Evangelical Cinema and Culture

[domino harvey]

Richard Dawkins crashes a screening.

This is a great review

[Kirkinson]

Here's a clip. I love how scary it's apparently supposed to be, based on the music.

[domino harvey]

It's great that even with their editing tricks, nothing these guys said except the very last line (which is clearly said in jest) is even remotely offensive or radical.

[miless]

I found this blog that is a response to the film (apparently they relate evolution to Nazism?)

[Antoine Doinel]

The film uses John Lennon's "Imagine" without permission, but the filmmakers are claiming some kind of First Amendment rights in regards to its use.

[M]

The film uses John Lennon's "Imagine" without permission, but the filmmakers are claiming some kind of First Amendment rights in regards to its use.

Of course they are. They'd be appealing to that portion of the fair use clause that allows for use without permission if the copied portion of the work is a small enough portion compared to the work as a whole. Why would the filmmakers want to use a song that contains the line 'Imagine there's no heaven' in a movie about creationism?

[miless]

to make John Lennon out to be a Nazi?

[domino harvey]

I always knew the lyric was "Number nein"!

[Antoine Doinel]

More on the whole music licensing fiasco here, including this line that was fed to the Killers when obtaining the use of their music:

The film is a satirical documentary with an estimated running time of 1 hour and 50 minutes, exploring academic freedom in public schools and government institutions with actor, comedian, economist, Ben Stein as the spokesperson.

[domino harvey]

Though a "limited release," one let's say advantage of living in the Midwest is that this is playing at every movie theatre, even the mom and pop theater that only plays like five movies.

[M]

Though a "limited release," one let's say advantage of living in the Midwest is that this is playing at every movie theatre, even the mom and pop theater that only plays like five movies.

Playing to the cultural vanguard, ingenious. As Peoria goes, so goes the nation.

[CSM126]

I caught this movie last night (got in for free, mind you), and I can safely say I've seen few things more hysterical than this. Every single interview with the ID proponents is underscored with this insane, overdramatic music that sounds like something that should play when the plane crashes at the end of United 93 - Oh the tragedy of it all and whatnot. And watching Ben Stein, of all people, playing dumb so he can be "shocked" when he hears about these strange new concepts like "God" and "science" is laughable.

It was almost like Kent Hovind was supposed to host this film but had to drop out so Stein stepped in and read Hovind's feverish/delirious script verbatim.

[domino harvey]

Not that anyone here needed it, but in case a co-worker or family member tries to convince you of the film's claims: Expelled Exposed

I kind of chuckled that even with all the church pre-selling and 1000 screens it was only able to pull in $3 million this weekend

[Antoine Doinel]

I kind of chuckled that even with all the church pre-selling and 1000 screens it was only able to pull in $3 million this weekend

That's actually a pretty good opening for a documentary, especially for such a small screen count. It earned double per screen than Morgan Spurlock's new film.

[domino harvey]

Morgan Spurlock didn't have a built-in audience like this film did. Even that Christian movie with Casper Van Dien sold more tickets when it opened

[jesus the mexican boi]

Spurlock's film opened in very few theaters, and to almost zero marketing fanfare. The intelligent designees have been banner'd across the Internets for weeks now, and getting a lot of free publicity as well. Still, I had thought they'd do better than 9th place. But one can't imagine the budget for this colossal waste of celluloid was that high. They've already recouped their costs on the sales of DVDs for your child's public school science curriculum.

[CSM126]

I kind of chuckled that even with all the church pre-selling and 1000 screens it was only able to pull in $3 million this weekend

That's actually a pretty good opening for a documentary, especially for such a small screen count. It earned double per screen than Morgan Spurlock's new film.

That's the saddest misuse of the word 'documentary' since the last time a Michael Moore movie came out.

[domino harvey]

Spurlock's film opened in very few theaters, and to almost zero marketing fanfare. The intelligent designees have been banner'd across the Internets for weeks now, and getting a lot of free publicity as well. Still, I had thought they'd do better than 9th place. But one can't imagine the budget for this colossal waste of celluloid was that high. They've already recouped their costs on the sales of DVDs for your child's public school science curriculum.

A thousand screens is a wide release. They promoted it at churches and presold a lot of tickets, this should have resulted in much more business than it did, showing that perhaps there are plenty of Christians who aren't idiots. I've known several Christians who accept evolution as part of God's plan and that seems like a far more logical way to marry science and religion if it must be married at all.

I was reading an article somewhere (Hell, maybe it was linked on page one of this thread-- I'm not taking ten seconds to check!) about a teacher whose school received promotional material (a DVD with clips) from Expelled for the purpose of instigating "debate" in her students.

[Antoine Doinel]

Morgan Spurlock didn't have a built-in audience like this film did.

I would argue Spurlock does indeed have a built-in audience. Super Size Me and 30 Days put him in a pool along with Michael Moore and his crowd. And this movie had it's fair share of pre-release buzz including countless interviews with Morgan Spurlock in nearly all the big media outlets (everything from the NY Times to the AV Club), not to mention the brilliantly constructed festival buzz around the film (did he actually find Osama?) and of course the trailer floating around online for the past two months.

I think the fact that Expelled is cracking the top ten at all is terrifying.

[domino harvey]

Morgan Spurlock didn't have a built-in audience like this film did.

I would argue Spurlock does indeed have a built-in audience. Super Size Me and 30 Days put him in a pool along with Michael Moore and his crowd. And this movie had it's fair share of pre-release buzz including countless interviews with Morgan Spurlock in nearly all the big media outlets (everything from the NY Times to the AV Club), not to mention the brilliantly constructed festival buzz around the film (did he actually find Osama?) and of course the trailer floating around online for the past two months.

I said "a built in audience like this film did"-- If you think there are less Evangelical Christians in America than Super Size Me fans, you're mistaken-- also, Spurlock's film DID open in limited release, unlike the wide (ten times as many screens) release for the Stein "doc"

[Antoine Doinel]

Morgan Spurlock didn't have a built-in audience like this film did.

I would argue Spurlock does indeed have a built-in audience. Super Size Me and 30 Days put him in a pool along with Michael Moore and his crowd. And this movie had it's fair share of pre-release buzz including countless interviews with Morgan Spurlock in nearly all the big media outlets (everything from the NY Times to the AV Club), not to mention the brilliantly constructed festival buzz around the film (did he actually find Osama?) and of course the trailer floating around online for the past two months.

I said "a built in audience like this film did"-- If you think there are less Evangelical Christians in America than Super Size Me fans, you're mistaken-- also, Spurlock's film DID open in limited release, unlike the wide (ten times as many screens) release for the Stein "doc"

But Evangelicals are rarely known to be avid filmgoers, even with projects aimed square at their demographic. And the fact that this film skews to an even more niche market than Passion Of The Christ and it still managed to crack the top ten is frankly, remarkable.

[domino harvey]

Anotoine we're just gonna have to agree to disagree-- I live in Evangelical USA and they pack the theatres for movies like this due to church promotion. Maybe this kind of promotion is a phenomenon that Canada doesn't experience?

[Antoine Doinel]

Maybe this kind of promotion is a phenomenon that Canada doesn't experience?

We do have our segment of evangelicals here in Canada, but they are nowhere near as influential or organized as those in the United States. Though, Passion Of The Christ still packed 'em in up here.

[Luke M]

Does this thread have any purpose other than the Christians-are-fucking-retarded circle jerk?

We got one person who commented on the film. Anyone else?

[Mr Sausage]

Does this thread have any purpose other than the Christians-are-fucking-retarded circle jerk?

We got one person who commented on the film. Anyone else?

Instead of looking to everyone else to fix certain wrongs, why don't you take the first step yourself?