WS Chronicle

Two Greensboro College professors have had essays included in a new book on how movies interpret the Bible.

W. Barnes Tatum, Jefferson Pilot Emeritus Professor of Religion and Philosophy, contributed an analysis of Franco Zeffirelli’s 1977 six-hour mini-series, “Jesus of Nazareth.”

Rhonda Burnette-Bletsch, Lucy H. Robertson Professor of Religion, contributed analyses of Stanley Kubrick’s film “2001: A Space Odyssey,” produced in 1968, and Ridley Scott’s film “Blade Runner,” produced in 1982.

Their work is part of “Bible and Cinema: Fifty Key Films,” edited by Adele Reinhartz and published in the U.S. and the U.K. by Routledge.

Both Tatum and Burnette-Bletsch participate in the Religion and Film Section of the Society of Biblical Literature. Burnette-Bletsch also serves as a film editor of the emerging “Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception,” whose first volume was published in 2005 by DeGruyter.

Tatum recently published the third edition of his book “Jesus at the Movies: A Guide to the First Hundred Years and Beyond.”

Tatum assumed emeritus status in 2009 after having joined the faculty in 1973. He holds an A.B. from Birmingham-Southern College; an M.L.S. from the University of Saint Andrews; a B.D. from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro; and a Ph.D. from Duke University. Burnette-Bletsch, who joined the faculty in 1997, holds a B.S. and a Ph.D. from Duke University.