Although this “television” mini series has excellent acting (there are no weak actors on the show), props, scenery, and story line, there are some disturbing messages in the program. It’s not only what is said, but also what is NOT said.
Remember, philosophers these days do not stand on Mars Hill spouting off their ideas. Instead, they make movies.
Every time you watch a movie, there is a message in that film that the producer/director/script writer is trying to convey. No scene is “by accident”. The editing process (what is left in, what is thrown out) is tedious, exacting, and intentional.
1883 is a godless show. It preaches, it screams, it promotes a world without the God of the Bible. Each episode begins with the voice of the teenage girl Elsa (actress Isabel May) spouting off her stupid preachments, in which she is dictating to the viewer what reality is and isn’t. (Yes, an 18 year old has enough knowledge and world experience to define reality for the rest of us, apparently.)
In her worldview, there is no absolute moral truth. There is no overarching meta-narrative in which a sovereign God is guiding history to a final conclusion. Life is purely based on how one feels at the moment. Heaven is here on earth. There is no eternal hell or final judgement in the afterlife. Moral truth is what you make up from moment to moment. Two thousand years of Christian truth and tradition is meaningless and has no place in this world as Elsa has sex out of wedlock with more than one man. Elsa is the main evangelist of this godless equation, and all her sentiments are echoed by all of the other characters. All of her actions are condoned in the movie.
Life is meaningless as most of the people are wiped out, for no apparent meaning in this world. Death is everywhere, and we die for no reason. Sam Elliot’s wife “appears” as a hummingbird (so I guess that is teaching reincarnation maybe?), and then he commits suicide at the end (spoiler alert again!). We are left to believe that at last he has peace.
At one point the Indians are killing the pioneers out of revenge for their village being wiped out. Tim McGraw says to a Native American warrior, “we don’t know your gods, or what your rules are, so we left your dead alone.” Fine, I guess he is being respectful of another culture. But the Indian warrior responds, “our gods have no rules, only ceremonies, by which we get to know them better.”
No gods with bothersome things like rules cluttering up our lives. No rules, just right. Sounds like a commercial I’ve heard before. Well, a world without absolute moral truth sounds wonderful, until someone comes along and lies, steals, murders…then you’re kinda stuck with trying trying to stop people from doing things (like lying, stealing, and murdering) that are against absolute universal moral standards/rules.
With all the scenes of outlaws, pioneers, native Americans, railroad men, vigilantes…is it too much to ask for just one godly Christian preacher to make it into just one brief scene as a voice of real truth? Such people existed and were all over the wild, wild West.
But not here in the show 1883. I wonder why?