Presidential candidates on movies

Fascinating. On CBS News tonight Katie Couric asked the 2 main presidential candidates what’s their favorite movie – and their favorite scene in that movie. I found their answers interesting.

McCain cited Viva Zapata, and described it as a movie of heroism, honor, sacrifice, selflessness. His fave scene? One in which the hero’s newly-wed bride reads him the Bible. Wow!

Obama, on the other hand, likes The Godfather – because it’s about “old world gentility and ritual, with this savagery underneath. It's all about family.” OK, it's about family (and definitely savagery). But not exactly a family I’d want to emulate.

Should a candidate’s choice in movies influence our vote? Perhaps not. But it should not be ignored either. One of the reasons we write our fave movies on our websites (blogs, myspace, facebook etc.) is because movie choices reveal a lot about who we are.

Funny how we all see differently (I wrote a book about that called Women & Men in Dark Glasses!) We could all see the same movie and see it differently. What we take away from the books we read and the films we see tells a lot about what is dear to us.

So, I won’t cast my vote here – even though the choice is pretty clear according to my values. But hopefully, we are all watching vigilantly, weighing up what we see – and praying for God to guide us according to His will.

You can read the full transcript of Katie Couric’s interview with the two presidential candidates here.

Janey DeMeo © Copyright September 2008