Joseph Holmes retweeted
Religion Unplugged’s culture writers @NormalGuy8 and @_jilliancheney sat down before Halloween to explore how Gen Z thinking is changing the horror genre. youtu.be/uIY5Mo4_Hc0?si=iJdh…
This is how ideology can create blindspots that function as barriers to understanding each other. The Dune films are great. But they make a weak objective or factual case for the idea that Paul makes the wrong choice. They instead rely heavily emotionally on a bias in favor of seeing the poor, women, and minorities as having the default moral high ground. The problem is, many people reject that default. So those moments where Chani is judging Paul don't make them see Paul badly, but Chani badly. I personally think both interpretations work for the Dune films. (That's one of the reasons it's so good!) But it's important for everyone to recognize the very valid reasons why people see it so differently.
Oh no. Things that came out when I was a kid that became iconic for my generation are now being shamelessly milked for nostalgia! youtu.be/iWFlFNm2IPk?is=ERVZ…
This year has been a big one for horror films. Particularly ones for Gen Z. @_jilliancheney and I break down what these movies say about Gen Z spirituality for the @ReligionMag podcast.
religionunplugged.com/news/2…
Immigration is one of the most contentious issues facing our country. And especially in Christian circles. A movie wrestling with that from a Christian perspective would be great. Unfortunately not this one. My latest for @ReligionMag religionunplugged.com/news/b…
Easily the best movie I've seen about the conflict between religious conservative minorities and a secular society majority is this year's #Fjord. Christians should definitely make an effort to watch this if it's available in their area. Read my review in @ReligionMag to see why. religionunplugged.com/news/f…
This is what it looks like when studios realize the faith-based film market is shifting to dads instead of moms. (Even though this is not a faith film.)
Doesn't surprise me. Most of the evening showtimes of this movie have been sold out at my theater. Word of mouth is making THE must-see movie of the year.
This is the correct question. The problem is I suspect most of Hollywood has one answer, and most of James Bond's fans have a different one.
This has been coming a long time-- based on my own experience and people I've talked to. But still very sad. Still, the way it's framed as "its the fault of the right wing Evangelicals" is bad framing. As @bonniekristian notes in her own substack.
@nytimes piece: nytimes.com/2026/10/21/us/ch…
@bonniekristian's take:
bonniekristian.substack.com/…
What’s wrong with evangelicals? Are they as bad as what their critics--on both the left and the right--say? Why or why not? NEW episode of The Overthinkers with journalist and author @bonniekristian.
I had the pleasure of writing for her at @CTmagazine back in the day and once again showcases in this interview all her great qualities as a thinker and a person. Now that more people are discovering her through the recent @nytimes piece, people should listen to this episode and like her even more.
Also, @NathanJClarkson and I talk in relative depth about our relative Evangelical and Evangelical-adjacent upbringings in this one. So that's a bonus for those who are all about the #lore.
Listen here:  podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…
Replying to @grant21_34_55 @HansFiene
I'm not sure if I agree that most people who watch horror lean too hard into watching it in an unhealthy manner or not. Certainly, they might. But even if they do, this response doesn't help us engage with the issue better. It doesn't help us discern the difference between engaging with horror in a healthy or unhealthy way. xitter.cf/NormalGuy8/status/2112…
Not true @conservmillen. You become courageous by experiencing fear and overcoming it. You become more fearful by avoiding scary things. This is exactly why @JonHaidt calls out "safetyism" for contributing to the mental health crisis. Horror films therefore can make you become courageous by giving you a safe place to experience scary things and make them lose their power over you. Obviously not all Horror films are the same. "Friday the 13th" and "Saw" make evil seem cool. "Halloween" and "The Exorcist" make overcoming evil seem cool. But rejecting horror films because they make you fearful is the wrong solution to the wrong problem.
Not true @conservmillen. You become courageous by experiencing fear and overcoming it. You become more fearful by avoiding scary things. This is exactly why @JonHaidt calls out "safetyism" for contributing to the mental health crisis. Horror films therefore can make you become courageous by giving you a safe place to experience scary things and make them lose their power over you. Obviously not all Horror films are the same. "Friday the 13th" and "Saw" make evil seem cool. "Halloween" and "The Exorcist" make overcoming evil seem cool. But rejecting horror films because they make you fearful is the wrong solution to the wrong problem.
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Love to see it
‘YOU CAN SEE EVERYTHING’ will be submitted for Oscar consideration in the following categories:
• Best Picture
• Best Director
• Best Supporting Actress
• Best Documentary Feature
• Best Production Design
• Best Cinematography
• Best Costume Design
• Best Film Editing
• Best Makeup and Hairstyling
• Best Sound
• Best Original Score
I think this is a key thing that separates people who were blown away by "You Can See Everything" and people who weren't. And it deserves to be taken seriously. And the critics' concerns deserve to be taken seriously.
Here's why I love the movie: Nathan FOREGROUNDS the filmmaking artifice that exists in EVERY documentary whether the filmmaker admits it or not. The average person might think that the more traditonal documentary style makes a documentary more truthful. But people in or near the film community are well aquinted by default with all the ways that all these styliistic choices are just as contrived and manipulated. Nathan making his filmmaking and presence so prominent and open to audience interrogation therefore makes it feel MORE honest to that audience. It isn't hiding the puppet master or the strings. So it empowers the audience as much as is humanly possible to separate the truth from the puppetry, while encouraging deep humility about our limits of ever doing so. In many ways, that makes it a deeply Christian--and perhaps even deeply Protestant--work.
That doesn't mean more traditonal documentaries are bad or people are dupes for watching them. Documentaries that hide the observer help us focus on the subject. But to watch them well we have to watch them with the same awareness of how our view of the subject is being guided that "You Can See Everything" forces us to have whether we want to or not.
i seem to be the only person who saw "you can see everything" and didn't like it. a few reasons why:
- the tone felt wrong. the audience was laughing for much of the film, but i don't find the subject matter particularly funny. made it feel like the film was making light of a serious situation, intentionally or not.
- i couldn't tell what was real. how much of this was scripted, rehearsed, or manipulated in the editing room? everyone spoke a little too perfectly for it to be entirely unscripted. the ambiguity made it difficult for me to trust what i was watching.
- nathan felt like an unreliable narrator. his relationship with elizabeth blurred the line between observer and participant, making me question his motives and the film's perspective.
- so many layers of performance...i understand that blurring reality and performance is part of the point, but at some stage, the cleverness started getting in the way of the story. it's one of the most confusing documentaries i've watched from an audience perspective.
- i'm simply tired of elizabeth holmes having a platform.
i'll also be the first to admit that i fell asleep during the middle of it and knew absolutely nothing about nathan fielder going in. both definitely influenced my experience & i will watch it again to see what i missed the first time.
was it interesting and provacative? yes, of course. i'm not arguing with that. but i seem to have missed the genius everyone else saw, but i left feeling like the film was more interested in being clever than in saying something meaningful.
The wildest part of this is this is EXACTLY what he sounds like in the documentary
Elizabeth Holmes' partner Billy Evans admits "she looks insane" in the "You Can See Everything" trailer and says "I might think this is the dumbest thing I have ever done" when he finally sees the movie.
"There's been a lot of media produced on her. There's been a lot of people who have told her story. That narrative is pretty ossified. The whole idea was here she is, see her and make up your own mind. It's not to re-litigate the case. It was to have people see who she is. I have gone through this consistent experience with the people who love me most, from my grandmother to my best friends. They'd hear I knew [Elizabeth Holmes] or I was falling for this person and now we're going to have a kid... in the beginning, every single one of these people thought I was crazy. 'Do you know who she is?' I would tell them, 'I understand why you feel that way but just meet her.' And they would meet her and spend time with her and see her in a totally natural environment, like going on a hike or helping a friend. Every opinion of her would radically shift. That was the intention of the film. To help scale that up and allow other people to sit with her and make up their own minds."
"Am I nervous [for the movie to be seen]? I have been through so many intense, surreal experiences that it takes a bit to raise my blood pressure. With this there's certainly concern but it's ultimately our decision." (via All-In Podcast)
variety.com/2026/film/news/b…


















