Ken and Todd look at Rian Johnson’s sci-fi, time-travel hit, Looper. Is changing the future the same as “playing God”? Is there anything theological about the film’s depiction of addictions? What verse in the Book of Genesis makes Ken doubtful that time-travel is ever really possible? Just what exactly is soul annihilation, and why does the way we interpret the film have consequences for the way we conceptualize hell?

Guest host Andrew Johnson joins Ken at the Toronto International Film Festival to discuss Mike Newell’s adaptation of Charles Dickens’s classic novel. What is the difference between grace and random acts of kindness? Which character reminds Ken of the rock opera Chess? Warning: some profanity in this episode.

Director Julia Haslett makes a documentary that is part biopic, part self-reflection. How should we respond to human suffering? Do Simone Weil’s writings give us a road map for answering that question?

Critics polled by Sight & Sound magazine in 2012 ranked Vertigo as the greatest film of all time. What does that ranking say about the spirit of the age? Is the greatness of a film measurable? If not, why do we keep trying? What causes our obsession with lists? Ken and Todd discuss Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece and the poll that thrust it back into the limelight. Warning: Spoilers for Vertigo and Sunrise: A Story of Two Humans.

How Batman is not a “Christ figure” but Bane is reminiscent of…Willy Wonka!?! It’s the summer’s most anticipated film as only The Thin Place can cover it. Ken and Todd discuss whether Christopher Nolan’s trilogy is telling us “you can’t handle the truth” or simply isn’t clear in its own mind about what it wants to say. Warning: Spoilers!

Few films are more beloved in Christian circles than Chariots of Fire. Todd and Ken ask why this is the case, and whether the film that beat out Raiders of the Lost Ark for an Academy Award has stood the test of time.

Ridley Scott’s return to science fiction is not only one of the most anticipated films of the year–a prequel to Alien–but it also attempts to address deep philosophical and religious questions. Can a film be an action blockbuster and a successful cosmological treatise?

As a touring retrospective and the reissue of a famous anthology revive interest in the enigmatic and critically revered Robert Bresson, Ken and Todd examine the French director’s Lancelot du Lac.

Ken and Todd discuss the theology of gays in the Christian church, the social justice of gays in America, and the differences (if any) between the two as they review a documentary about the first openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church.

Ken and Todd discuss Blue Like Jazz, Steve Taylor’s adaptation of Donald Miller’s best seller. Is the film a satire of Christianity? A Christian satire of the godless university? Is it funny? Will Christians like it? Will anyone else?