The screenplay for The Christians: Earth’s Cry, Heaven’s Smile by Tony Gioutsos and Linda M. Wright is the faith-based story of Christos Giostos (whose name is quite similar to the author’s). The story, at its heart, is about faith, hubris and redemption. In the opening montage, we see a number of Biblical quotations as well as the axis of time, which will play a major role in the story.
Christos is born into a Christian family and is something of a prodigy in math and other subjects. He’s also a bit of a football star. But after a career-ending injury, he decides to pursue a career in engineering. As a youth, all Christos wants to do is to be a good Christian. But over time, he succumbs to the temptations of the world.
There is an interesting juxtaposition of the concept of time that computer programers have to deal with and the notion of what we could call Biblical time. God and Jesus stand, in a sense, outside of time. They promise immortality, which of course, is the ultimate overcoming of time and death. Christos, similarly, must figure out how to deal with the problem of time as it relates to air bags – devices which are meant to protect human beings from death.
Christos is well aware of the idea that God created time and that He is able to stave off death. And, after a time, he too feels that he is in some way a god as well. This is, of course, the classic definition of hubris: trying to be like the gods. Hubris is an ancient Greek term and exhibiting hubris in ancient Greek mythology was a sure path to being flayed alive or turned into some sort of animal by Zeus or another god. From the Christian point of view, though, it tends not to turn out that way. Instead, those who are hubristic on earth are very often highly successful and wealthy. What awaits then after death is another matter.
Christos follows the path of hubris. Perhaps he’s lured by the big money he’s making. But I think he’s more drawn to the sense of worldly power. Large corporations are after him. He’s doing something that is of great benefit to mankind. He’s respected by his peers. Money is one of the trappings of his success, but the feeling of success itself is the bigger draw. He no longer has much time for his family and Dawn, his wife, becomes more and more distant. Christos, for his part, seeks Christian advice from a dancer at the local strip club, starts drinking more and doesn’t seem to realize what kind of predicament he’s gotten himself into.
One of the interesting things about this screenplay is that it takes a broad, worldly perspective. Not only are there several scenes (flashback is not quite the right word) in which Christos dreams of the lives and deaths of saints; St. Paul, as well as Father Miguel from Mexico, Blandina from France and others. This international perspective is a prelude to what becomes a major and unexpected turn in the script. Christos has been working with an Egyptian colleague and decides that his true calling is in Egypt with the Coptic Christians. The Copts account for about 10% of the Egyptian population, but numbers are hard to verify. They are devout and believe (at least one told me when I visited the Siwa oasis) that Joseph and Mary went all the way to Siwa, near the Libyan border, then down to Aswan and back up the Nile, making the sign of the cross across the map of Egypt. They are routinely persecuted and are very often relegated to jobs like garbage picking.
In the end, the story would have been stronger if we’d had more of a sense of where we were going early on. And after the end, I couldn’t help but think that we’d left Dawn and Paul hanging. Dawn really gets the short end of the stick and doesn’t have enough of a life of her own. This may be intentional. After all, in John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress, the protagonist, Christian (much like Christos) is constantly running away from those things that distract him from Christ. And that includes his wife and children: when they implore him to stay with them, he covers his ears and runs. Overall, this is an interesting tale and the fact that it revolves around someone doing an ordinary job will make it resonate with many.
© 2021. UniversalCinema Mag.