Can a Film Redeem Our Attention?

A review of the Flannery O'Connor biopic Wildcat

I’ve found people to fall into one of two camps with Flannery O’Connor. They love her work or they don’t. People who seem not to like her work also tend to preface their dislike with a lack of understanding.

So is it worth seeing? Does it do justice to her work? Many reviews in the Catholic world took an interest in this film. They found it to do something fundamentally different from what a mainstream Christian film tries to do. There was also secular interest in the film, but a few reviews I read did seem to misunderstand O’Connor and Catholic realism.

So in my review, I sought to answer a few questions:

What made this film successful?

How can it redeem our attention?

What did the filmmakers ultimately believe about their audience? Are we enchanted lovers of art or disenchanted spectators of entertainment?

Read more at Humanum Review:

https://humanumreview.com/artefact/redeeming-our-attention

While her work may not be for a mass audience with infinite desires, it is certainly for a universal audience who possesses a holy longing for the infinite.

Let me know what you think in the comments!

---

Thanks for subscribing to A Holy Wonder. If you’ve enjoyed the newsletter or something in it resonated with you, I invite you to share it with others.