My problem with the movie Noah is that some Christians seem to think it was ok. If Star Wars adds a stupid character like JarJar Binks, the movie is crucified by Star Wars fans. If Katniss Everdeen is shown smiling in the movie, it's big news because she doesn't in the book (ok, maybe she did a fake one once, ). Harry Potter fans expect the same. Why is this movie any different with Christians? Because we are so excited that someone with more "skill "and more 'artful ability' than Kirk Cameron or Sherwood Baptist is making a Christian Story? "Hey, It won't be cheesy!" Maybe it's just me, but I PREFER Christian cheese to out right BS...at least cheese is edible.
My problems with the movie are as follows- And for the record, you will be able to tell this review is written with an angry slant. This is because the movie was done so as well. Spoiler warnings: the entire thing was angry. No happiness here.
God never speaks to Noah, he only has vague visions and deduces what to do but even admits that he doesn't really know for sure on occasion.
There are rock monsters, (bad CGI creations for those stuck on the 'art' angle) not unlike Ents from Lord of the Rings (much better done), who were originally bad in helping Cain flourish in his punishment, but are now good for some reason? Not sure about that one and its not worth re-watching for clarity. I'd read my Bible for clarification, but mine is missing the chapters dealing with the Rock Monsters.
Methuselah is treated as Yoda, who lives in a cave (and apparently has for sometime, yet still isn't looking like Golum). He is shown to have a better connection to God (somehow) and can heal the barren womb (good thing, because otherwise the human race would have died out pretty quick with only that ONE extra female taken on board).
The main reason I wanted to see it was to see the grandeur of the ark and the animals gathering or flood gates opening up, but their 'wow' factor was detracted by the meaninglessness of the story and the screen was maybe 100 times smaller. The ark did look amazingly duplicated. However, the rock monsters built most of it from trees that grew INSTANTANEOUSLY (because who has time to wait 500 years). I also don't believe hundreds of snakes filled the ark- imagine 2 of every species of every animal fitting on that thing? (Well, minus the 1 species because the 'bad guy' who was sneaked onto the ark killed one of them) But this point is probably the most forgivable.
Instead of being a righteous man and having a relationship with the Lord, Noah believed he was given a mission- to help God wipe out the human race, including him and his family, because of the wickedness- And this depravity is shown well in ALL characters. Noah does wrestle with some deep theology but there are no answers in a non-christian portrayal. Simple logic begs, why waste your time (or the rock monsters' time) building an ark if you are all just going to die out afterwards anyway? Why wouldn't the Lord just create new animals? The last 30 minutes of the movie was a miserable ordeal with a hateful family stuck together, with Noah's wife and son's pregnant girlfriend (?!) trying to steer clear of Noah as he wrestled with his "necessary task" in killing the two baby girls after their birth, and his son plotting murderous revenge with a stowaway on Noah because Noah let his girlfriend die in the mob before the flood. Noah, why not just kill the babies' mother now, as opposed to waiting til birth to face 2 beautiful babies later? Or better yet, why did you get on the boat in the first place if God meant to COMPLETELY wipe out humanity?? It wasn't even because someone needed to feed the animals because these animals allegedly slept the entire nine or so months. These lapses in logic are probably forgivable to some seeing that the movie creators don't understand the story or have an ounce of real wisdom and weren't going for a truly Christian story anyway... Well then for the love of donuts, please change his name to Tubal Seth or something else so we don't THINK its meant to be a story resembling one of the mighty men of Faith. Even if not meant to be Christian, the logic of the movie and its portrayal was AWFUL and this is far less forgivable than the subpar acting or 'cheese' factor of something worthwhile and redeeming like Facing the Giants, or Fireproof.
The lone moment of redemption came with Noah kissing his granddaughters as opposed to stabbing them. But in the vein of the story-logic, it was a moment of complete disobedience to his 'god', so movie-wise, that was a moment of pure sin. I couldn't even enjoy the rainbow either. It was more like multiple colorful ripples in the sky as the Lord (the sun??) pulsed out his pleasure with his still completely corrupt and angry creation. No beauty in this art.
