The controversy over the casting of actor Chad Allen in the lead role of the movie The End of the Spear continues to grow — and rightfully so. Chad Allen is known for his very public homosexual activism. As a matter of fact, he has been on the cover of The Advocate, the leading homosexual news magazine, at least three times. What were they thinking? And how should Christians react?

Nominations for the 63rd annual Golden Globe Awards were announced Tuesday, and Brokeback Mountain, the movie identified as a “cowboy romance,” has taken the lead with seven nominations. While Hollywood celebrates yet another “achievement” for tolerance and diversity, Anthony Esolen, Professor of English at Providence College in Providence, Rhode Island, warns that the breakdown of the natural sexual order that this movie represents has led to the death of friendship–particularly to the death of male friendships.

The long awaited release of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, comes today, and the movie is likely to become a blockbuster. Opening on three thousand screens nationwide, the Narnia film is the product of a collaboration between Walt Disney Pictures and Walden Media. Fans of C. S. Lewis and his most famous literary work, the seven-volume series known as The Chronicles of Narnia, have waited for the film version of this work for a very long time.

When Bill Moyers asked his youngest son why he had seen Star Wars at least a dozen times, he responded: “For the same reason you have been reading the Old Testament all your life.” As Moyers explained, “He was in a new world of myth.” That new world of myth has been a topic of debate and interest ever since 1977, when Star Wars first warped itself into our national consciousness. With the release of “The Revenge of the Sith” the mythological impact is again a matter of spirited discussion.

Clint Eastwood has emerged as one of the biggest names in Hollywood, with a score of awards for both acting and directing. This year, he’s up again for the Best Director award at the Oscars, and many Hollywood insiders believe Eastwood is the likely winner over his closest competition, Martin Scorsese. Scorsese, who has never won an Oscar for Best Director, was nominated for his film “The Aviator,” and is seen as a sentimental favorite for the award. Eastwood’s film, “Million Dollar Baby,” surprised the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences with its commercial success and artistry. Viewers of the movie are likely to be surprised by another feature of the film–its presentation of assisted suicide. The film tells the story of a female fighter, Maggie Fitzgerald, played by Hilary Swank, who achieves a meteoric rise in the world of women’s boxing. As many observers have noted, the first part of the film suggests little more than a female version of the famed “Rocky” films starring Sylvester Stallone.

Americans love disaster movies, and crowds have flocked to see blockbusters such as “The Towering Inferno” and the “Jurassic Park” series. As a general rule, disaster movies are intended as sheer escapism–generally timed for summer consumption and maximum crowds among both teenagers and adults.

Controversy over Mel Gibson’s movie “The Passion of the Christ” continues as the film sets new box office records and has been seen by millions of Americans. Next week, the film opens in Great Britain and a new round of revues and reactions is certain to follow.

Mel Gibson must be doing something right, because he has Hollywood in an absolute uproar. His new film, The Passion, has incited one of the hottest Hollywood controversies of recent years–and the film will not even be released for months.