God's Not Dead

It's impossible to review Christian films because if you're a believer you think this is a great film with a great message. If you're a skeptic or an out and out atheist you'll not view it kindly. Credit however should have gone to such items as Crash, Magnolia, and heaven forfend Boogie Nights because in terms of structure God's Not Dead most closely resembles those films. There's a bunch of stories with people all interconnected somehow.

But the main plot line involves young Shane Harper who is a Christian kid who is taking philosophy as an elective course. Instead of free academic discourse we have Professor Kevin Sorbo right off the bat wants to have his students declare God is dead. Harper is the one holdout and Sorbo essentially turns the class over to him, not for just one lecture, but for several periods where Harper has to get up and defend his faith.

Back in the day I had college professors, mostly liberals to be sure, but would never act like Kevin Sorbo does. Later on we learn in the film that he's got some deep issues.

As for Harper, he's told by the local pastor David A.R. White that this is an opportunity to go to bat for his faith. It would have been a lot easier to just drop the course and take another elective. In fact Harper is such a devoted believer one wonders why he's not in some place like Jerry Falwell's Liberty Baptist University or Pat Robertson's Regent University. Especially the latter since they have a law school there with guaranteed employment in the Justice Department when a Republican administration is in power.

As we all know Kevin Sorbo first came to prominence portraying that most mythic of pagan heroes Hercules on television. Another former television superhero in this film is former Superman Dean Cain who is a lawyer with one colossal ego. His part is almost a caricature, especially when his girlfriend tells him she's got cancer. What a comfort Cain is to her.

Christian icons like Willie and Korie Robertson from Duck Dynasty make an appearance. The finale is a concert by that most noted Christian Rock group the Newsboys.

As a non-believer, not an anti-believer and there is a difference despite the position this film takes I'm not thoroughly trashing a job moderately well done. Why though the existence of a Creator/Deity is automatically meaning that a fundamentalist interpretation of Christianity is necessarily valid. Or a literal interpretation of any religion for that matter. Harper even concedes that there was no literal 24/7 creation. I suspect that if he had tried to defend the Bible in a literal interpretation of the flood or Joshua stopping the sun, etc., things might have turned out differently.

One thing however did offend me greatly. David A.R. White is playing host to a visiting missionary from some unnamed African country. These are the same people who are currently pushing with glee and delight pogrom like laws against gay people in many African countries. Of course no mention of that in God's Not Dead, but I assure you that any gay people who see this film will mark it well for this colossal bit of hubris.

Technically God's Not Dead is not a horrible film, but people depending on their point of view will react accordingly to it.

You know when a movie made by Christians is about religion, it's going to demonize secularism. It makes out that Morality is entirely exclusive to Christianity and that without God, there is no point in being moral, which is just ridiculous. It makes every non-Christian look either evil or stupid, which is just insulting. It is just propaganda, no way around it, it's trying to make Christianity look perfect when it isn't and it's trying to make secularism and any other religion look evil and immoral. It's almost like this movie was made Christians who knew absolutely nothing about their own faith and of other beliefs. It's a new low for cinema, it's upsetting to think that this movie was allowed to be made.

I was dragged to this "movie" by a Christian friend who keeps thinking that I"ll finally come around to her religious way of thinking. Jeez, it was worse that I expected. Atheists are portrayed as evil beings who "hate god" and are determined to convert Christians. Actually, atheists do not "hate" god; god is simply something they don't believe exists. As to forcing their way of thinking on anyone, the movie has it backwards. It's Christian zealots who demand that everyone think like them. Most atheists - those that I know anyway - are happy to let others believe as they wish as long as they don't force their "values" on the rest of us. As to production values, etc., the film is pretty basic. The lead actor over-emotes and the supporting cast of Kevin Sorbo and Dean Cain look pretty silly. The plot is pretty much what you'd think. Thoughtful friends shouldn't let friends see this piece of propaganda: it has no basis in reality. As to Christians, knock yourself out. Like Fox News, it's been produced to reinforce your preconceptions without actually presenting another point of view in anything resembling a thoughtful way.

... when he said the movies are a great big empathy machine. At least in this case he probably was, because this film is a great big stereotype machine.

I'll cut it some slack on acting and direction because the whole thing was shot in 20 days with probably a low budget. The screenplay itself, mainly focusing on the conflict between Christian student Josh Wheaton and his atheist philosophy professor, really has a narrow point of view. The film really paints everything with a black and white brush and makes assumptions about atheists - AND people from other faiths and countries - that cause much of the criticism of the Christian community in the first place. I know several atheists, and they are not all narcissists that abandon sick friends or people that blame God for some tragedy in their past. Many of them have a behavior code that exceeds that of Christians because they do not have a "ticket to heaven in my pocket" mentality which many Christians do have and I have observed.

Meanwhile, we get a look at what is supposed to pass for a typical Arab-American Muslim household, as dad always makes sure that his daughter Ayisha has her face totally covered when he drops her off at school. He doesn't seem to mind that she has on short sleeves and clothes that are just as revealing as her peers. Note to dad - the face is not the only physical thing about a young lady that catches the eye of young men. No matter though, because as soon as dad is out of sight. Ayisha removes the face covering. It turns out that Ayisha is a closet Christian, and when dad finds out he reacts as we would expect any Muslim man to react who is three times his daughters size - he smacks her around fist to face and then physically throws her out into the street.

Getting back to the film's main protagonist,Josh, he is now having to debate the philosophy prof in class as to the existence of God using philosophical arguments or else he will fail. The in-class debate part of the film was interesting, but I believe professor Raddison when he said they did not have pre-law at the university, because just about every action he took was completely illegal, from threatening his students with failing grades or at least greatly enhanced workloads if they did not write down "God is dead" on a piece of paper and sign it, to confronting and taunting the student Josh when he began to get his goat.

Josh makes a big deal during his portion of the debate about God allowing free will to reign on earth and that being the reason for all of the evil, and then the plot goes on to disprove exactly that by implying divine destruction of the ignition capabilities of every car that two random missionaries on their way to Disneyland touch (in one of many sideplots) so that they can be at a particular place at a crucial time. As one missionary states to the other "God has you exactly where he wants you". What happened to free will if these two are just manipulated actors in God's grandiose play? Other interesting points - apparently all atheists turn to Christ when confronted with death (a point the late Christopher Hitchens disproves), and exactly what is this generic cancer that the atheist blogger has? Inquiring minds want to know. Plus - filmmakers - I know plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery, but many of us know an "I am Spartacus" moment when we see it (Josh's argument in favor of the existence of God causes everybody in the class to stand and say "God is not dead"). The great irony here - the screenwriter for Spartacus was James Dalton Trumbo, who just happened to be an atheist. I would say this film is worth watching as a curiosity if nothing else.

The ways this film treats all atheists is the rough equivalent of a film treating all Christians as Fred Phelps clones.

It's a thoughtless, unintelligent film whose only appeal is that it preaches to the choir. It presents the world in the most one- dimensional, black-and-white format I've ever seen.

And if anyone sees it fit to jump in and criticize me for being biased against the film: I have several friends who are very sincere and devout Christians. I have the utmost respect for their beliefs, and would never try to convert them.

THEY have even said that this film is the pinnacle of stupidity, and that it misrepresents their religious beliefs entirely.

Skip it.