I just got back from seeing religious with some friends. They all had great opinions on the film, but I want to hear more. But to be honest with you I’m sick of ranty rambling reviews. So I’m challenging everyone to keep their review to 100 words or less.
Please respond to this video with one of your own, or write a response in the comments below.
Here’s my 100 word review:
Religulous
Religulous is funny. The first hour-and-a-half of the film has hilariously awkward moments, slick one-liners, smarmy subtitles, constant laughs. But the ending isn’t great. (Bill) Maher spends so much time humorously “promoting doubt,” that in the end when he calls all the anti-religious to stand and be heard it falls flat. You can’t use a suicide bombing clip for a laugh and then try to use another for a doom-and-gloom call to action. It doesn’t work. Religulous will offend some. Others will gain that ember of doubt that can change a person into a fiery skeptic.
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on Oct 12th, 2008 at 10:00 pm
I agree with you, Brandon, that the end of Religulous represented a sudden shift from ridicule to warning. We should be scared, of course, but the majority of the movie was spent laughing at unfounded beliefs and gullible people, not focusing specifically on the fact that when people take seriously/literally an old story with God-endorsed violence/hatred/persecution in it, they are opening that intellectual hole that can lead to horrendous violence/hatred/persecution toward others (or, as Maher said, the potential end of earth). I think it could have been a powerful ending if the proper case had been made beforehand.
Nevertheless, I recognize that the genre probably doesn’t lend itself to building a particularly strong intellectual case. There were several times when I wanted Maher to back up his objections (e.g., explain how we know that the gospels weren’t written by eyewitnesses), but I don’t think that type of movie would have appealed to as large an audience. People in the theatre just wanted to laugh and, for the most part, they got it…which isn’t particularly bad. It was fun, and laughing is a good way to get people to question ridiculous beliefs….
on Oct 13th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Religulous is one of many comedic efforts in popular culture right now that is both deftly humorous as well as timely in its social commentary. Mahr manages to keep a straight face when dealing with the ridiculous beliefs of religious people. He uses humor to pull in the viewer, but as the movie goes the interviewees and respective belief systems seem to get crazier – and scarier. This helps with the powerful punch he packs at the end with his call to action to all non-believing people to stand up and demand rational leaders and policies for America and the world.
on Oct 13th, 2008 at 6:02 pm
Religulous- I really enjoyed it, though I found the editing and cutting kind of shifty. I felt like he didn’t give some people a fair shot at all. I do however, think the ending worked in his favor. You laughed for the first 3/4 of the movie and the last 1/4 he brought it home by making you realize that these people hold the nuclear codes. Overall 3.5 of 5.
-A
on Oct 14th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
I appreciated the fact that Maher was an equal opportunity offender. He got his digs in with Christians, Muslims, Mormons, Jews, Scientologists with the same degree of blistering candor & critique. The ending felt preachy and didactic to say the least. Maher spends a good chunk of the film attacking religion for its use of fear of eternal damnation as a motivator, then immediately turns around to scare the viewer into dismantling or discarding non-rational belief. Say what you will, images of mushroom clouds and suicide bombs evoke knee-jerk emotional responses. Save this apparent logical inconsistency, I’d still call it a must see for skeptics and believers alike.
on Oct 14th, 2008 at 8:12 pm
In Religulous, Maher attacks the low-hanging fruit of on the tree of willful ignorance, focusing too much attention on the bronze-age ethos of biblical literalism, theme park piety and the lunatic fringe of religion. Had the film highlighted the juxtaposition between liberal and fundamentalist versions of those same religions, he could have made a strong case against blind faith without the need to ridicule religious identification itself. While an enjoyable romp for a nontheistic audience, Maher does not muster an appropriate level of cinematic demagoguery, and the effort falls flat, succeeding neither as comedy nor as insightful commentary.
on Oct 20th, 2008 at 2:30 am
The basic mistake of Religulous is overestimating how interesting Bill Maher is when he doesn’t have a stand up routine prepared. The movie’s producers got some great interviewees lined up, from a Puerto Rican guy who had gotten a lot of people to believe that he was the second coming to Dutch politician Geert Wilders, who wants to limit Muslim immigration to the Netherlands. However, instead of cautiously prompting the interviewees, letting the crazy ones hang themselves, and slipping in the occasional outrageous remark, Maher tries to dominate every conversation. And he’s kinda boring.
on Oct 20th, 2008 at 2:33 am
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