Category Film Reviews

Was Jesus Christ the son of god? Is there evidence that he even existed at all? Should Christianity be viewed as a dangerous belief? In The God Who Wasn’t There, director Brian Flemming attempts to answer these questions and more. Released to DVD in 2005, the film primarily argues against an historical Jesus with the help of many skeptics like philosopher and historian Richard Carrier, Professor of Biblical Criticism Robert M. Price, and anthropologist and folklorist Alan Dundes. Teaming up with the atheist group known as The Rational Response Squad, Flemming offered free copies of the DVD to the first 1,001 participants in the Blasphemy Challenge. Although it generated plenty of controversy and attention, The God Who Wasn’t There is not so noteworthy for its critique of Christianity.

I...

Lock your doors! Sound the alarm! Mothers, hide your children, for wicked anti-Christian scientists are out to destroy your faith and teach ‘evilution’ in its place. At least this is the message of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, a documentary contending that intelligent design has been unfairly suppressed by scientific academia. Hosted by Ben Stein, the film features interviews with several individuals supposedly fired for promoting intelligent design or questioning evolution, members of the religiously conservative group known as the Discovery Institute also make appearances, and a few noteworthy atheists are included as well. Expelled opened in 2008 to overwhelmingly negative reviews, surrounded by controversy, yet despite this it premiered in a record number of theaters to become t...

“Teach the controversy” was a fairly popular slogan to hear in the debate over intelligent design versus evolution, and if there’s one thing this documentary does well, it’s teaching the controversy. Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial follows the 2005 court decision of Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, wherein 11 parents in Dover, Pennsylvania sued the school district over the required reading of a statement to ninth-grade science classes. Much more was on trial than just the mandated statement though, as the debate became one of how to determine what belongs in science curriculum, how to tell science apart from pseudo-science, and whether or not religiously motivated ideas may have a forum in public school classrooms.

I. Taking Sides

From the very beginning, Judgment Day s...