Cool Hand Luke and Faith

[JoeRoccoCassara]

In the movie Cook Hand Luke, starring Paul Newman, a War Veteran is sentenced to work in a chain gang for two years, he only lives a couple of months before a guard kills him.

 

In that movie he goes from questioning God's existence in a lightning storm, to singing the song Plastic Jesus after his mother dies, to asking God for his purpose in life.

 

This film's message is clear, we need faith to help us cope with the vastness of death.

[Flying Binghi]

In the movie Cook Hand Luke, starring Paul Newman, a War Veteran is sentenced to work in a chain gang for two years, he only lives a couple of months before a guard kills him.

 

In that movie he goes from questioning God's existence in a lightning storm, to singing the song Plastic Jesus after his mother dies, to asking God for his purpose in life.

 

This film's message is clear, we need faith to help us cope with the vastness of death.

 

Yer not been torturing some one there eh, morg's gard :)

 

 

( i can see when i wake up in the mornin, my alt self will have a different view on this. via, Paul Bloom, Yale university)

[Buffy]

Quite the contrary: many analyses of the film (like this one) basically see Luke as believing God just doesn't care, and the increasing desperation that he undergoes proves it and is made *ironic* by the elements you cite!

 

The author of the book that became the movie Donn Pearce had quite a rough life and had no strong religious beliefs at the time he wrote the book (and ironically was tortured by society in much the same way as his character for years afterward!)...

 

What we've got here is... failure to communicate, :lol:

Buffy

[HydrogenBond]

Whether Cool Hand Luke believed in God or not, it would not have changed his life or his ordeals. He would have still died at the hands of the guard. He could have been questioning atheist utopia and still got killed. Both his father and the guard are examples of what can happen when humans follow their blind impulses and lack humanity and self restraint. They are the problem.

 

His dad left his family, not to find god. He was actually closer to the modern free choice of the atheist, than to religion. This started a chain of problems for many other people. Luke more than likely did the opposite of his dad, by acting more responsible and trying do good by his mother. God was part of that opposite, or he would not have gone back to that when times got tough again. But in the end he is killed while trying to resolve his faith. He was blaming god for not interceding against the godless behavior of humans.

[Thunderbird]

In the movie Cook Hand Luke, starring Paul Newman, a War Veteran is sentenced to work in a chain gang for two years, he only lives a couple of months before a guard kills him.

 

In that movie he goes from questioning God's existence in a lightning storm, to singing the song Plastic Jesus after his mother dies, to asking God for his purpose in life.

 

This film's message is clear, we need faith to help us cope with the vastness of death.

 

A bit of the "Plastic Jesus song" I seemed to have missed it.

 

 

 

God made Christ a Holy Jew

God made Him a Christian too

Paradoxes populate my car

Joseph beams with a feigned elan

From the shaggy dash of my furlined van

Famous cuckold in the master plan

 

Naughty Mary, smug and smiling

Jesus dainty and beguiling

Knee-deep in the piling of my van

His message clear by night or day

My phosphorescent plastic Gay

Simpering from the dashboard of my van

 

When I'm goin' fornicatin

I got my ceramic Satan

Sinnin' on the dashboard of my Winnebago Motor Home

The women know I'm on the level

Thanks to the wild-eyed stoneware devil

Ridin' on the dashboard of my Winnebago Motor Home

Sneerin' from the dashboard of my Winnebago Motor Home

Leering from the dashboard of my van

 

If I weave around at night

And the police think I'm tight

They'll never find my bottle, though they ask

Plastic Jesus shelters me

For His head comes off, you see

He's hollow, and I use Him for a flask

 

ALT CHORUS

Plastic Jesus, plastic Jesus

Riding on the dashboard of my car

Ride with me and have a dram

Of the blood of the Lamb

Plastic Jesus is a holy bar

 

 

There is nothin that is cuter

than a smilin Jolly Buddha,

Ridin on the dashboard of my car,

I don't have no idol cuter,

comes in plastic, bronze and pewter,

Take him with me when I go afar.

 

Jolly Buddha, fat and squattin,

on a pad of aspirin cotton,

He's with me wherever I may roam,

When it's late and I start to hurry,

I know he ain't gonna worry,

He looks at me and all he says is, "Oooommmmmmm."

 

There is nothing that is gaucher

Than eatin food that isn't kosher,

Right in front of my smilin Moses' face,

I'm afraid that he'll awaken

When I'm eatin ham or bacon,

And throw them Ten Commandments in my face.

 

I don't care if I'm broke or starvin'

As long as I've got a fish named Darwin

Glued to the trunklid of my car

God, I'm feeling so evolved

Drivin' with my problems solved

Proclaiming what I think of what we are