Review: Spitfire Grill

Redemption and Salvation are powerful and moving words with many diverse meanings. Redemption is defined as deliverance from the spiritual effect of past transgressions and may or may not be identical with salvation, though the terms are in many cases synonymous. Redemption can also be something that has been restored in terms of its value. Salvation is the deliverance of mankind from such fundamentally negative or disabling conditions as suffering, evil, finitude, and death. In some religious beliefs it also entails the restoration or raising up of the natural world to a higher realm or state. For many Christians Redemption and Salvation are found inside the church, through faith, or even what they consider an atoning blood sacrifice by Jesus of Nazareth. I would suggest that Salvific and Redemptive peace can be found in the simplest and most commonplace of situations, within our communities, our families, and perhaps most importantly ourselves.

Professor Douglas Hall, asks the questions; what do we need to be saved from and what for. He answers these questions by saying it depends on who we are and whether we are asking the question corporately or individually. He elaborates further by telling us “we need to be saved from the anxiety of being without purpose or meaningful vocation”. This in itself seems to be a way of saying, at least to me, that we need to be saved from ourselves. He moves forward with his premise by stating that, “I have tried to show that what we are saved for is the vocation of friendship, solidarity, and the stewardship of others”. This is the powerful message that we find threaded throughout the complicated tapestry of interwoven relationships as illustrated in Lee David Zlotof masterful film, The Spitfire Grill.

Zlotof's film is a wonderful contemporary adaptation of the morality play genre. The stories central character exemplifies the proposition that redemptive salvation can be found in our own lives without the benefit or mediation of an external ecclesiastical body. Percy Talbot provides the spark that Gilead needed to find itself gain. Percy had sought out Gilead in hopes of self redemption. She seems to have believed that Gilead would act a balm to ease her wounded spirit. And while Gilead did provide the salvific salve which assuaged her pain in some ways, it was her presence that proved to be the very ointment that Gilead and it's inhabitants needed to heal its own wounded heart.

Gilead was suffering from a grievous series of wounds. The relationships between many of the inhabitants had become frayed to the point of breaking. The loss of Eli, who seems to have represented the glue that held the community together, must have been a tragic emotional blow to the small community. Followed by the closing of the quarry which provided the fiscal lifeblood it packed a one-two punch that nearly destroyed the fabric of their society. The closing of the town church, the symbolic center of community, exemplified the changed state of affairs.

Percy touched members of the community in ways that spurred healing and growth which had long been stunted. Hannah, who grieved over the psychological damage done to her son in the war had hardened her heart, seemed to soften through her contact with Percy. Shelby found someone who saw the potential in her and provided the nurturing environment which allowed her to blossom. Percy even provided the context through which Hannah and Shelby developed a relationship outside of her role as Nahum's wife. The change for the entire community came into play when Percy facilitated the contest to raffle off the Spitfire. Soon everyone who desired to do so was involved in the reading of letters. They had a role to play in the course their community was going to take. They were a part of the decision making process, they were vested. I found it interesting to note that interspersed with scenes of town members reading letters were scenes of town folk rebuilding the fence around the church, the symbolic center of their town. We saw Percy and Shelby on the inside the day of her death and the sanctuary still seemed decrepit, unused and empty. Then, at Percy's funeral, we see the inside of the facility shinning, refurbished, and filled with people. One can only assume that Percy's death provided the impetus needed to spur the Gileadites on towards completion of their church. Percy's death provided the force needed to bring about the redemption Gilead needed and a return to cohesive solidarity amongst it's citizenry.

Hall States unequivocally that, “The God whom Jesus makes known to us cannot be considered a deity who insists that everyone who wants to be “saved” has got to accept the Christian faith^v” Yet he diligently insists that Jesus is a necessity. Hall tells us, “That particular Jesus, is that, being person, he puts us in touch with a universal God, who as living person transcends our ideas and images of the divine in the very act of coming close to us”. Hall tells us without reservation that he is more of a pluralist through knowing Jesus than he would be apart from him. He tells us that for him what he would mean by salvation is, “being saved from the “natural” but ultimately very destructive tendency of human beings to distrust and exclude others, especially those who are obviously other”. The citizens of Gilead certainly fell into such behavior when Percy came to town.

It had to be Percy, or someone like her. Percy was the messenger that the citizenry of Gilead needed. Her message was the message the needed to hear. Percy represented the right theological tool, at the right time, for the right place. Different methods of delivering theological method is determined by the audience. One size does not fit all. For example the message delivered by Meister Eckhart or Paul Tillich may be well received in the academy and to a certain extent in the pews. But a populist form of theology as we saw demonstrated in The Spitfire Grill requires a completely different sort of messenger. And perhaps, a redrafting of the message. Hall, although obviously a brilliant theologian and an accomplished rhetorician would not have had much success in Gilead. Despite all his skill and ability, Hall's pontificating would not have led them towards the redemption that Percy provided. She, through her actions, set them on the path to wholeness. And her death brought a solidarity and purpose to the community that had been all but forgotten.

Hall is correct when he says we need to be saved from the anxiety of being without purpose or meaningful vocation and when he tells us he has tried to show that what we are saved for is the vocation of friendship, solidarity, and the stewardship of others. Hall further explains that The God whom Jesus makes known to us cannot be considered a deity who insists that everyone who wants to be “saved” has got to accept the Christian faith, a concept with which I heartily agree. Yet, he still stands by the more traditional viewpoint that Jesus is a necessity. I would suggest that he is not. If there had been no Jesus one would have been created for us. Or mayhap even we might have created one for ourselves.

If redemption is accepted as deliverance from the spiritual effect of past transgressions, or something that has been restored in terms of its value, that is no reason to suppose that either could be achieved without Jesus. Percy came to a town that was in dire need of the redemptive process. Its church was in decay and its citizens were without a spiritual leader. Percy's time in Gilead provided the impetus and served as the catalyst needed for the redemptive process to move forward. There was no Jesus, his name was not mentioned nor invoked, no supernatural forces healed the wounds of Gilead. It was put into play by one single person with the character to make it happen. When the community did come together and the church was refurbished for use it was notable to me that there was still no clergy, no trappings of Jesus. There was even no mention of a Christ, Lord, or Savior at Percy's funeral. And, perhaps most important the service was presided over by one of their number. They had no need for a Jesus, redemption was achieved without him or the idea of him. We can do what we need to do ourselves. While some might need or desire the aid of a Christ figure it is by no means a necessary or integral part of the redemptive process.