Okay, another list. Movies with prayers.

What's inspired this inspirational thread is the inspiration that inspired me when I watched JOE VERSUS THE VOLCANO. Not the most likely place one would look for, well, inspiration. So I was gobsmacked when Joe, after giving the water to Patricia, after dancing like a madman to the Dell-Vikings "Come Go With Me," after having a good shave and making up a cowboy song on his ukelele and listening to "I Cover The Waterfront" as the constellations drift by, after lifting his arms to the most glorious moonrise you'll ever see, kneels and prays.

"Dear God, whose name I do not know.
Thank you for my life.
I forgot how big…
Thank you.
Thank you for my…."

Got any more? I'm thinking THE KING, I'm thinking ELECTION, I'm wondering about JUNEBUG...

There's a movie lectionary. Let's make a movie prayer book!

Or THE STATION AGENT

Bring 'em in.
What?
Grace.
Really?
Really, we got to give thanks. C'mon, bring em in. Hands around. Who wants to say it?
You.
God, thank you for letting us sit here and enjoy this meal. Please watch over everybody. Please let my dad heal, he's driving me fucking crazy…. Anybody you guys want to mention?
No.
Amen. Let's dig in.

From Bergman's The Virgin Spring.



"You saw it. God, you saw it. The death of an innocent child and my vengeance. You allowed it to happen. I don't understand you. I don't understand you. Yet still I ask your forgiveness. I know no other way to make peace with myself than with my own hands. I don't know any other way to live. I promise you, God, here by the dead body of my only child, I promise that as penance for my sin, I shall build you a church. On this spot I shall build it, out of mortar and stone and with these very hands." [Birds chirp and the spring bubbles up from the ground]

Don't forget [spoiler]Leave me alone ... forever.[/spoiler]

Ladyhawke in a couple places. I seem to remember one on the ice, something like "Father, we confess, as human beings our lives are totally in your hands..."

Of course Becket TURNS on an awesome, heartfelt prayer of the protagonist.

Sophie Scholl:

"Dear God, I can do nothing but stammer to you. I can do nothing but hold out my heart to you. You created us in your likeness. Our hearts are uneasy until they find peace in you.”

Officer Jim Kurring in Magnolia:

http://www.script-o-rama.com/movie_scripts...t-stillman.html

Lord's Prayer, United 93.

You know how it goes.

Oh, and back to Ladyhawke -- let's not forget that the main character (Phillipe the Mouse) has a (very funny) running dialogue with God throughout the film. "How am I suppose to learn right from wrong when You keep confusing me?"

From O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Everett's prayer - head in noose - next to the happy little tire swing...

EVERETT
Oh Lord, please look down and
recognize us poor sinners... please Lord...
I just want to see my daughters again.
Oh Lord, I've been separated
from my family for so long...
I know I've been guilty of pride and
sharp dealing. I'm sorry that I turned
my back on you, Lord. Please forgive me,
and help us, Lord, and I swear I'll mend my ways...
For the sake of my family... For Tommy's sake,
and Delmar's, and Pete's...
Let me see my daughters again.
Please, Lord, help us... Please help us...


And on a humorous note... from Dr. Strangelove...


Cheering starts among men in the War Room,as the Big Board indicates the bombers are retreating from their targets.

TURGIDSON
(whistles loudly)
Gentlemen, gentlemen.

War room falls silent.

TURGIDSON
Ah, gentlemen, Mr. President, I'm not a sentimentalist at all, by nature, but I think I know what's in every heart in this room. I think we ought to all just bow our heads and give a short prayer of thanks for our deliverance. Lord, we have heard the wings of the angel of death fluttering over our heads from the valley of fear. You have seen fit to deliver us from the forces of evil...

STAINS
Excuse me sir, Premier Kissov's calling again and he's hopping mad.

I believe the original Alfie (1966) includes a climactic scene where Michael Caine says he was moved to prayer, but I can't recall if the words of that prayer are ever spelled out.

Greg Focker's prayer in MEET THE PARENTS:

"Day by Day, Day by Day, Oh, Dear Lord three things I pray..."


In MUNICH - Louis' blasphemous Lord's prayer is memorable.


In PHANTOM OF THE OPERA - Christine's prayer to her "Angel of Music"


A SOLDIER'S DAUGHTER NEVER CRIES - The young mother giving her son up for adoption prays that her son, Billy, "will receive the love which is his right.


COURAGE UNDER FIRE - with Col. Sterlings' prayer setting up the film.


Denny

I'm surprised this one hasn't been mentioned yet:



Conan the Barbarian, 1982

"If I never meet you in this life, let me feel the lack. A glance from your eyes and my life will be yours."
1st Sargent Edward Walsh in "The Thin Red Line"

AMADEUS

Old Salieri (recalling his boyhood, V.O.):

FORREST GUMP:

Child Forrest and child Jenny hiding in the cornfield from her abusive father: "Dear God, Please make me a bird, so I can fly, far far away from here." [repeats]

Cool Hand Luke
City Slickers
Shane
Fiddler on the Roof
You Can't Take It with You
It's a Wonderful Life
The Sound of Music
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
(I think this applies to the Disney & Chas. Laughton versions; can't recall offhand about the Lon Chaney version)

X-Men 2: X-Men United:



Here's an odd one, from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge ("The lover takes the bride") spoiler-filled plot summary & analysis.
The potential "lover" Raj and "bride" Simran find themselves in Switzerland. Simran wants to visit a church. Raj thinks it's silly, but goes along, mocking, as Simran kneels before a lighted candle, prays silently, crosses herself.
RAJ: [as they walk away from the altar] What did you ask for?
SIMRAN: You aren't supposed to speak of it.
RAJ: Then you must be sure about being given what you've asked for.
SIMRAN: Whatever one seeks with a pure heart, one is surely given.
RAJ: [stops] Go on. I'll be back in a minute.
SIMRAN: What happened?
RAJ: Go on--I'll join you. [returns to kneel before candle, waves] Hi! I'm Raj. [in English] I'm sorry, I don't know how to pray. But I want nothing for myself. I'm very happy. But that girl, Simran, she's nice. Very good at heart. Give her whatever she asked for. Please. Thank you. [starts to sketch a cross, shrugs] OK! [runs out]
CUT TO: mural of Christ glorified over altar

Lee Marvin's got one at a graveside right at the start of PAINT YOUR WAGON.

Ned and his wife pray in bed in WAKING NED DEVINE.


Wow.

Okay, maybe I have to start liking this movie more.

WAKING NED DEVINE (26:41)

"I think we should make room in this day for some prayers.
God bless mothers and fathers and grandparents too,
Aunties and uncles and friends old and new.
Amen.
And dear lord, we pray tonight for a little man from Tully More, Ned Devine. as sweet a soul as ever was blessed. A gentleman, who loved his life, and carried a heart the size of his head in his chest. Amen."
"Amen."

Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby features several scenes in which Will Ferrell prays to "little baby Jesus", and not "grown-up Jesus", because baby Jesus is his "favorite" -- one scene in particular features a long and drawn-out discussion of his prayer preferences between him, his family and his best friend.

I don't remember exactly what is said but some of the most memorable/unsettling prayer scenes are in Breaking the Waves when Bess prays out loud and then changes her voice slightly to give 'God's response.'

A stiff recitation of the Lord's Prayer in I Heart Huckabees by the daughter in the smugly middle class evangelical family.

Battlestar Galactica (yeah, it ain't a movie, but neither is The Decalogue):

[spoiler]Lords of Kobal, hear my prayer. I don't know if he had a soul or not, but if he did, take care of it.[/spoiler]

The Lord's Prayer, screamed, in World Trade Center

Alexander in The Sacrifice:


Our Father, who...
Our Father, who art in Heaven...
hallowed by thy name...
Thy Kingdom come..
Thy will be done...
Give us this day our daily bread...
And deliver us from evil.
For Thine is the Kingdom...
and the Power...
and the Glory.
Amen.
Lord!
Deliver us in this terrible time.
Don't let my children die,
nor my friends...
my wife...
Victor...
All those who love Thee and believe in Thee...
All those who do not believe in Thee, because they are blind...
those who haven't given Thee a thought...
simply because they haven't yet been truly miserable.
All those who in this hour have lost their hope, their future...
their lives...
and the opportunity to surrender to Thy will.
All those who are filled with dread
who feel the End coming closer...
who fear, not for themselves, but for their loved ones.
All those whom no one,
except Thou, can offer protection.
Because this war is the ultimate war
a horrible thing.
And after it, there will be no victors and no vanquished...
no cities or towns, grass or trees,
water in the wells,
or birds in the sky.
I will give Thee all I have.
I'll give up my family, whom I love.
I'll destroy my home,
and give up Little Man.
I'll be mute, and never speak another word to anyone.
I will relinquish everything that binds me to life...
if only Thou dost restore everything as it was before...
as it was this morning and yesterday
Just let me be rid of
this deadly...
sickening, animal fear!
Yes, everything!
Lord!
Help me...
I will do everything I have promised Thee.

I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE

O Lord God most holy. Deliver them from the bitter pains of eternal death. The woman was a wicked woman, and she was dead in her own life. Yea Lord, dead in the selfishness of her spirit, and the man followed her. Her steps led him down to evil. Her feet took hold on death. Forgive him O Lord, who knowest the secret of all hearts. Yea Lord, pity them who are dead, and give peace and happiness to the living.

Bruce Almighty

Smite me, O mighty smiter!

Sonny in The Apostle. Bedroom Scene.

Ed Harris in The Third Miracle
"I would leave everything, everything, if I knew it was all true"

Priest - Our Father prayer answered scene.


Behrani in House of Sand and Fog











Please, God, don't take my joon-am. I make my nazr. My nazr, hear me, please to hear me. I will give everything to one who is less fortunate. Yes! I will make it for the broken bird. Please, God, I'm making nazr to this woman. To Kathy Nicolo. And I, to you I promise, if you heal my son, I will return her father's house. I will also give to her all the money I have. My God, Khoda. I make nazr only for my son. Please, I want only for my son. I beg you. I will do whatever is your will. I will purchase ten kilos of the finest seed and I will find an American mosque and I will feed them to all the birds outside. I will let the birds cover me and peck out my eyes! Please, God, my nazr is in your hands!

WICKER MAN (1973)
1:24:38

Dear God, i humbly entreat thee for the soul of this thy servant [spoiler]Neil Howie[/spoiler], who will today depart from this world. Do not deliver me into the enemy's hands or put me out of mind forever. Let me not undergo the real pains of hell, dear God, because I die unshriven. And establish me in that bliss which knows no ending, O Christ, Our Lord...

BARCELONA
34:15

34:57

Well, we should get started.

(CUT TO P.O.V. of forklift driver coming to pick up the casket)

Our Father, preserve us from the dangers of the seas and the violence of enemies. Bless the United States. Watch over all that are upon the deep and protect the inhabitants of the land in peace and quiet. 'All hands bury the dead. (Trumpet plays) Unto Almighty God we commend the soul of our brother departed.''

Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind: at about 1:30, Nausicaa prays for God to protect the valley.

One of the more unusual uses of prayer in a movie. Private Jackson, while targeting several different German soldiers, in Saving Private Ryan...

These are all passages from Psalms, aren't they? Not that they can't be prayers, as well.

The Notorious Bettie Page

Thank you, subtitles

(According to the commentary, the script writer used recordings or transcripts of actual revival sermons from a seminary archive as a resource for sermons and, perhaps, prayers in this film)




Miami altar call prayer:

O my God, tonight I know that first things come first,
and the most important thing of all
is that men and women and young people surrender their lives to Christ.
God, don't let a mother's boy who heard me preach here tonight go to hell.
God, don't let a mother's girl who heard me tonight go to hell.
Don't let a daddy or a mother who heard me preach tonight go to hell.
Save them. Save them tonight...from all their sins.
May they be born again, washed in the blood,
saved through and through without the loss of any, I pray.
Amen. Amen.

Miami preacher's prayer for Bettie:

O Father, we ask that you deliver this woman from sin.
Destroy it by the spirit of God.
Heal her through and through, including her heart.
Make her a new creature in Christ.

They pray the Lord's Prayer in MY NIGHT AT MAUD'S. There are at least three liturgical sections, much of which would be prayer, as well. Sorry not to be more specific.

It might be fun to see which films end the Lord's Prayer the "western" way ("Deliver us from evil", which is pretty general) and which films end the Lord's Prayer the "eastern" way ("Deliver us from the Evil One", which is much more specific). Offhand, the only film I can think of that has done it even close to the latter way is a documentary on, um, that photographer who caused a controversy in England when she put up photos of her naked children at an art exhibit (I forget her name); her schizophrenic mother, who has some sort of affiliation with a Russian group, ends it with "Deliver us from the Devil".

In Deja Vu, early as they watch Claire in the past, she gives a morning prayer of thanks for the day.

from Sophie Scholl: The Final Days, thanks to the English subtitles. I hope the minimal context provided won't be considered excessive:

Sophie (awakened in prison in the middle of the night):
Dear God, all I can do is stammer to you.
I can do nothing but hold out my heart to you.
You created us in your likeness. Our hearts are uneasy
until they find peace in you.
Amen.
[Nice allusion to St. Augustine]

Sophie (at prison window before her trial):
I beg you from the bottom of my heart
I beseech you
I beseech thee, even though I know nothing about you.
You alone are my salvation.
I beg of you, please, don't turn away from me, dear God,
my glorious Father.
Amen.

Sophie's final prayer:
My God, glorious Father,
transform this ground into fertile earth,
so your seeds may not fall in vain.
Let the longing grow for you the creator that they so often do not want to see.
Amen.

Minister's blessing:
May God the Father bless you, who created you in his image;
May God the Son bless you, whose suffering and death redeems you;
May God the Holy Spirit bless you, who leads you to his temple and hallows you.
May the Triune God judge you with mercy and grant you eternal life. Amen.
[subtitles said "Trinity," but the actual words were certainly "three-in-one God," which is stronger]

Winter Light: (English dub)

There are 3 or 4 prayers in Apocalypto, but the gods prayed to have names that aren't easy to remember. My favorite is the one prayed by a woman captive as they cross the river. Something like a Marian prayer.

A couple of prayers in Entertaining Angels:

0:50 -- a fairly conventional prayer: "Lord You've got to show me what to do...."

1:33 -- one that may go into my all time favorite prayers: Dorothy begins as she walks into church. "Where are you? Why don't you answer me? [catalog of her problems and the problems of the people she cares for] Am I suppose to find you in them? Because you're ugly; you're drunk; you wet your pants; you vomit. How could anyone ever love you? I need you, but you're not here. You've deserted me too, haven't you."

Sounds quite like the prayer at the end of Cool Hand Luke. Have we mentioned that film in this thread yet?

Matt

The Night of the Hunter has some chilling conversations with God from Harry Powell that are in the vein of Sonny in The Apostle. Ther is also a brief prayer by Willa on their wedding night that she be made clean.

I recall a few, but these are just paraphrases from memory, not direct quotes.

"It's a Wonderful Life" starts off with a view of snowy rooftops all over Bedford falls, and we can hear dozens--perhaps hundreds--of voices, lifting up the name of George Baily in prayer. Next is the conversation between the two angels (Joseph and another high-ranking angel whose name I forget) discussing the fact that so many prayers are being raised for George Baily. And they decide they need to dispatch an angel (Clairence) to go and help George

Later on, after George has found out about the missing money, we find George sitting in tears at Martini's Bar, drinking heavily. And he whispers "Lord, you know I'm not a praying man, but ... [and he says something like 'I sure could use a little help right about now']..."


"Miracles" starts off with the tribal chief in a tropical village angrily sentencing the medicine man to death for failing to cure his little child from some sort of sickness (the child isn't dead, but pretty close). The medicine man gets staked down onto the beach and he lies there all night long, looking up at the stars and calls out: "To the great god of the universe whose name I don't know, I ask not for my sake but for the sake of that poor child--" [he's interrupted by a sudden explosion of lightening and thunder] "--okay, so maybe I am asking a little bit for myself too. Please, send another medicine man, one with medicine stronger than my own, a man who can cure the chief's child." And then the credits roll. And then we find the hero (a doctor) and his wife in a Los Angeles lawyer's office finally finishing up the paperwork for their very, very bitter divorce. And the two of them are then subjected to the most ridiculous and endless series of utterly unlikely events (or "miracles") which sends them both half way around the world in a mere twenty-four hours to the tribal village where the child lies dying. [My favorite mircale is when the hooker in six-inch stilleto heels is walking at night in a very seedy section of town. Right across the street is an occult bookstore. A car is driving toward her, and she suddenly gets her heel caught in the road. She can't move and is about to get hit by the oncoming car. She yanks on her leg and the spike heel snaps off the bottom of her boot. Now she runs and leaves the spike sticking up in the air. The car runs over the heel and ruptures a tire. The car careens right into the occult book store and destroys it. So with one miracle, a hooker AND an occult book store are both put out of commission (at least for a while). And I think I recall that there was also a Christian storefront soup kitchen right next to the occult book store which the careening car did NOT hit.]

"Saved." The rebellious Jewish girl spends the whole night driving around in worry, looking for the kid in the wheelchair (I think he was played by McCauly Culkin). At one point during her frantic driving she whispers "Please let me find him!" This one moment was perhaps the entire payoff for her own character arc. All of "Saved" is full of many, many prayers. But her one prayer was the most significant because it was a character arc fulfillment. The funniest prayer was when the main character finds out she's pregnant and makes her way alone to stand solo before the HUGE cross on the lawn of the Christian school she attends. And as she looks up at Jesus' face, all she can bring herself to say is a blurt of tear-laden profanity.

There's a prayer in Sherrybaby about 6-8 minuted in when she is going to bed.

In "Catch Me If You Can" Leonardi DiCaprio goes with his girlfriend to her parents house to meet them and ask for her hand in marriage. They're a very fine, traditional Southern family of lawyers. And they expect their daughter to marry a Christian man. He lies and says he is a Christian. When they all sit down to dinner they ask him to say grace. He has no idea what to say. So he borrows from an inspirational allegorical tale about two little mice that his father often told at Rotary Club meetings.

Apollo 13 had a montage of the world-wide reaction to the plight of the astronaughts, including the Pope calling for prayers for their safe return to Earth.

Indigenes (Days of Glory) has several scenes in which the soldiers are praying, including one where we hear a good part of their morning prayers. The corporel often uses the Shahadah ("There is no god but God") in much the same way that the Lord's Prayer or a line from Ps. 23 might be used by Christian soldiers.

From Conan the Barbarian.

Conan: Crom, I have never prayed to you before. I have no tongue for it. No one, not even you, will remember if we were good men or bad. Why we fought, or why we died. All that matters is that two stood against many. That's what's important! Valor pleases you, Crom... so grant me one request. Grant me revenge! And if you do not listen, then to HELL with you!

There are several in Land of Plenty