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RELIGULOUS
Released October 3rd, 2008 Director: Larry Charles Writer: Bill Maher Studio: Lionsgate Witnessed by M.G. Wood
I, M.G. Wood, bear witness to the best comedy of the year. I shall document the miracle I witnessed upon the silver screen. I walked on the proverbial water, and parted the theater doors... Ah, fuck it, I can’t keep that up. Comedian Bill Maher serves as our host and narrator of RELIGULOUS, a really funny doc about the absurdity of organized religion. Following in the footsteps of two great bestsellers, GOD IS NOT GREAT by Christopher Hitchens and THE GOD DELUSION by Richard Dawkins, Maher and director Larry Charles (CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM) set about to essentially distill the best points made by Hitchens and Dawkins, albeit in a far more humorous way. The movie opens with Maher standing on a pile of rocks in Jerusalem, stating that people who believe the Bible literally, claims the spot he stands in, will be ground zero at the end of the world. By opening the movie there, Maher will attempt (and succeed) to bring the movie full-circle. Starting with the cause of most people's grasp for a Holy Ghost: fear of death, and ending with a very serious danger: a politically motivated self-fulfilling prophecy, bringing about The End of the World. Along the way, Maher will tour the world, looking for answers to pretty reasonable questions. Those familiar with Michael Moore (SICKO) will be struck by the fact that, as opposed to Moore, Maher truly attempts to go out of his way to be respectful to his interviewees, even when it's clear they are absolutely bat-shit crazy. There is one particular scene that I sensed may have actually stunned the movie-goers in the screening I saw, and it involves a set-up that is just begging to be exploited to comic effect, which Maher does perfectly. The location: The Holy Land Experience, a biblical theme park in Orlando, Fl. The target: Jesus (or rather the actor who plays Jesus in the park's main attraction). The stunner comes when Maher, after knocking the actor down with one zinger after another, asks Jesus to explain how God could be three different entities: The Father, The Son, and The Holy Ghost. Jesus answers: "The same way water can be a solid (ice), a gas (steam), and a liquid". And where as someone looking to score political points, or aggrandize their own intellect would likely move on (or cut the scene altogether), hoping no one notices this very insightful philosophical argument, Maher spends several minutes speaking directly to the fact that Jesus actually made a well thought out, rather keen statement. This is not to say that Maher doesn’t generate some big laughs at the expense of a couple of off-the-reservation characters. But, there seems to be a genuine feeling of actual intellectual curiosity about Maher, as he moves from the Tractor Trailer Prayer Vigil in Raleigh, NC to the Vatican in Rome. Or when he sits down to interview the Preacher who was once homosexual, but now “healed” and straight, married to a “former” lesbian. One of the biggest laughs comes when Maher rises to leave, and the Preacher-turned-straight requests a hug; suffice it to say, it was a somewhat “stiff” embrace. Many religious people will be offended, of course, and claim that one’s religion is no laughing matter. And Maher will reply, You’re Goddamned Right It’s Not! Because, RELIGULOUS is not simply satisfied with making hay of heaven for hilarity’s sake, no, RELIGULOUS has a serious edge that cuts clean to the bone: while religion may aid and comfort the sick and dying, the lost and disaffected, the ugly truth is, religion does more harm than good. And the danger lies not in the scandalous secrets we all know so well like Predatory Priests and Money-Hungry Evangelists; but in the very philosophy of religion itself: if the world is going to end, and there’s a better place waiting, why care for the environment? Why not fly a plane into a building? As long as we believe in Magical Thinking and Fairy Tales, the Real World will forever be an illusion, a preamble to The Kingdom of Heaven; a Rest Stop to take a dump.
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