Monday, February 23, 2009

Review: "Madea Goes to Jail"


I just saw Madea Goes To Jail. I liked it. There are a lot of positive things about the movie. I'd like enumerate them:

1. Forgiveness frees both the transgressor and the one has been transgressed against.
2. People must stop being a victim and take responsibility for the parts they played in the situations they find themselves in.
3. It is wrong to step on other people's lives to advance your lives.
4. It is wrong to look down on others and judge where they are in life as if you are better than they.
5. People can change for the better.

However, there are somethings that I think that the movie teaches are wrong.
1. A minister was attempting to hand out clean needles and condoms to prostitutes in an attempt to help keep them safe. My problem is that it enables them to keep going in their condition without neccessarily changing. The Word of God is powerful enough to change any life. Rather than enabling people in their sins we need to feed them, clothe them, and preach the Word of God to change their lives. For those who are unwilling to accept but will take the condoms and the needles, there isn't much more we can do for them other than to pray.
2. Madea's and Joe's characters' addictions and attitudes are presented for humor and not shown to be negative. Anger is not sinful but destroying property, shooting at people, or being rude and cursing are not the ways God wants us to handle our anger.
3. Madea's disdain for church is glorified and the movie suggests that you can be moral and wise without church. God told us that we must go to church. Bottom line. If you belong to Him and you want to obey him (which means you belong to him) then you will go to church....happily!
4. Now this is the most controversial point, that I'm sure that I will get some flack for saying this: It is wrong for Tyler Perry to dress up as a woman and pretend to be a 60-something woman. It is unfortunate that he is now in a position that without Madea his work is not financially bankable with the big Hollywood studios. I think that Lionsgate has made it clear that he must do a Madea film every once in a while. What is my proof that God does not like cross-dressing?

A woman must not wear men's clothing, nor a man wear women's clothing, for the LORD your God detests anyone who does this.
- Deuteronomy 22:5


In conclusion, I do not want to suggest that the movie has no good points. The issue is that the movie sends mixed messages. Here is the trailer:

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