to go and look at the house D K Broster lived in...

[regshoe]

I feel like there's a witty comment to be made about The Vision Splendid somewhere in here... :P

[luzula]

Yes! Alas, I am also not witty enough to make it. : )

[asakiyume]

I got your letter yesterday! And this line--

There is something to be said for being an ambitious mess rather than a small, safe, forgettable success.

--resonates with what you were writing about failure and success.

I don't think I would like a conversion story that's essentially "because I love this guy" --not that you're saying that's what this is, but it sounds like it's a bit unclear on that point.

[osprey_archer]

Clearly the meanings of success and failure have been on my mind! And is a story really a success, anyway, if it's forgettable?

I don't think they *mean* the impetus for her conversion to be "because I love this guy," but her other motivations weren't developed quite enough. Of course, ultimately it's difficult to portray a moment of epiphany or conversion - I don't think I've done it specifically in a religious context, but it's hard enough when the epiphany is about something comparative tangible and mundane!

[asakiyume]

And--I think this is tangential for the movie, but it comes to mind when we talk about conversions (thinking of them broadly as dramatic change of stance or opinion, religious ones just being a subset)--some conversions don't even involve a sudden epiphany... they develop slowly.

[regshoe]

there is something to be said for being an ambitious mess rather than a small, safe, forgettable success.

Very true!

I like—with some reservations—stories about religion, and I can see the appeal in a pairing whose relationship develops through meaty intellectual arguments about theology. It does sound like what this did instead would be a bit frustrating.

[osprey_archer]

I also like stories about religion, but it definitely seems to be tricky to do religious themes well. Sometimes creators are so intent on getting it right, either by staying in the box of their own orthodoxy or creating a portrayal that won't offend anyone, that they end up making something airless. Or they try to deal with big questions about mortality etc. but lose their nerve partway through, or simply haven't considered the question deeply enough to really say anything about it in story form.