Film Comment: Doctor Strange (2017)

Doctor Strange (2017), seen merely as  film, is very enjoyable and technically well made. It is equally funny, frightening, visually amazing, and thought provoking. The acting is top-level and the music perfectly fits the film.

The story is based on the comic book character created by writer Stan Lee and artist Steve Ditko in     1963.  Doctor Strange is a brilliant but hideously arrogant neurosurgeon.  He is a totally unlikable man, and is verbally and emotionally abusive of everyone around him, even the fellow doctor who considers herself to be his girlfriend.  As an atheist, he derisively rejects any mention of God or the supernatural. Then, his smug life is totally shattered as his talented hands are mangled in an especially violent automobile crash.    

Stephen’s entire self-worth has been built around what he considers to be his obvious superiority to those around him. He cannot accept that his prior life is gone. He desperately spends his entire fortune on increasingly experimental and questionable medical procedures. He is still broken with no improvement in sight.

Eventually his search leads him to Kathmandu and a secretive school led by a mystic known as The Ancient One. She claims to be thousands of years old. The Ancient One opens Strange’s eyes to the unseen world surrounding him.

This is an origin story and Stephen eventually becomes a Master Sorcerer charged with protecting the world from supernatural threats from powerful otherworldly beings. He has become a full-fledged hero even though he still carries just a touch of his former arrogance.

Doctor Strange is directed by Scott Derrickson, a publicly acknowledged Christian and, while the film is about personal redemption, it is not a Christian film. There is no mention of Jesus at all.

Christians are commanded to stay away from magic and the occult. Magic is essentially the quest to use knowledge of spells, objects, and rituals to cause the universe (read spirits, demons, Satan, and God) to react in specific ways. This is the way in which Stephen Strange becomes a sorcerer. He is merely a man who learns how to manipulate space and time and how to leave his physical body to move about as his spirit self.

The primary sin is to place oneself in the place of God. This is essentially what magic does, harnessing supernatural beings and forces to impose one’s will upon the universe. It has no place in true Christianity.

Some commenters have said that director Scott Derrickson has used Doctor Strange’s eastern mystical roots to hint at a deeply Christian perspective on reality.  For example, the Ancient One teaches Strange that what we see around us is only a small part of reality. Paul says the same thing in the sixth chapter of Ephesians. Some commenters are much more troubled by the film’s roots and some denounce it.

In the film, The Ancient One is discovered to be a hypocrite in that, while fighting for Good, she is drawing much of her power and longevity from The Dark Dimension which is ruled by the utterly evil being known as Dormammu. Since she is their teacher, it must be assumed that the Ancient One’s students, including Stephen Strange, are also drawing power from the Dark Dimension. Surely he understands this once the revelation has been made and yet, he still uses the power.

Strange cannot possibly defeat a being as immensely powerful as Dormammu but he succeeds in outwitting the monster. Though Dormammu repeatedly and violently kills him, Doctor Strange has trapped Dormammu and himself in a repetitive time loop. The only way that Strange will release him from the loop is for the monster to agree to leave. Strange becomes a self-sacrificing savior who returns from the dead. This alone should be a massive red flag for Christians.