Today's been a pretty good day.
Mar. 20th, 2011 07:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xiphiasLast night and today were Purim, so, last night, we went out to the megillah reading at my shul/Hebrew school, and had fun. When I got home, there was a message from a friend saying that said friend's life was actually going pretty well. In the morning, I went to the shul/Hebrew school's Purim Carnival, and played music for folks as part of it. People seemed to have a good time, then we had pizza. When I came home, we tried to listen to the radio program Says You!, which was pre-empted for a pledge drive for re-runs of Garrison Keillor (why? Why would you do re-runs of "A Prairie Home Companion" instead of a new episode of "Says You!"? Nothing against APHC, but, still), but Lis was able to find another station that was playing it, from Ohio, and stream that one.
Then we drove out to the movie theater -- and Lis got the show streaming through her phone, so we could still listen while we were driving, and even plug the phone into the car stereo to listen through better-quality speakers -- and saw PAUL.
Short review? If you're on my friends list, you're probably the target audience for this movie, and you'll likely enjoy it.
Slightly longer review?
It is so completely, unabashedly, joyfully geeky. The opening scene has the two main characters at ComicCon, talking about how weird it is that they're five thousand miles from England, but they feel, for the first time in their lives, completely at home. This isn't played for laughs or anything -- it's a genuine exciting, sweet moment.
Roger Ebert didn't completely like it. He thought it almost worked, but somehow missed it by that much. Flick Filospher, on the other hand, felt it absolutely DID hit exactly what it was aiming for.
Downsides? Um, I dunno. It's clearly not a GREAT MOVIE FOR THE AGES, or anything, but it's solid, it's fun, it's actually sweet, it has good guys smoking and drinking and smoking pot and dancing REALLY badly and thinking about having sex.
What else? Well, I enjoy a bit of fundie bashing as much as the next fellow, but the anti-Creationism message was a bit oversold, I thought -- it works fine as an anti-Creationist message, but I've always felt that it's a bit of a stretch to extend a solid anti-Creationism message to be a general atheist message. But that's a really minor quibble. And Paul DOES point out that, to be completely fair, his existence doesn't really disprove ALL religion -- just all the Abrahamic faiths . . .
Now, just as font geeks notice people in movies making poor font choices, I'm a theology geek, so I feel compelled to point out that Paul's existence only disproves some particular literalist/Creationist interpretations of the Abrahamic faiths. Yes, Paul completely destroys the faith of a sheltered creationist fundamentalist, but had, say,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mabfan or brotherguy encountered Paul, it wouldn't have shaken THEIR faith at all.
That's my biggest quibble about the movie. They were insufficiently technically precise on a particular theological point that is important to character development, but, since the IMPORTANT part was the breaking of the brittle kind of rigid faith that fundamentalism creates, I can let it slide.
Also, I've probably just spent more time writing about it that it actually takes in the movie.
Female characters generally have some agency, and there are, um, four reasonably significant ones. It DOES barely squeak a "pass" on the Bechdel/Mo's Movie test, about thirty seconds before the end credits.
Homophobia? Remarkably little. The two main characters are occasionally mistaken for lovers, and their response is embarrassment, but not defensiveness. When they accidentally are given a hotel room with one king-sized bed instead of two double beds, the person bringing room service asks if they're on their honeymoon. They try to explain that they're just friends, and there was a mistake with the room, but the explanation begins to get confusing, they just drop the subject, and when he leaves with a "have a nice honeymoon," they just say "thank you." They're embarrassed like you would be if someone assumed that your opposite sex platonic friend was your boyfriend/girlfriend, but not like anyone said anything BAD about you.
Lis had been showing me all the trailers and clips that have been released, and I was afraid that I'd already seen everything good in the movie. As it turned out, I probably only saw about HALF the good lines. If I had it to do over, I'd avoid the trailers and just see it cold, but it's worth seeing.
Not as good as SHAUN OF THE DEAD or HOT FUZZ, but that's an unfairly high bar to set.
So, yeah, a good day.
Edited to Add: In looking this over, I thought of one more positive comment to make about Paul. Note that, in the quote, Paul talks about how he invalidates "Abrahamic" faiths. They used the proper term, "Abrahamic", meaning religions which count their descent in some way from the Old Testament story of Abraham -- i.e., primarily Judaism, Christianity, and Islam -- rather than using the all-but-meaningless and deeply annoying term "Judeo-Christian".
Then we drove out to the movie theater -- and Lis got the show streaming through her phone, so we could still listen while we were driving, and even plug the phone into the car stereo to listen through better-quality speakers -- and saw PAUL.
Short review? If you're on my friends list, you're probably the target audience for this movie, and you'll likely enjoy it.
Slightly longer review?
It is so completely, unabashedly, joyfully geeky. The opening scene has the two main characters at ComicCon, talking about how weird it is that they're five thousand miles from England, but they feel, for the first time in their lives, completely at home. This isn't played for laughs or anything -- it's a genuine exciting, sweet moment.
Roger Ebert didn't completely like it. He thought it almost worked, but somehow missed it by that much. Flick Filospher, on the other hand, felt it absolutely DID hit exactly what it was aiming for.
Downsides? Um, I dunno. It's clearly not a GREAT MOVIE FOR THE AGES, or anything, but it's solid, it's fun, it's actually sweet, it has good guys smoking and drinking and smoking pot and dancing REALLY badly and thinking about having sex.
What else? Well, I enjoy a bit of fundie bashing as much as the next fellow, but the anti-Creationism message was a bit oversold, I thought -- it works fine as an anti-Creationist message, but I've always felt that it's a bit of a stretch to extend a solid anti-Creationism message to be a general atheist message. But that's a really minor quibble. And Paul DOES point out that, to be completely fair, his existence doesn't really disprove ALL religion -- just all the Abrahamic faiths . . .
Now, just as font geeks notice people in movies making poor font choices, I'm a theology geek, so I feel compelled to point out that Paul's existence only disproves some particular literalist/Creationist interpretations of the Abrahamic faiths. Yes, Paul completely destroys the faith of a sheltered creationist fundamentalist, but had, say,
mabfan or brotherguy encountered Paul, it wouldn't have shaken THEIR faith at all.That's my biggest quibble about the movie. They were insufficiently technically precise on a particular theological point that is important to character development, but, since the IMPORTANT part was the breaking of the brittle kind of rigid faith that fundamentalism creates, I can let it slide.
Also, I've probably just spent more time writing about it that it actually takes in the movie.
Female characters generally have some agency, and there are, um, four reasonably significant ones. It DOES barely squeak a "pass" on the Bechdel/Mo's Movie test, about thirty seconds before the end credits.
Homophobia? Remarkably little. The two main characters are occasionally mistaken for lovers, and their response is embarrassment, but not defensiveness. When they accidentally are given a hotel room with one king-sized bed instead of two double beds, the person bringing room service asks if they're on their honeymoon. They try to explain that they're just friends, and there was a mistake with the room, but the explanation begins to get confusing, they just drop the subject, and when he leaves with a "have a nice honeymoon," they just say "thank you." They're embarrassed like you would be if someone assumed that your opposite sex platonic friend was your boyfriend/girlfriend, but not like anyone said anything BAD about you.
Lis had been showing me all the trailers and clips that have been released, and I was afraid that I'd already seen everything good in the movie. As it turned out, I probably only saw about HALF the good lines. If I had it to do over, I'd avoid the trailers and just see it cold, but it's worth seeing.
Not as good as SHAUN OF THE DEAD or HOT FUZZ, but that's an unfairly high bar to set.
So, yeah, a good day.
Edited to Add: In looking this over, I thought of one more positive comment to make about Paul. Note that, in the quote, Paul talks about how he invalidates "Abrahamic" faiths. They used the proper term, "Abrahamic", meaning religions which count their descent in some way from the Old Testament story of Abraham -- i.e., primarily Judaism, Christianity, and Islam -- rather than using the all-but-meaningless and deeply annoying term "Judeo-Christian".
(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-21 08:58 am (UTC)But I'm of similar opinion in that the film really mishandled the religion angle something fierce. Even though Paul asserts he doesn't invalidate all faiths, I still got an impression that the film confused Creationism with religion as a whole, or at least presented a general polarized line between religion and science. The strawman creationist (and the strawkristenwiig, which was weirder to type than it is to read) were also embarrassingly one-dimensional, almost drawn from a Bizarro Jack Chick tract.
Still, the film tries for balance but just a little bit. One character is saved by their faith. Paul does throw out the disclaimer, and doesn't deny the existence of any higher powers. (However, while he uses the correct term Abrahamic, at another point he quotes "an eye for an eye" as coming from the Old Testament. Hammurabi wouldn't be pleased.)
I saw this on Friday and have been mulling it over the entire weekend. I want to write more about it but am waiting for spoilers to blow over.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-21 10:07 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-21 10:30 am (UTC)23 But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life,
24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
25 burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.
It's there. It may be taken from Hammurabi, but it's in the Old Testament, too. Now, the ongoing Jewish tradition re-worked it to be a system of tort laws involving financial reparations for damages, and Christianity entirely repealed it -- in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says "You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth'. But I say to you, do not resist an evildoer. If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." I don't know enough about Islam to know for sure how Muslims interact with the notion, but a very brief skim of Wikipedia suggests that Sharia law accepts the idea, but allows, and highly encourages, the victims to accept monetary compensation instead.
Personally, I feel that goes too far in the other direction, but, again, in the ongoing development of Christianity, Christians HAVE developed ways to resist evildoers -- just as we Jews have found ways to avoid taking lex tailonis literally, Christians have found ways to avoid taking "turn the other cheek" to an extent that would destroy society.
Society cannot survive EITHER too much justice OR too much mercy. It needs both in balance.
In any case, I agree that the religion was arguing against a strawman -- but I'm not COMPLETELY bothered by that. I perceived it as a disagreement in worldview that I, personally, have with the characters of Paul, Grahame, and Clive. And, in real life, I have that disagreement with people I like, so I found myself able to accept that.
It's probable that Pegg and Frost have similar views as Grahame, Clive, and Paul -- but, just as that doesn't make me dislike Pegg and Frost, it doesn't make me dislike the movie.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-21 02:38 pm (UTC)*applause*
(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-21 03:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-21 04:04 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-03-21 11:59 pm (UTC)