The Jewish news service JTA filed a report noting that there were three Jewish-themed films and an Israeli film up for the 2010 Academy Awards. The best known of those films are A Serious Man, a Coen brothers movie that examines their Jewish roots in a retelling of the Book of Job, and Inglourious Basterds, in which a […]

The website SpiritualityandPractice.com has several lists broken down by documentaries, animated films, feature films and so on.  Avatar was a top pick of the site’s founders, United Church of Christ members Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, even though other Christian critics felt the movie glorified pantheism.

Phil Boatwright, movie critic for the Baptist Press and author of Movies: The Good, The Bad and the Really, Really Bad, wrote a year-end wrap of the “best and worst” movies of 2009. Boatwright pointed to some good movies but felt Hollywood generally “continued its attack on people of faith.”

Christianity Today‘s film critics compiled a list of the 10 most “redeeming” movies of 2009 — as well as a list of the best films. The Blind Side was No. 2 on the “most redeeming” list but did not make the Top Ten overall best films.

Movieguide is a leading Christian movie reviewing website. Founded by Ted Baehr, an evangelical Christian, Movieguide lobbies Hollywood to make more religious and “family-friendly” films, and each year before the Oscars the organization presents awards to what it considers the best films of the year.

Jeff Staley is a core lecturer in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at Seattle University. He co-edited Jesus, Son of D• V• D: A Handbook of Jesus Films (Westminster John Knox, forthcoming in 2007), an analysis of 18 Jesus films available on DVD.

Gregory Robbins is an associate professor of religious studies at the University of Denver. His interest is film studies, and he has taught the course “Jesus on the Silver Screen.”

Roy Anker is a professor of English at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich., and author of Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies. He says most movies based on biblical retellings go for epic scale rather than the humanity of God.

A Sept. 17, 2006, ABC News story explores the controversy over the documentary Jesus Camp.