Kozlovic: Christian Communication in Popular Cinema … 143 Christian Communication in Popular Cinema: Cross Imagery, Cruciform Poses and Pieta Stances.

Numerous Christian references exist within popular cinema, but they are frequently ignored, dismissed or under-utilised by educational and ecclesiastical institutions, despite feature films being the lingua franca of contemporary Western society and the most persuasive of modern art forms. Therefore, it is incumbent upon the professions in this post-Millennial period to raise the public’s consciousness and treat them, and the art of video exegesis, as legitimate extra-ecclesiastical tools for religious education, communication research and cultural studies. Using textually-based, humanist film criticism as the analytical lens, the critical film and religion literature was reviewed and the popular Hollywood cinema scanned to explicate the following three Christian focuses, namely: (a) cross imagery, (b) cruciform poses and (c) Pieta stances. It was concluded that these three taxonomic categories are legitimate and entertaining pop culture phenomena whose pedagogic utility looks promising for the classroom, home and pulpit. Further research into the emerging and exciting interdisciplinary field of religion-and-film was recommended