I have come to set the world on fire, and I wish it were already burning.- Jesus, Luke 12:49, NLT
She waits, the little girl who has the
power to start fires with her mind. But
she doesn’t use it. She doesn’t
burn. It slips out sometimes, when she’s
angry, yet even when she is with them, held captive by them, she still
waits. This government agency known as
“The Shop” may think that they are the ones in charge, yet she could, at this
very moment, destroy them all with just a thought. As one man describes it, “Suppose there is a
little girl out there somewhere today – this morning – who has within her,
lying dormant at present, the power someday to crack the very planet in two
like a china plate in a shooting gallery.”
That
little girl, Charlene McGee (Drew Barrymore), gives them small glimpses of what
she is capable of. She and her father
are befriended by a nice old couple, Irv and Norma Manders, and when those who
want to use her – or kill her – finally catch up with her at the old couple’s
farm, she burns. Cars explode! Lots of them!
People catch on fire! “There’s
nothing going on here, honest to gosh!” says one lying agent, attempting his
best impression of a decent person, but even she, this little child, sees
through them, and when they try to grab her, this very agent catches fire, spreading
quickly from his outstretched arm and engulfing the rest of him in a matter of
seconds!
But
they do eventually catch her, and her father. An agent named Rainbird (George C. Scott)
knocks them out with tranquilizer darts, and they keep them both prisoner. And she doesn’t burn… yet. Rainbird then pretends to be her pal. As “John, the friendly orderly”, he convinces
her to work with them, and so she does.
She performs controlled burns for them, so they can quantify and record
her firepower. They don’t realize it yet, but they
are the ones in danger, not her!
Their days are numbered, and there will come a day when she will
release her power, and then they will burn!
And
that day does come. Her father,
Andrew McGee (David Keith), has planned their escape, and he arranges to meet Charlie
in the barn outside the main facility where they are being kept. Unbeknownst to him, Rainbird is already
there.
“My
friend John is here!” she tells her father excitedly.
“The
orderly?” he asks.
“Yeah,
up there,” Charlie says, motioning to the rafters above them. “Couldn’t we take him with us, if he wants to
come?”
Andy
puts his daughter down and shakes her shoulders as he tells her, “He’s the one
that shot us, baby. He’s the one that
brought us here.”
Charlie
shakes her head. “Oh, no, Daddy! That’s John.
He took care of my room…”
Andrew
stops her in mid-sentence. “No! He
is with them!”
She
thinks for a moment, and a sadness crosses her face as Rainbird aims a gun at
them both. She was deceived! “It isn’t true, is it?” she asks softly.
“Yes,
it’s true!” Rainbird declares loudly from the rafters, hiding behind a bale of
hay.
“You
tricked me! You lied to me!” Charlie
shouts defiantly to the rafters above them.
Rainbird
laughs as he shouts back, “No, I just mixed up the truth a little Charlie, and
I did it save your life.” Everything he
tells her is a lie, even now! He wants
to kill her, and even worse, he wants to see the shocked look on her face when he
strikes her across the bridge of the nose with the back of his hand, sending
bone fragments into her brain!
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| Burn it all down, baby |
“You
come down here before I set everything on fire,” she threatens, “’cause I can
do it!”
“Oh,
I know you can,” he replies, “but if you do, you’re gonna burn up an awful lot
of horses.” He tries to use her love
against her. “Can’t you hear them? Necromancer’s in one of those stalls,” he
says, referring to her favorite steed.
Yet
in the end, after he shoots and fatally wounds her father, he is the first
one to burn. And as the barn goes up in
flames, Charlie turns her attention to her beloved dad, as he uses his last
breath to tell her she must destroy it all.
She cries, and sorrowfully kisses him goodbye, and then saves the horses
she loves, using her great power to sear the latches and hinges on the stall
doors, allowing the horses to escape.
Once she blows the front doors off the barn, propelling several agents
in fire suits backward from the blast, the frightened horses trample them
underfoot. While some agents run for
their lives, others shoot at her, but the bullets won’t touch her. The air around her is so hot, they ignite and
explode before they can penetrate her skin.
And then the fire leaves her, and these agents die burning and
screaming.
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| Pyromania Rampage! |
A huge fireball springs from
her and blasts a man trying to make a get-away in a motorized cart. With a techno beat as relentless as her
rampage, courtesy of Tangerine Dream, and some superb cinematic fire stunts,
more bullets explode from the intense heat before they can get to her, and then
all these agents have left is screaming and pleading and crying before her fire
reduces them to ashes. Three agents fire
at her, and then run away in three different directions. A flow of fire leaves her and splits into
three jet streams, seeking out each of them as they scream in agony. The men hiding in the nearby trees aren’t
safe either, and soon, after firing their useless weapons at her, they are
burning along with the trees! Another
agent thinks he has a clear shot as she comes to a little bridge on the property. He misses, and is reduced to begging and
pleading as a fireball hits him dead on and sends his burning body flying into
the top of a nearby tree. The agents
then send out a truck and a helicopter, but she repels the truck and brings the
helicopter crashing and burning to the ground, both of them bursting into
flames! And then she turns her attention
to the compound, for the people there aren’t safe either. Flames and fireballs bombard the great
mansion. All-consuming and blazing fire comes
from somewhere inside this little girl, who didn’t want to burn and didn’t want
to kill, yet she destroys everything there, and all of those who meant her
harm, prompted by the words of her father who told her to burn it all down, so
they can’t do this to anybody else.
And
she did it with an almost cleansing fire.
“I baptize you with water; but someone is coming soon who is greater than I am – so much greater that I’m not even worthy to be his slave and untie the straps of his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.”
–
John the Baptist, Luke 3:16, NLT
There
are parallels here between Jesus and this fictional little girl Charlie McGee.
Both
are innocents. In fact, Jesus was pure,
and he never sinned, and he has a special place in his heart for innocent
little suffering children. “I tell you
the truth,” Jesus said in Matthew 18:3, “unless you turn from your sins and
become like little children, you will never get into the Kingdom of Heaven.”
Both
refrain from burning. Jesus is giving
the world an opportunity to repent, until his second coming. Talking about the end times using a parable
about wheat and weeds, with Satan taking on the role of an evil farmer planting
weeds among the seeds, Jesus explains, “The field is the world, the good seed
represents the people of the Kingdom.
The weeds are the people who belong to the evil one.” (Matthew 13:38). Explaining further about the fire that will
consume those who belong to Satan, Jesus says “Just as the weeds are sorted out
and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the world. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they
will remove from his Kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. And the angels will throw them into the fiery
furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Correct me if I’m wrong, but won’t the evil
people of the world see these cleansing angels in pretty much the same
horrified, pleading fashion these agents must see Charlie when she burns them alive?
Just
as with this make-believe little girl and the deceiving agents who surrounded
her, some of those who surrounded Jesus tried to disguise their true motives. “Teacher,” the Pharisees said to Jesus, “we
know how honest you are. You teach the
way of God truthfully. You are impartial
and don’t play favorites.” (Matthew 22:16)
They were attempting to flatter him with kind words before ensnaring
him, just like the agents were trying to deceive Charlie at the Manders’ farm
with their fallacious “aw shucks” charm.
But Jesus knew their evil motives.
“You hypocrites!’ he said. “Why
are you trying to trap me?” (Matthew 22:18)
“Look,
I am sending you out as a sheep among wolves,” Jesus tells his disciples in
Matthew 10:16. He also warns them,
“Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really
vicious wolves.” Yes, Jesus was
certainly aware of them, though his disciples could be deceived, just as
Charlie was fooled by Rainbird in the movie Firestarter,
based on the superb novel by Stephen King.
In fact, Jesus was always aware of everything that was going on, and
though Rainbird managed to fool Charlie, hiding from her his plan to kill her,
Jesus knew the Pharisees were plotting his death, the difference being
that it was actually all part of God’s plan for our salvation.
And
just as with Charlie having her extraordinary powers tested, verified and
measured, the Pharisees and teachers of religious law of Jesus’ day wanted him
to perform for them as well. Jesus did
many miracles during his time on earth, including healing the blind, the lame,
the deaf and dumb, and the sick, casting out demons, feeding groups of
thousands with only a few loaves of bread and a few fish, turning water into
wine, commanding the winds and waves, walking on water, and bringing the dead
to life. Yet these same Pharisees and
teachers of religious law didn’t believe these miracles. They even wanted to kill not only him, but
also Lazarus, when he brought Lazarus back from the dead. And instead of recognizing these miracles and
rejoicing when Jesus performed them, they instead took him to task for
“working” on the Sabbath, and yet after all of this, they still had the gall to
ask him, “Teacher, we want you to show us a miraculous sign to prove your authority.”
(Matthew 12:38) But Jesus replied, “Only
an evil, adulterous generation would demand a miraculous sign; but the only
sign I will give them is the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was in the belly of the great
fish for three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of
the earth for three days and three nights.” (Matthew 12:39-40). Jesus, of course, was referring to his death
on the cross for our sins and his glorious resurrection in which he triumphed
over death and the grave.
And
just as the day finally came when Charlie unleashed her full power, destroying
the evil agents and their compound, so too will there come a day when Jesus
returns to do the same thing with the evil people of this world! He’s given them time to repent and turn from
their sins and believe in him, but that time will eventually come to an
end. “For the Son of Man will come with
his angels in the glory of his Father and will judge all the people according
to their deeds.” (Matthew 16: 27). Even
Jesus does not know when this will happen, for he says, “However, no one knows
the day or hour these things will happen, not even the angels in heaven or the
Son himself. Only the Father knows.” (Matthew 24:36). However, Jesus warns that the day and hour
WILL come, so we’d better prepare for it!
“If a homeowner knew exactly when a burglar was coming, he would keep
watch and not allow his house to be broken into. You must be ready all the time, for the Son
of Man will come when least expected.”
(Matthew 24:43-44)
And
on that day, he will “separate the chaff from the wheat with his winnowing
fork. Then he will clean up the
threshing area, gathering the wheat into his barn but burning the chaff with
never-ending fire.” (Luke 3:17) And
perhaps, like Charlie, he will be sad on that day, for the ones who wouldn’t
change, and maybe he’ll even say the very same words Charlie said as she cried
and watched it all burn. “For you,
Daddy.”
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| "For you, Daddy!" |
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