The Colour Purple

Director
Steven Spielberg

Producer
Steven Spielberg
Kathleen Kennedy
Frank Marshall
Quincy Jones

Cast
Danny Glover
Whoopi Goldberg
Margaret Avery
Oprah Winfrey
Willard Pugh
Akosua Busia
Rae Dawn Chong
Laurence Fishburne

The Color Purple
Review
The adaptation of Alice Walker's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, about growing up 'poor, female, ugly and black' in the Deep South, by a Middle American movie brat not hitherto noted for his interest in any of the above, could be cynically seen as a blatant (and botched) bid for Oscars. And it's easy - but unfair - to stamp on the Spielberg version of Celie's triumphant pursuit of happiness and self-respect. Example: Walker's clear, lyrical patois has been filmed with, well, purple pomposity, a battering ram of flashy editing and tearful emotion (the brutish husband played by Glover, whom Walker finally allows his own small epiphany, gets especially short shrift as yet another of the big, bad authority figures who stalk Spielberg's world). Nor is it altogether surprising that Spielberg treads delicately round the story's more radical elements, like Celie's lesbian love for free-spirited blues singer Shug (Avery) or the political insights of her sister's African experience. And yet... due in no small measure to a superb cast spearheaded by Whoopi Goldberg, this is a powerful and honourable attempt to wrest an unusual book into the populist Hollywood mainstream. SJo
Source : Time Out Film Guide 13

The word Advent means "coming" or "arrival." The focus of the entire season is the celebration of the birth of Jesus the Christ in his First Advent, and the anticipation of the return of Christ the King in his Second Advent. Thus, Advent is far more than simply marking a 2,000 year old event in history. It is celebrating a truth about God, the revelation of God in Christ whereby all of creation might be reconciled to God. That is a process in which we now participate, and the consummation of which we anticipate. Scripture reading for Advent will reflect this emphasis on the Second Advent, including themes of accountability for faithfulness at His coming, judgment on sin, and the hope of eternal life.
In this double focus on past and future, Advent also symbolizes the spiritual journey of individuals and a congregation, as they affirm that Christ has come, that He is present in the world today, and that He will come again in power. That acknowledgment provides a basis for Kingdom ethics, for holy living arising from a profound sense that we live "between the times" and are called to be faithful stewards of what is entrusted to us as God’s people. So, as the church celebrates God’s inbreaking into history in the Incarnation, and anticipates a future consummation to that history for which "all creation is groaning awaiting its redemption," it also confesses its own responsibility as a people commissioned to "love the Lord your God with all your heart" and to "love your neighbor as yourself."