'Man's Search for Happiness' goes from Temple Square to cult film

 This post was originally published at StandardNET:

Who remembers “Man’s Search for Happiness,” the 1964 LDS 13-minute film on the “plan of salvation?” That movie played constantly when I was a child and into my teens. It played at LDS visitors centers, in church, at firesides, as a missionary tool. I must have seen it 20 times.

And then it disappeared, replaced by a newer version. In the pre-Internet days, the original “Man’s Search for Happiness” became so scarce you couldn’t find it at a Deseret Industries. So, one day I was leafing through a catalog for Something Weird, a Seattle mail-order DVD and online cult film operation that traffics in everything from old 1930s melodrama to skin flicks. In the “Christian Scare Films” category at SW, Volume 14, surprise, you can buy “Man’s Search” (sic) for $10, $9.99 for an online download. Indeed, it is the old Mormon flick of my youth.

• RELATED: Watch the 1964 version of “Man’s Search for Happiness”

The catalog reads: “Man’s Search (color) actually shows us what Heaven looks like (well, actually, a glimpse of our “pre-life”) and, yup, it’s surprisingly psychedelic: lots of pretty colors and angels milling around. And this trippy, Mormon-made short shows us this pre-mortal life as a way of explaining where we came from and where we’re going in this “Earth life.” So don’t be distracted by the “Funland” amusement-park of sin (where you can zoom around on a cartoon ride, ogle women, and stare at distorted mirrors). Join the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints and keep things dull until your Spirit-Self can walk straight up to Heaven (yes, literally, we see it!) and hug lots of dead people.“

Part of me loves the irony of seeing ”Man’s Search ...“ literally go to out-of-date religious film purgatory (could you imagine what RiffTrax could do with this?) Part of me is sad to see a film I have an affection for being sold as a joke by SW. Another part of me relishes the irony of my faith’s big 1964 film, which premiered to millions at that year’s World’s fair in NYC, being sold by a ”dirty films“ seller during the same era of my faith waging a highly publicized campaign against pornography. Finally, I remain surprised that the LDS Church leadership allowed its copyright to expire so ”Man’s Search ...’ would enter the public domain. After all, it’s narrated by an apostle, Richard L. Evans. 

Or maybe it’s not in the public domain? Maybe a copy was dumped somewhere, or a print found its way into a SW buy of “old, obsolete film?” As mentioned, the LDS Church filmed a newer version in 1987 but retained Evans’ narration and the original script. Are those copyrighted? It would be amusing if SW received a “cease-and-desist” letter from LDS Church attorneys.

If you haven’t seen the 1964 version of “Man’s Search ...” in a long time, it’s easy to find. YouTube has a few copies, including a five-minute “teaser” from SW. I’ve watched it a couple times a year the past several years and was able to share it with my wife and children, who hadn’t seen it. If you grew up on this “Man’s Search For Happiness,” you’ll enjoy it. But, not surprisingly, it has become very dated. The BYU-produced film, directed by the late Disney animator Judge Whitaker, does use psychedelic screen-over colors to portray pre-mortal life, and that’s funny.

The film is very campy and unintentionally cultish. Given the many dysfunctions and sins to choose from, it’s pure camp that a mere carnival would symbolize “the evils of the world.” Viewers are advised to stay away from roller coasters, fun house mirrors, wheels of fortune and shooting galleries.

I’ve saved the most amusing camp for last, where a gaggle of men gaze hungrily at the ankles and calves of burlesque dancers dressed as modestly as Shirley MacLaine in “Can Can.” The late Russian leader Kruschev’s well-publicized objections notwithstanding, that was pretty old-fashioned “indecency” even for 1964.

The rest of the film, which involves the birth of one individual and the death of a grandfather, provides a pretty good overview of the LDS Plan of Salvation. Near the end, when grandpa walks slowly into the spirit world (SW has it wrong, he’s not in heaven) things get funny. A Facebook friend is on target when he compares the spirit world inhabitants that grandpa greets to the possessed souls in the old Brit shocker flick “Village of the Damned.”

Still, I’m glad that “Man’s Search for Happiness” lives on, whether on the Net or through a mail-order company. (The Salt Lake Tribune mentioned this post soon after its original posting in 2011.)

--- Doug Gibson

Mormon Doctrine enjoyed a long, controversial history

This article was originally published at StandardBlogs in 2010.

“Mormon Doctrine” is finally going out of print. The late apostle Bruce R. McConkie’s interpretation of LDS theology was a common sight in the homes of active Mormons for decades. Even today, it’s often seen in the homes of older Mormons. In fact, it will likely be decades before the book becomes difficult to find in used bookstores or ebay, etc.

Peggy Fletcher Stack of the Salt Lake Tribune wrote an excellent article about the “popular but polarizing” “Mormon Doctrine.” McConkie’s book was written as an authoritative index of beliefs, but in truth it caused much controversy; in fact as much from outside critics as within the hierarchy of the Mormon Church. The first edition of “Mormon Doctrine” — and a copy of that must be considered rare — prompted the LDS leadership to propose more than 1,000 changes. Eventually, in the early 1960s, McConkie revised “Mormon Doctrine” and it was re-published with the clear idea that it was just McConkie’s opinion.

Nevertheless, as an active Mormon who grew up in the 1960s, 70s and early 80s, I can attest that the many times I or others had a dispute on theology, “Mormon Doctrine” was the first place we went to check and see who was “right.”

According to Fletcher Stack’s article, a key problem with the first edition was severe attacks on the Roman Catholic Church. Later problems with the book were its content regarding blacks. In early editions, McConkie had stated a reversal of denying the priesthood to blacks would never occur. And “even in the most recent edition … McConkie wrote that God cursed Cain with ‘a mark of dark skin, and he became the ancestor of the black race,’” writes Fletcher Stack.

In recent years, the Mormon Church has become public relations conscious. Although McConkie is regarded as a beloved late apostle, — his last public address, as he was dying, has been sold for years and he wrote chapter headings in LDS scripture — once-popular books such as “Mormon Doctrine” are being phased out, particularly those that say politically incorrect things about blacks.

The recent battle over Proposition 8 in California has made the need for a more enlightened church more necessary. This is a simple reality, and it is not meant to imply that official church doctrines are changing today, only that a softer stick is preferred and more care has been taken between what the church believes and what one man’s specific opinions are.

“Mormon Doctrine” was to many 20th century Mormons what Parley P. Pratt’s “The Key to Science of Theology” was to late 19th century Mormons, a book on many coffee tables. No doubt another LDS book will one day rise in this century and enjoy decades of influence.

-- Doug Gibson

Frank J. Cannon a thorn in Mormonism's side 100-plus years ago

Frank J. Cannon, son of the LDS leader, George Q. Cannon, Mormonism’s most famous apostate, led the Salt Lake Tribune’s editorial assault on the LDS Church, Sen. Reed Smoot, and particularly President Joseph F. Smith from the years 1904 to 1907.

Historians Michael Harold Paulos and Kenneth L. Cannon II have done a great job preserving Cannon’s contributions. Even those Latter-day Saints who agree with his most fervent critics should acknowledge FJC’s many contributions to LDS history.

He was more than a writer and editor. FJC was a paradox: An educated, accomplished advocate and diplomat, editor and founder at the Ogden Standard, missionary to the Sandwich Islands, LDS Church authorities utilized his many talents to negotiate statehood for Utah. Later, FJC served as the Utah territory’s U.S. senator.

However, FJC also was a man of many personal weaknesses. His vices included drinking and patronizing brothels. These weaknesses in following LDS Church laws were tolerated, or at least partially forgiven, while his dad, George Q. Cannon lived. But after his father died, FJC saw his influence within the church’s hierarchy wane quickly. The result was an antipathy toward his longtime faith’s leaders that would last the rest of his life. In fact, his anger, while always eloquent, would sometimes be so over the top as to backfire and generate sympathy for his targets.

FJC’s editorials during the Smoot hearings, between 1904 and 1907, are masterful polemics, designed to amuse, humiliate, sneer, attack, moralize and infuriate LDS Church supporters. One who was very often infuriated was then-LDS Prophet Joseph F. Smith, who not surprisingly, seethed at the savage pen of FJC, which accused the LDS leader of being a traitor to the United States, a traitor to the original LDS Church, a dictator in Utah, and an unrepentant polygamist. In public, Smith mostly avoided mentioning FJC. In private, he called him many names, including a “son of Perdition,” which is an LDS term for those consigned to hell.

Besides attacking Senator Smoot, FJC also enjoyed taunting Deseret News editor — and LDS apostle — Charles W. Penrose, as a toady for the LDS Church. An example: “Probably the only person in Utah who doesn’t know the Mormon Church is in politics up to its very eyebrows, is Apostle [Charles W.] Penrose, of the Deseret News. The Church has to keep things secret from Penrose. He is a new apostle, and, like President Smith blats out everything he knows. … Penrose ought to wash windows. He takes to soapsuds.”

But FJC saved his harshest criticism for the prophet. He mocked the LDS leader’s claim on Capitol Hill that he had never received revelation and later called him “God’s Appointed Liar” after Smith justified his testimony to many perplexed Latter-day Saints as a way to avoid being trapped by hostile questioners. For example, FJC editorialized: “Gentiles and Mormons, you are front to front with the proposition. Either you must accept Joseph F. Smith as the prophet of God, ordained to speak falsehoods or truth at his pleasure, ratified by God as a liar or a truth teller to meet the prophet’s needs; or, you must consider him a false, deceiving, lying, hypocritical old man, who clings to his power with selfish hands, and who fain would live out the balance of his life with his five wives …”

Why FJC hated Joseph F. Smith so fiercely is still debated by historians. FJC’s father, George Q. Cannon, whom Frank loved, had a long in-depth business relationship with the prophet. Historians opine that JC may have blamed President Smith for cutting him off from the church’s hierarchy after his dad’s death.

I favor the theory that FJC blamed President Smith for the death of his brother, apostle Abraham H. Cannon, who died in the mid-1890s shortly after marrying another wife, years after polygamy was abolished. In FJC’s opinion, stress from the secret marriage harmed his brother’s health.

Cannon was excommunicated by the LDS Church long before the Smoot hearings concluded. His barbed editorials continued until Smoot was eventually cleared by the U.S. Senate. Soon afterwards, Cannon left Salt Lake City and worked at the Post and the Rocky Mountain News.

His sabbatical as an anti-Mormon crusader would resume soon, and “Round 2″ would continue for a generation, both as author of a best-selling “expose” on Mormonism and his longstanding gig at chautauquas, a series of lectures, dances, debates, plays and music offerings then popular across the country that Paulos and Cannon describe as the forefront to modern adult education. At one chautauqua event where Cannon lectured, he was confronted by a group of outraged LDS priesthood holders.  (To read more about FJC's editorials, read this Journal of Mormon History article by Paulos).

-- Doug Gibson

This essay was originally published at StandardBlogs.