Review of Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014) by Drew A — 03 Feb 2015

Exodus: Gods and Kings.

What a load of crock. What an absolute load of utter steaming stupid. Exodus Gods and Kings is yet another proof that Ridley Scott should just go back to making creepy space movies because even Prometheus, which is not a particularly good film, is better than THIS. Once again delving into the historical epic genre that he managed to do right one time (but even Gladiator has its issues), Scott kinda brings us the story of Moses and Rameses that we've all seen twice before with Charlton Heston and a rather haunting and well-made animated musical. So what does Ridley Scott offer to this classic story? Decent special effects. Yeah. That's about it. But notably Scott took away something precious to the Exodus story: Every single character. He reduced the role of Aaron to 4 lines. Joshua has 5. Miriam has one scene. If you're not Moses, God, or Rameses apparently you do not matter to the story of the Exodus or the history of the Hebrew peoples. And even those three are either poorly performed (Moses/ Rameses) or absolutely horrid in a portrayal that is blasphemous to at least three religions. God in this film is played as a petulant angry 10 year old child who needs to sit in the corner for a while in time out. Admittedly, the child playing Weird God is a wonderful actor and his performance is to be commended, but that doesn't change the bafflingly stupid portrayal of God in this film. Stunningly bad with 15 minutes of redeeming beauty during the plagues, Exodus Gods and Kings is a failure no matter your faith. 2/10.