RELIGULOUS (Sony, 2008) D: Larry Charles, w/ Bill Maher. Rating: NN DVD package: NNN Rating: NN
If you’re just starting to suspect that most religious beliefs make no sense whatsoever, this is the movie for you. But if you’re already comfy with Adam and Eve as a fairy tale, all you’ll find in Religulous is moderately amusing comedy lightly sprinkled with travelogue and history.
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Comedian Bill Maher confronts various sorts of Christians, Jews and Muslims, clergy and ordinary believers alike, and invites them to discuss some of their beliefs. Then he rains comic mockery on their attempts.
It’s shooting fish in a barrel and gets tedious just as fast. Right away, it’s evident that Maher and his subjects aren’t connecting on any level – and why should they, since rationality has nothing to do with faith? Mockery, however satisfying, will not advance Maher’s cause: he wants humanity to outgrow religion.
About an hour in, he talks to neuroscientist Dr. Andrew Newberg, who specializes in faith and the brain, but he won’t let the man get a word in. Too bad – he might have learned something. Google “Newberg.” His book is called Why We Believe What We Believe.
Maher’s affability keeps the interviewees friendly. Director Larry Charles moves things along with movie clips tossed in for punctuation, a Jesus/Horus/Krishna comparison and visits to key holy sites, including Sodom and Gomorrah and Megiddo, a pile of rubble in northern Israel, prophesied as the site of Armageddon.
The commentary and additional scenes offer more of the same. Amusing, but not insightful.
EXTRAS Maher and Charles commentary, extended and deleted scenes. Widescreen. French subtitles.
