Although it fancies itself to be a no-holds-barred exposé of the ignorance of Christians about the history of their own religion, The God Who Wasn't There is guilty of the same selective Bible-quoting that often turns the blindly faithful into judgmental, crusading evangelicals. Writer-director-narrator Brian Flemming cherry-picks passages from the New Testament to make his particular points, deliberately misunderstands others (Jesus does not demand his enemies be executed in Luke 19:27), and jumps to wild, often ignorant, conclusions based on very little evidence—in the process undermining the logical and well-reasoned parts of his film. The crux of this snarky, Michael Moore-style documentary is Flemming's assertion that Jesus is a fiction—and very good arguments are made based on historical records, extensive similarities to the stories of other mythical heroes and saviors of the time, and the church's willful omission of writings that don't tow the Christian line. The film's stronger points, often made by interviewed historians and theologians, offer food for thought and are great debate fodder, but the documentary gets wildly off track with references to Charles Manson, the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, Church-endorsed discrimination, the bloodletting in Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, and other irrelevancies. Ultimately, The God Who Wasn't There features arguments as thin as those used by the fundamentalist defenders of the faith, and seems to be more about Flemming's need to justify his atheism to himself than anything else. DVD extras include scratchy telephone interviews with scholars (passed off as commentary tracks), and a "slideshow" of the film's assertions with web links to further information. Optional. Aud: C, P. (R. Blackwelder)
The God Who Wasn't There
(2005) 62 min. DVD: $24.98. Beyond Belief Media (dist. by Microcinema International). PPR. Color cover. Volume 21, Issue 1
The God Who Wasn't There
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