Fresh and Exciting

disgusting, overrated, pointless

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

The film is Brian Flemming's personal nightmarish search for answers, who as a disgruntled boy never came to terms with his personal problems caused by his Protestant teachings, never bothered to check what they were teaching. So the best way for him to deal with his problems was to deny everything including the existence of historical Jesus.He claims that if the Church was wrong about the sun revolving around the earth it was wrong about the historicity of Jesus Christ. Catholic Church deals only with questions of faith and morals and never claimed to be a scientific institution, although Catholics have always been at the front end of scientific discoveries throughout the two thousand year history. First universities were opened by the Church back in 11 -12 centuries. The entire human race believed the sun revolved around the earth. In fact 1 in 4 Americans today believe the same according to a survey.He tries to demonstrate that Christianity has not invented anything new and the ideas of a saviour and other parallels with Christianity are found in ancient myths like the cults of Mithra, Osiris and Dionysus. These pagan gods belong, of course, to various ancient civilisations - Roman, Egyptian and Greek. Parallels with Osiris and Dionysus are so generic that they can be found in almost any religion. As for Mithra there isn't a single written source in existence from that cult. What survives are ambiguous stone inscriptions that historians still in disagreement about as to their meaning. He conveniently picks the Roman Mithra that has the most "parallels" with Christianity. This cult was followed by the Roman soldiers in 1-4 centuries AD. Yes, AD. That's AFTER the beginning of Christianity. The only written sources that survive of the Roman Mithra cult (a relative of Persian Mitra) are Christian sources that can hardly be turned against the writers who wrote them!He fails to see that Judaism is an ancient religion (if not the most ancient) and Christianity is the organic continuation of it. Judeo-Chritianity span almost four thousand years from Abraham, and in fact go back to Noah (24th century BC). The beliefs of this religion predate even those earliest surviving sources of Persian cults of Mitra by at least several hundred years. Animal sacrifice, bread and wine offerings, a Saviour, Heaven and Hell and many other concepts have always been part of this ancient religion. Longing for their promised Saviour by the Jews go back to the origins of that religion as evidenced in their books. In fact all pagan societies outside of Jewish of that era were so deeply cruel, immoral and perverted that nearly all of them were longing for some kind of a divine saviour, naturally coming up with various stories and man-made prophecies which would eventually turn into cults. Jews even resisted their religion throughout their entire ancient history. Besides, Judaism throughout its entire existence, was in constant contact with other civilisations (Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Roman, etc.), and an exchange of religious beliefs was an ordinary matter. Jews were always adopting various pagan cults. Similary, ancient accounts of the Great Flood and the Ark filled with animals can be found outside of Jewish tradition in ancient Greek, Hindu, Mesopotamian cults.Another point is, if one thing is similar to another does it mean they are identical? A human is similar to a monkey. Does it mean a human is a monkey? And if similarities exist in attributes that belong to humans or the facts of lives of one person and another are similar, does it mean one of them never existed? Likewise, attributes that belong to gods would be similar as what we lack in our human nature we would attribute to gods, even the invented ones.Using the same false logic we can "prove" that Napoleon never existed. It's all a sun myth, because of similarities. In Paris there is a column with Napoleon's statue with the inscription: "Neapolio, Imp. Aug.". Splitting of the name gives us "Ne", Greek particle of affirmation, and "Apolio", and we get "True Apollo". So Napoleon was god Apollo. Both Apollo and Napoleon were born on a Mediterranean island (Delos and Corsica). Apollo had three sisters and two wives (one - the earth, the other - the moon) and Napoleon had three sisters and two wives. Apollo was a sun god of light; the sun passes 12 signs of the zodiac and Napoleon was effectively a dictator for 12 years (1802 to 1814). Napoleon had 12 Marshals like the 12 signs of zodiac. The sun is strongest in the south and weakest in the north and Napoleon was defeated in Russia. So he is simply a sun myth just like Jesus of Nazareth.Mr. Flemming interviews Bible Christians to see what they know about the spread of Christianity. And, behold, they don't. What can one expect from the form of Christianity that have no foundation in history? His claims that since Apostle Paul didn't write about the life of Christ Christ, therefore, He never existed, that The Passion of the Christ film is evidence that Christians are blood thirty - these are ridiculous beyond belief. Just as his understanding of the denial of the Holy Spirit being an unforgivable sin is completely wrong and just hilarious. But he never bothers to check his "facts". And by his logic, because there is a gap between the years of the life of Jesus and the Gospels written... Jesus never existed. If someone writes a biography of someone who lived 40 years before does that prove he never existed?This is a truly sad story of a man who never looked anywhere else of what Christianity is all about and is still going blind - just as he was in his teenage years. The film should have been more appropriate called "My Mind That Wasn't There".

I have come out of Christianity too but did not like many tactics Brian used to make this film. Man made dogma has created many problems as far as controlling and misleading people. Just because man-made dogma is wrong does NOT mean God does not exist. You can sense Brian's bitterness in this film. I was mad at first too when I discovered, after much study of the scriptures, the error in the NT. Most of us do not know the Tanach well enough to detect them other than we recognize the verses when they are used as coming out of the Tanach, but normally there is no reference so it cannot be checked easily unless you make the effort, much like Brian's mistake. How many of you got your Bible and checked out his use of some quotes? One was Luke 19:17, where Brian implies Jesus is speaking about his enemies, but if you go back in the chapter to the beginning, Jesus is talking about a nobleman in a PARABLE who makes this statement, yet Brian wrongfully implies it is Jesus, talking about his enemies. Now, I am sorry, but I find that hypocritical because I think he would have known he took it out of context while making a film of this nature. Also Hebrews 8:4 was somewhat misleading, but that might be debatable, depending on how you look at it, since my husband & I both came up with a different understanding of it. I have removed the NT from the Tanach in my bibles(the Hebrew Scriptures, what Jesus used, OT, Original Text, I do not like to call it now what Christians do since it is disrespectful. How would Christians like it if Muslims added the Qur'an to the NT and started calling the NT the Old NT and that the Qur'an was now the currant word of God. I do not think they would like it at all. Each faith should stand on their own if you are going to choose to follow one.) I do not like labels, they divide us. I think we should all learn to say "Perhaps," even the Atheists, that way we are not demanding everyone believe as we do and that they are wrong and we are right and visa versa.I think if you want to get the attention of Christians, you need to be more respectful and address the misconceptions and quotes out of context with concern and seriousness, not sarcasm, such as I picked up on in the film. Again, I can understand the sarcasm but it is not helping while addressing Christians. Brainwashing is a serious state of mind and you are challenging someone who has been taught to love that teaching so if you want to introduce truth, extend some grace and be factual but gentle. I believe it is actually God who brings people out of the man-made dogma and points them to truth. One has to have an open mind and a teachable spirit. Often our ego gets in the way because we do not want to believe that we have been taught wrong and willingly accepted that error. There are "fear" verses used to control them as well. Very sad. Again, if Brian wanted to make progress in educating people, sarcasm probably is not the best approach. God is most important in my life but not as man has created Him, nor as Brian has lost sight of him in the movie . Seek God, Seek to Improve YOUR Spirit and harm no one in the process. God will look at your heart and mind, not your label. Do your own research. We are accountable for what we believe. It will affect the decisions we make and the outcome of your life.

I was expecting this film to be decent and while the points it makes are clear, technically it leaves a lot to be desired. I thought it was only extreme religious people that didn't know how to use technology. The director throws facts and challenges Christianity, which is fair enough, but after a while he tries to makes us care about him by saying that he once was a hardcore Christian himself. Personally, I think he lacked charisma to carry the film from that angle. Please try harder with the titles the next time. Also, the music deserves a special mention, it doesn't come across as funny at all. It just sounds cheesy. The whole film felt amateurish. That's my two pence.

Before I begin this review I must say I am surprised that I am even writing it. My reviews mainly consist of big blockbusters and anime. Do not get me wrong I enjoy documentary and fiction based stuff (Bill Maher's Religulous is one of my favorites) I just don't feel the need to comment on them, but with is film I felt needed to.As an agnostic I truly take no sides in the thesis or atheist argument when it comes to religion, I am a person to who see's both sides of any debate. Therefore I have seen interesting films that are both religious and non religious and The God who wasn't there was another one of these films.The beginning of the film is quite interesting where the director brings up inconsistencies in the Gospels and showing how other religions had similar figures to Jesus and his life; also it was good to show some people in both the religious and political spectrum twist certain ideas of faith to fit there own agendas and justification of violence.However, the director lost me when he returned to the fundamentalist school he attended as a youth where he basically tricked and cornered the school superintendent into trying to admit his teachings were wrong.While I am agnostic and have no real opinion on faith, I do think any sort of belief is a good thing and to go and make it seems like brain washing or something evil is just wrong, after watching the film it seemed more like a personal purging of the directors angst rather than a impartial argument of the existence of God.In closing, I would not say do not see this film it brings up some good points, but go in knowing that it is not unbiased view point. Otherwise it will leave a bad taste in your mouth.