Criteria: The Catholic Film Podcast

James and Thomas begin a sub-series on the filmography of Andrei Tarkovsky (whose religious films Andrei Rublev and The Sacrifice they already discussed as part of the Vatican Film List). His first film, Ivan's Childhood, depicts a young boy, Ivan, who acts as a scout for the Russian army during World War II. Made precocious – and profoundly damaged – by his wartime experience, Ivan is a fascinating and tragic figure brought to life in a remarkable performance by Nikolai Burlyayev.
Tarkovsky begins his career with a film that is understandably more conventional than the rest of his oeuvre – but still plenty unconventional, and in fact serving as a test run for Tarkovsky's poetic convictions. James and Thomas discuss the director's views on "poetic links" in cinema expressed in his book Sculpting in Time and instantiated in this film's dream sequences and evocative landscapes. Tarkovsky believed that poetry comes about when the objective beauty of reality is filtered through the artist's subjectivity, connected to his own personal associations and feelings, such that the authenticity and density of life somehow appear on screen, in a way that is truly poetic and allows the viewer to take part in the aesthetic experience of the artist.
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Music is The Duskwhales, "Take It Back", used with permission. https://theduskwhales.bandcamp.com

Thomas Mirus, Nathan Douglas, and Andrew Petiprin gave this panel session at the 2024 Notre Dame Fall Conference, presented by the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture. The theme of the conference was "Ever Ancient, Ever New: On Catholic Imagination."
30 Years of the Vatican Film List – Catholic Cinema's Past and Future
Thomas Mirus (Catholic Culture) – The Vatican Film List: Introduction and Reflections
Nathan Douglas (Independent Scholar/Filmmaker) – The Filmmaker as Auteur
Andrew Petiprin (Spe Salvi Institute; Word on Fire Institute) – Europe for Everyone: Yesterday's Vatican Film List and Catholic Imagination Today
Chair: John O'Callaghan (University of Notre Dame) 
Video of the panel: https://youtu.be/-7oE8d6RcCw?si=x4cTzl847-A8bG5M

Paul Duda joins James and Thomas to discuss Steven Spielberg's first extant UFO movie, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and what it says about the kind of meaning and transcendence people are seeking in the current UFO obsession. Paul also talks about the film he is producing about St. Bernadette.
Links
Bernadette movie: 
www.10thhourproductions.org
 www.Bernadettemovie.com
www.Instagram.com/bernadettemovie
Frank and Lou Creative www.Frankandlou.co 
 SIGN UP for Catholic Culture's newsletter: https://www.catholicculture.org/newsletters
 DONATE to make this show possible! http://catholicculture.org/donate/audio
Music is The Duskwhales, "Take It Back", used with permission. https://theduskwhales.bandcamp.com

On May 30, Thomas is giving the keynote address at the first annual conference of the Thomistic Artists Guild at the parish of St. Vitus in Los Angeles, CA. Free to attend!
https://www.zeffy.com/en-US/ticketing/thomistic-artists-guild-2026-conference

Thomas Mirus, Nathan Douglas, and Andrew Petiprin gave this panel session at the 2024 Notre Dame Fall Conference, presented by the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture. The theme of the conference was "Ever Ancient, Ever New: On Catholic Imagination."
30 Years of the Vatican Film List – Catholic Cinema's Past and Future
Thomas Mirus (Catholic Culture) – The Vatican Film List: Introduction and Reflections
Nathan Douglas (Independent Scholar/Filmmaker) – The Filmmaker as Auteur
Andrew Petiprin (Spe Salvi Institute; Word on Fire Institute) – Europe for Everyone: Yesterday's Vatican Film List and Catholic Imagination Today
Chair: John O'Callaghan (University of Notre Dame)
Video of the panel: https://youtu.be/-7oE8d6RcCw?si=x4cTzl847-A8bG5M