Plot
Eli, also known as the Walker, is traveling west looking for a resting place for his book. The Catch? It's a post-apocalyptic America where gangs are roaming the streets looking for a special book. In other words, Mad Max with a library card.
Central Conflict
Good versus Evil, Baby. The setup for this conflict is straight out of an old western. Eli, as the lone wolf, stumbles into a small isolated town that is run by the archetype oppressive robber baron of the old westerns played by Gary Oldman. Ironically named Carnegie, Gary Oldman, wants this book that Eli is traveling with and he wants it bad. He's willing to sacrifice everything to capture this book because he believes it will be the cornerstone for controlling the new world forming in this post-apocalypse. What comes out of this desire to possess the book is the classic confrontation of Good versus Evil. Eli believes that the book has a benevolent future of helping mankind heal while Carnegie believes it's a weapon he can use to control the masses. The conflict over the book and it's power introduces this social commentary on religion but it quickly gets lost amongst the hand to hand combat sequences. And what we're left with is an action movie with a mixed message do unto your brother before they do it to you? But never fear, the conflict does sort of get resolved. Good sort of triumphs over evil in this case but who really wins in post-apocalyptic America?
Influences and flaws
As I mentioned previously, the setup of this movie borrows heavily from the western archetype. And it has obvious influences from the dozen or so apocalyptic movies that have come before it such as Mad Max. But one other obvious influence is the series of samurai movies made about the character Zatoichi. If you are unfamiliar with Zatoichi, he is a seemingly harmless blind man that wanders the country side in Feudal Japan with his trusty cane. When he encounters a conflict, a samurai sword emerges from his cane and he would take care of business Daredevil style. There was an American version of this film made called Blind Fury with Rutger Hauer.
Are you not entertained?
The movie has great action sequences but not much else. When you have Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman on the marquee, expectations run high but unfortunately those expectations aren't completely realized since they're really not give much to work with. The story seemed way to contrived and cliche. The twist at the end was interesting but not authentic enough to elevate this movie. They tried to go "Six Sense" with a twist at the end but by then I didn't care.
Odds and Ends
Frances de la Tour and Michael Gambon, who star as an old couple in Eli, starred together in the Harry Potter movies. Malcolm McDowell, Jennifer Beals and Tom Waits also star in the movie.
If you're interested in this movie, you should also check out ...
Zatoichi
Blind Fury
Mad Max
Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior
The Road
Open Range
A Fistful of Dollars
Pale Rider
Daredevil
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Friday, January 15, 2010
Favorite Movies from the last decade
I picked these movies first and foremost because they were entertaining films but also because I related to them on a personal level or they've stayed with me because I think of them often. Also I left out the trinity of trilogies to save space: LOTR, Matrix and Star Wars.
Up (2009)
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
District 9 (2009)
Star Trek (2009)
The Hangover (2009)
Up in the Air (2009)
Avatar (2009)
Where the Wild Things Are (2009)
Zombieland (2009)
It Might Get Loud (2009)
The Hurt Locker (2009)
Public Enemies (2009)
Whatever Works (2009)
Gran Torino (2008)
Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
Kung Fu Panda (2008)
Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008)
Ghost Town (2008)
RockNRolla (2008)
Frost/Nixon (2008)
Doubt (2008)
Yes Man (2008)
Iron Man (2008)
Red Belt (2008)
No Country for Old Men (2007)
There Will Be Blood (2007)
The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)
Zodiac (2007)
Darjeeling Limited (2007)
Michael Clayton (2007)
Little Miss Sunshine (2007)
Stranger than Fiction (2007)
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007)
Once (2007)
Children of Men (2007)
300 (2007)
Reign Over Me (2007)
Knocked Up (2007)
Walk Hard (2007)
The Prestige (2006)
The Lives of Others (2006)
The Departed (2006) - the original, Infernal Affairs, is also worth watching
Nacho Libre (2006)
Casino Royale (2006)
Lord of War (2005)
Syriana (2005)
Batman Begins (2005)
Serenity (2005)
Sin City (2005)
Kung Fu Hustle (2005)
Kingdom of Heaven (2005)
Wedding Crasher (2005)
40 Year Old Virgin (2005)
Constant Gardener (2005)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Terminal (2004)
Collateral (2004)
The Incredibles (2004)
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
I Heart Huckabees (2004)
Sideways (2004)
Dear Frankie (2004) - Scottish Indie movie with a heart
Spartan (2004)
Anchorman (2004)
Borne Supremacy (2004)
Team America (2004)
Pirates of the Caribbean (2003)
Oldboy (2003) - very dark, sadistic movie being remade by will smith
Seabiscuit (2003)
Open Range (2003) - Great modern old school Western
Swimming Pool (2003)
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 & 2 (2003)
Lost in Translation (2003)
Second Hand Lions (2003)
Elf (2003)
Master and Commander (2003) Movie I most wish would have been a franchise
Last Samurai (2003)
I Am David (2003)
About a Boy (2002)
Minority Report (2002)
Gangs of New York (2002)
Spiderman (2002)
Amelie (2001)
Gosford Park (2001)
Seredipity (2001)
Training Day (2001)
Spy Game (2001)
Donnie Darko (2001)
Iron Monkey (2001)
From Hell (2001)
High Fidelity (2001)
Ali (2001) Favorite Bio Pic of the oughts
Finding Forrester (2000)
Snatch (2000)
Almost Famous (2000)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)
Gladiator (2000)
Up (2009)
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
District 9 (2009)
Star Trek (2009)
The Hangover (2009)
Up in the Air (2009)
Avatar (2009)
Where the Wild Things Are (2009)
Zombieland (2009)
It Might Get Loud (2009)
The Hurt Locker (2009)
Public Enemies (2009)
Whatever Works (2009)
Gran Torino (2008)
Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
Kung Fu Panda (2008)
Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008)
Ghost Town (2008)
RockNRolla (2008)
Frost/Nixon (2008)
Doubt (2008)
Yes Man (2008)
Iron Man (2008)
Red Belt (2008)
No Country for Old Men (2007)
There Will Be Blood (2007)
The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)
Zodiac (2007)
Darjeeling Limited (2007)
Michael Clayton (2007)
Little Miss Sunshine (2007)
Stranger than Fiction (2007)
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007)
Once (2007)
Children of Men (2007)
300 (2007)
Reign Over Me (2007)
Knocked Up (2007)
Walk Hard (2007)
The Prestige (2006)
The Lives of Others (2006)
The Departed (2006) - the original, Infernal Affairs, is also worth watching
Nacho Libre (2006)
Casino Royale (2006)
Lord of War (2005)
Syriana (2005)
Batman Begins (2005)
Serenity (2005)
Sin City (2005)
Kung Fu Hustle (2005)
Kingdom of Heaven (2005)
Wedding Crasher (2005)
40 Year Old Virgin (2005)
Constant Gardener (2005)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Terminal (2004)
Collateral (2004)
The Incredibles (2004)
Shaun of the Dead (2004)
I Heart Huckabees (2004)
Sideways (2004)
Dear Frankie (2004) - Scottish Indie movie with a heart
Spartan (2004)
Anchorman (2004)
Borne Supremacy (2004)
Team America (2004)
Pirates of the Caribbean (2003)
Oldboy (2003) - very dark, sadistic movie being remade by will smith
Seabiscuit (2003)
Open Range (2003) - Great modern old school Western
Swimming Pool (2003)
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 & 2 (2003)
Lost in Translation (2003)
Second Hand Lions (2003)
Elf (2003)
Master and Commander (2003) Movie I most wish would have been a franchise
Last Samurai (2003)
I Am David (2003)
About a Boy (2002)
Minority Report (2002)
Gangs of New York (2002)
Spiderman (2002)
Amelie (2001)
Gosford Park (2001)
Seredipity (2001)
Training Day (2001)
Spy Game (2001)
Donnie Darko (2001)
Iron Monkey (2001)
From Hell (2001)
High Fidelity (2001)
Ali (2001) Favorite Bio Pic of the oughts
Finding Forrester (2000)
Snatch (2000)
Almost Famous (2000)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)
Gladiator (2000)
Favorite Movies from 2009
In no particular order ...
Up
Inglourious Basterds
District 9
Star Trek
Up in the Air
The Hangover
Avatar
Where the Wild Things Are
Zombieland
It Might Get Loud
The Hurt Locker
Public Enemies
Whatever Works
Up
Inglourious Basterds
District 9
Star Trek
Up in the Air
The Hangover
Avatar
Where the Wild Things Are
Zombieland
It Might Get Loud
The Hurt Locker
Public Enemies
Whatever Works
Dreamland
Plot
The story centers on a young girl named Audrey that lives in a trailer park in the New Mexico desert. We soon learn that her best friend Calista, also from the trailer park, has succumbing to the symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis and that her father can't leave the grounds of the trailer park because he's so emotionally crippled by the death of his wife, our protagonist's mother. Enter stage left ... Justin Long, now and forever known as the Apple guy, stumbles upon their trailer park on his way to a basketball tryout at UNLV.
Central Conflict
Audrey is a girl destined for greatness who hides her fear of failure in the stoic duties of taking care of her emotionally crippled father and her friend Calista who’s diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. As Justin Long’s Character, Mookie, starts to gravitate towards Calista, we see Audrey start to project her dreams and desires of leaving the trailer park behind onto him. The friendship between Audrey and Calista unravels as the two girls fight for his affection. And in the end, you really don't care who ends up with him.
This movie drowns in what I'll refer to as the "victim mentality." The lead character blames her dead mother, her father, her friends and her trailer park for not being able to move on with her life. And instead of doing what she already knows is the best thing for her to do, she allows herself to be paralyzed by her self pity. It takes Justin Long to come along and give her something she had all along ... self respect.
This movie is just too contrived, clichéd, unoriginal and has been done before in better movies such as Bodies, Rest & Motion and Gas, Food Lodging. Also, it's as if the script was written by Debbie Downer ... "I want to be Miss America but I have MS" ... queue the Wah-Wah trumpets.
Characters
Justin Long cast as an undiscovered basketball prodigy living in the desert? Really? Soccer maybe but not basketball. Kelli Garner cast as the second fiddle in a trailer park that only contains two girls? Really? Was the casting director blind? Gina Gershon's part consists of us watching her unpack Justin Long's crap? Really? Central Casting! I need a super hot actress in her late thirties to early fourties that can unpack the back of a truck? Horrible casting but I blame the script more than the cast for this epic failure.
"Are you not entertained?"
Did I mention that Gina Gershon has two lines in this movie?
I'll have to add a new category to describe this movie: EPIC FAIL
The story centers on a young girl named Audrey that lives in a trailer park in the New Mexico desert. We soon learn that her best friend Calista, also from the trailer park, has succumbing to the symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis and that her father can't leave the grounds of the trailer park because he's so emotionally crippled by the death of his wife, our protagonist's mother. Enter stage left ... Justin Long, now and forever known as the Apple guy, stumbles upon their trailer park on his way to a basketball tryout at UNLV.
Central Conflict
Audrey is a girl destined for greatness who hides her fear of failure in the stoic duties of taking care of her emotionally crippled father and her friend Calista who’s diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. As Justin Long’s Character, Mookie, starts to gravitate towards Calista, we see Audrey start to project her dreams and desires of leaving the trailer park behind onto him. The friendship between Audrey and Calista unravels as the two girls fight for his affection. And in the end, you really don't care who ends up with him.
This movie drowns in what I'll refer to as the "victim mentality." The lead character blames her dead mother, her father, her friends and her trailer park for not being able to move on with her life. And instead of doing what she already knows is the best thing for her to do, she allows herself to be paralyzed by her self pity. It takes Justin Long to come along and give her something she had all along ... self respect.
This movie is just too contrived, clichéd, unoriginal and has been done before in better movies such as Bodies, Rest & Motion and Gas, Food Lodging. Also, it's as if the script was written by Debbie Downer ... "I want to be Miss America but I have MS" ... queue the Wah-Wah trumpets.
Characters
Justin Long cast as an undiscovered basketball prodigy living in the desert? Really? Soccer maybe but not basketball. Kelli Garner cast as the second fiddle in a trailer park that only contains two girls? Really? Was the casting director blind? Gina Gershon's part consists of us watching her unpack Justin Long's crap? Really? Central Casting! I need a super hot actress in her late thirties to early fourties that can unpack the back of a truck? Horrible casting but I blame the script more than the cast for this epic failure.
"Are you not entertained?"
Did I mention that Gina Gershon has two lines in this movie?
I'll have to add a new category to describe this movie: EPIC FAIL
Terminator Salvation ... Meh
Plot
The year is 2018. Judgment day has come and gone leaving humanity in the hands of a few, scattered resistance fighters. Various terminator models roam the post-apocalyptic wasteland either killing or harvesting humans all under the direction of a faceless, computer enemy known as Skynet. And the salvation of the human race rests in the hands of one man ... John Connor.
This of course is the fourth film in the Terminator series and the first to not feature Arnold ... sort of. If the first movie was about saving Sarah Connor, and the second movie was about saving John Connor, this installment seems to be about saving Kyle Reese. This is where the holes in the story begin with me. How does Skynet know about the relationship between Kyle Reese and John Connor? I can understand that they know about John Connor from his FDR style fireside chats over the radio as the leader of the resistance. But how would they know about his relationship with Kyle Reese? Kyle Reese and the T-800 are sent back in time in the year 2029 and yet this is only 2018.
Central Conflict
Man versus Machine. The idea that somehow the best in us can become the worst. That by advancing our technology we're losing our humanity. Whoa, I just went way too deep. This movie stays in the shallow end philosophically so let's back up a bit. Man versus machine. In this corner … Machine want man dead ... and in this corner, Man want machine dead ... And Go. Unfortunately, this plays out more as a guilty pleasure movie than a canonical extension of the James Cameron Terminator series.
In the first Terminator movie Kyle Reese assesses the conflict between man and machine in the following quote, "That terminator is out there. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead." That context helps build the tension in the first 2 movies. Whereas the conflict in this installment is full of less tension because it seems Skynet is content to leave the resistance to its own devices while it’s busy in the lab working on schemes. There are no scenes like in the first movie where we see terminators infiltrating resistance camps. That would have been cool. Interesting side note, Arnold’s workout buddy Franco Columbo plays the terminator infiltrator that shoots up the resistance camp in Kyle Reese’s flash back sequence in the first terminator movie.
Influences and flaws
MCG cites such movies as Black Hawk Down, Children of Men, and Road Warrior as influences for this movie. In reality, this movie plays out more like a thinly veiled rip off of those movies while managing to never come close to catching the authenticity or originality of any of those movies.
That's probably my biggest complaint about this movie is that there’s nothing original about it at all. It's just a rehash of old clichés. Why there's even the cliché post-apocalyptic child, same archetype child as found in the Road Warrior, old Star Trek reruns (Bop!), or Aliens. I half expected her to say ... "The Terminators mostly come out at night, mostly." The 60 foot tall harvesters are right out of the movie War of the Worlds. Even the sounds they make are exactly the same as Spielberg’s alien harvesters in War of the Worlds. The air battles in the canyons are played out. The terminator motorcycles are straight out of Road Warrior and in fact the entire high way sequence is straight out of road warrior. The acceptance of Terminators as allies and even mentors for young would be resistance leaders (in this case, Kyle Reese) and not just enemies was already introduced in T2. The final sequences take place at an industrial plant and plays out exactly like the ending of T2. cough, cough, HACK! All the call backs to the original material in the form of "i'll be back" and "Come with me if you want to live" feel cheesy instead of inciting nerd nirvana like the call backs did in the recent Star Trek movie.
Maybe my problem is that I've seen too many movies and my expectations are set a little high. Or maybe MCG is a hack and this movie should have been held to a higher standard. Nevertheless it feels like they're just cashing in on the Terminator name.
Other franchises have been successfully rebooted such as Hulk, Batman and James Bond. I think in those cases, the source material needed a bit of freshness to appeal to modern audiences. This attempt at rebooting falls flat and lacks the fresh approach necessary to over shadow the source material. James Cameron casts a giant shadow. This movie plays out more like a made for TV sci-fi channel attempt at capitalizing on the franchise name instead of a true reboot of the franchise. Being a fan of the series, it was fun to see the T-600 walking around like zombies ineptly attempting to kill humans. But beyond serving up more endoskeleton murder machines walking around with "crush, kill, destroy" on their little tiny robot brains, this movie doesn't offer much.
Characters
A bright spot among the acting was new comer Sam Worthington who plays Marcus Wright. We find out that Marcus Wright is a prototype cyborg used by Cyberdyne systems to infiltrate the human resistance. That is something I would have preferred to find out in the middle of the movie when it's revealed rather than in the TRAILER!!!!!!! Because really that's the only twist in this movie. Other bright spots are Moon Bloodgood who plays a fighter in the resistance and Anton Yelchin who plays Kyle Reese. All the other performances, including Christian Bale who seems to be phoning this one in with his Batman voice, fall flat.
"Are you not entertained?"
A very qualified yes. If I had to quantify it, I'd say this movie gets 3 out of 5 stars. At least that's what I'll give it on Netflix. It's not so much that I dislike this movie as I think it's forgettable. Really, once you've seen this movie, there won't be any scenes that you'll be talking about with your friends afterwards.
Therefore this movie gets a ... Meh.
Rating System:
W00t ... Victory
Meh ... Indifference
Blah ... extremely boring
If you're interested in this movie, you should also check out ...
The Terminator
Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines
Black Hawk Down
Children of Men
Mad Max 2
Transformers
War of the Worlds
Westworld
Futureworld
The year is 2018. Judgment day has come and gone leaving humanity in the hands of a few, scattered resistance fighters. Various terminator models roam the post-apocalyptic wasteland either killing or harvesting humans all under the direction of a faceless, computer enemy known as Skynet. And the salvation of the human race rests in the hands of one man ... John Connor.
This of course is the fourth film in the Terminator series and the first to not feature Arnold ... sort of. If the first movie was about saving Sarah Connor, and the second movie was about saving John Connor, this installment seems to be about saving Kyle Reese. This is where the holes in the story begin with me. How does Skynet know about the relationship between Kyle Reese and John Connor? I can understand that they know about John Connor from his FDR style fireside chats over the radio as the leader of the resistance. But how would they know about his relationship with Kyle Reese? Kyle Reese and the T-800 are sent back in time in the year 2029 and yet this is only 2018.
Central Conflict
Man versus Machine. The idea that somehow the best in us can become the worst. That by advancing our technology we're losing our humanity. Whoa, I just went way too deep. This movie stays in the shallow end philosophically so let's back up a bit. Man versus machine. In this corner … Machine want man dead ... and in this corner, Man want machine dead ... And Go. Unfortunately, this plays out more as a guilty pleasure movie than a canonical extension of the James Cameron Terminator series.
In the first Terminator movie Kyle Reese assesses the conflict between man and machine in the following quote, "That terminator is out there. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead." That context helps build the tension in the first 2 movies. Whereas the conflict in this installment is full of less tension because it seems Skynet is content to leave the resistance to its own devices while it’s busy in the lab working on schemes. There are no scenes like in the first movie where we see terminators infiltrating resistance camps. That would have been cool. Interesting side note, Arnold’s workout buddy Franco Columbo plays the terminator infiltrator that shoots up the resistance camp in Kyle Reese’s flash back sequence in the first terminator movie.
Influences and flaws
MCG cites such movies as Black Hawk Down, Children of Men, and Road Warrior as influences for this movie. In reality, this movie plays out more like a thinly veiled rip off of those movies while managing to never come close to catching the authenticity or originality of any of those movies.
That's probably my biggest complaint about this movie is that there’s nothing original about it at all. It's just a rehash of old clichés. Why there's even the cliché post-apocalyptic child, same archetype child as found in the Road Warrior, old Star Trek reruns (Bop!), or Aliens. I half expected her to say ... "The Terminators mostly come out at night, mostly." The 60 foot tall harvesters are right out of the movie War of the Worlds. Even the sounds they make are exactly the same as Spielberg’s alien harvesters in War of the Worlds. The air battles in the canyons are played out. The terminator motorcycles are straight out of Road Warrior and in fact the entire high way sequence is straight out of road warrior. The acceptance of Terminators as allies and even mentors for young would be resistance leaders (in this case, Kyle Reese) and not just enemies was already introduced in T2. The final sequences take place at an industrial plant and plays out exactly like the ending of T2. cough, cough, HACK! All the call backs to the original material in the form of "i'll be back" and "Come with me if you want to live" feel cheesy instead of inciting nerd nirvana like the call backs did in the recent Star Trek movie.
Maybe my problem is that I've seen too many movies and my expectations are set a little high. Or maybe MCG is a hack and this movie should have been held to a higher standard. Nevertheless it feels like they're just cashing in on the Terminator name.
Other franchises have been successfully rebooted such as Hulk, Batman and James Bond. I think in those cases, the source material needed a bit of freshness to appeal to modern audiences. This attempt at rebooting falls flat and lacks the fresh approach necessary to over shadow the source material. James Cameron casts a giant shadow. This movie plays out more like a made for TV sci-fi channel attempt at capitalizing on the franchise name instead of a true reboot of the franchise. Being a fan of the series, it was fun to see the T-600 walking around like zombies ineptly attempting to kill humans. But beyond serving up more endoskeleton murder machines walking around with "crush, kill, destroy" on their little tiny robot brains, this movie doesn't offer much.
Characters
A bright spot among the acting was new comer Sam Worthington who plays Marcus Wright. We find out that Marcus Wright is a prototype cyborg used by Cyberdyne systems to infiltrate the human resistance. That is something I would have preferred to find out in the middle of the movie when it's revealed rather than in the TRAILER!!!!!!! Because really that's the only twist in this movie. Other bright spots are Moon Bloodgood who plays a fighter in the resistance and Anton Yelchin who plays Kyle Reese. All the other performances, including Christian Bale who seems to be phoning this one in with his Batman voice, fall flat.
"Are you not entertained?"
A very qualified yes. If I had to quantify it, I'd say this movie gets 3 out of 5 stars. At least that's what I'll give it on Netflix. It's not so much that I dislike this movie as I think it's forgettable. Really, once you've seen this movie, there won't be any scenes that you'll be talking about with your friends afterwards.
Therefore this movie gets a ... Meh.
Rating System:
W00t ... Victory
Meh ... Indifference
Blah ... extremely boring
If you're interested in this movie, you should also check out ...
The Terminator
Terminator 2: Judgment Day
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines
Black Hawk Down
Children of Men
Mad Max 2
Transformers
War of the Worlds
Westworld
Futureworld
Angels & Demons
Plot
Based on the best selling novel by author Dan Brown, Angels & Demons is a popcorn thriller about a symbologist professor named Robert Langdon, played by Tom Hanks, being summoned to the Vatican to assist in foiling a diabolical plot against the church and its cardinals. The pope has died and 4 cardinals are kidnapped before the start of the ceremony to elect a new pope. A cryptic note is sent to the Vatican police that details the intentions of the Illuminati to kill the 4 cardinals and blow up Vatican City. Robert Langdon must decipher the clues and, in a sense, save the church. Along for the ride this time is beautiful and mysterious scientist Dr. Vittoria Vetra played by Ayelet Zurer. Together the two set out on a frantic hunt to find the Path to Illumination. The story is full of church intrigue, power struggles, and violence from within and without the Vatican.
Central Conflict
One of the themes at the center of this movie is science versus religion. More specifically who owns the moment of creation? CERN, the European Center for Nuclear Research, is on the eve of proving the God Particle exists that created life in the universe from the collision of matter and anti-matter. The Illuminati choose this as the time to strike back at the Catholic church in an act of vengeance for a previous incident against the Illuminati refered to as La Purga where 4 members of the Illuminati were branded in the chest with crosses and burned at the stake.
"Are you not Entertained?"
The verdict is Guilty. I was entertained. In a recent Colbert Report interview Ron Howard stated "The thing that Dan Brown does so well in his novels is he collects all these fringe theories and conspiracy theories, old and new, and combines them in these works of fiction and yet he puts enough verifiable history in there so that it stimulates your imagination and your curiosity while it entertains you." Ron Howard so succinctly encapsulates why this movie and others like it such as the National Treasure are so successful.
Does this movie solve the issue between religion and science?
No, but I think it sheds enough light on the subject to spark some interesting conversations that just might make people finally realize that religion and science are not inherently at odds with each other.
Odds and Ends
Read about the Vatican review of the movie
If you're interested in this movie, you should also check out ...
National Treasure
National Treasure: Book of Secrets
The Third Miracle
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed
and of course ...
The Da Vinci Code
Based on the best selling novel by author Dan Brown, Angels & Demons is a popcorn thriller about a symbologist professor named Robert Langdon, played by Tom Hanks, being summoned to the Vatican to assist in foiling a diabolical plot against the church and its cardinals. The pope has died and 4 cardinals are kidnapped before the start of the ceremony to elect a new pope. A cryptic note is sent to the Vatican police that details the intentions of the Illuminati to kill the 4 cardinals and blow up Vatican City. Robert Langdon must decipher the clues and, in a sense, save the church. Along for the ride this time is beautiful and mysterious scientist Dr. Vittoria Vetra played by Ayelet Zurer. Together the two set out on a frantic hunt to find the Path to Illumination. The story is full of church intrigue, power struggles, and violence from within and without the Vatican.
Central Conflict
One of the themes at the center of this movie is science versus religion. More specifically who owns the moment of creation? CERN, the European Center for Nuclear Research, is on the eve of proving the God Particle exists that created life in the universe from the collision of matter and anti-matter. The Illuminati choose this as the time to strike back at the Catholic church in an act of vengeance for a previous incident against the Illuminati refered to as La Purga where 4 members of the Illuminati were branded in the chest with crosses and burned at the stake.
"Are you not Entertained?"
The verdict is Guilty. I was entertained. In a recent Colbert Report interview Ron Howard stated "The thing that Dan Brown does so well in his novels is he collects all these fringe theories and conspiracy theories, old and new, and combines them in these works of fiction and yet he puts enough verifiable history in there so that it stimulates your imagination and your curiosity while it entertains you." Ron Howard so succinctly encapsulates why this movie and others like it such as the National Treasure are so successful.
Does this movie solve the issue between religion and science?
No, but I think it sheds enough light on the subject to spark some interesting conversations that just might make people finally realize that religion and science are not inherently at odds with each other.
Odds and Ends
Read about the Vatican review of the movie
If you're interested in this movie, you should also check out ...
National Treasure
National Treasure: Book of Secrets
The Third Miracle
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed
and of course ...
The Da Vinci Code
Religulous
Religulous is funny. But of course, that's its main intent: to entertain. In the style of Borat, Bill Maher films himself in a series of interludes where he makes simple people of faith look foolish by asking all the right questions about serious religious issues that are at the core of faith. Questions such as why are there so many different world religions, creationism versus evolution, is the earth only 6,000 years old, what's the deal with transubstantiation, what's the deal with the trinity, and so on. All valid questions that everyone has probably answered for themselves after a late night dorm room discussion while on the journey of forming their world view.
The only problem is I don't think Bill Maher was looking for the answers or even looking for a level playing field on which to debate the questions. The goal here is to strictly to entertain rather than educate. And that's where this movie falls short. Bill Maher's political debates on his show "Real Time" are, for the most part, well represented by conservatives and liberals alike so as to have a fair and balanced debate of the political issues of the day. In contrast, Religulous is more like the Christians being fed to the lions than a fair and balanced discussion on faith.
"Are you not Entertained?"
I have to say I was. Dispite my beliefs differing from Bill Maher, I found the movie very funny. But I have a sick sense of humor.
The movie fails to resonate any truth since the discussion was pretty one sided. In other words, this was a religious version of Jay Leno's Jay walking where you ask simple questions to stupid people to get a laugh at their expense.
If you are really interested in listening to educated people discuss this type of material than I suggest the PBS special entitled
The Question of God: Sigmund Freud & C.S. Lewis
If you're interested in this movie, you should also check out ...
Borat
The Question of God: Sigmund Freud & C.S. Lewis
The only problem is I don't think Bill Maher was looking for the answers or even looking for a level playing field on which to debate the questions. The goal here is to strictly to entertain rather than educate. And that's where this movie falls short. Bill Maher's political debates on his show "Real Time" are, for the most part, well represented by conservatives and liberals alike so as to have a fair and balanced debate of the political issues of the day. In contrast, Religulous is more like the Christians being fed to the lions than a fair and balanced discussion on faith.
"Are you not Entertained?"
I have to say I was. Dispite my beliefs differing from Bill Maher, I found the movie very funny. But I have a sick sense of humor.
The movie fails to resonate any truth since the discussion was pretty one sided. In other words, this was a religious version of Jay Leno's Jay walking where you ask simple questions to stupid people to get a laugh at their expense.
If you are really interested in listening to educated people discuss this type of material than I suggest the PBS special entitled
The Question of God: Sigmund Freud & C.S. Lewis
If you're interested in this movie, you should also check out ...
Borat
The Question of God: Sigmund Freud & C.S. Lewis
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