Review of Exodus: Gods and Kings (2014) by Bigz — 16 Dec 2014

I was surprised to see this movie come into light and to see the actors and the director who brought this all into being. The previews show promise for both religious types and epic action types and so I was intrigued.

Because of this being a biblical story, you take a gamble no matter what. So many different faiths to judge one film is going to turn into a blood bath no matter how you approach. So, I went to see this because I was curious, and I was not nearly as disappointed with this as I was with another biblical movie called, Noah.

Sure, since these are Hollywood productions a solid overall likable bible story is quite a bit to ask. But a lot of work and effort was put into this film. The scale and grandeur was magnificent. Each costume and each city had a different style and detail to it that characterized the story.

The dialogue and acting was sharp on most areas. I thought Ramses was played flawlessly. I liked how they put Moses in a military position because upon assumption you see Moses as a hardened general who becomes a humble prophet which proves for a good story.

I thought the movie went well until Moses and God...or at least what was meant to represent God, meet. Things start to get weird and shaky for Christian Bale's portrayal of Moses. He seems lost and unsure of himself, as if God isn't helping him and it angers him and you lose touch with the love and care Moses and God are meant to have.

Therein lies the failures of the movie. If you read the bible account of Exodus verse by verse you will find not many details and specifics of Moses' life and activities. This movie had its own vision about how to fill in the blanks.

Although they did straight up abandon the bible account on several things, there is still the violent and brutal tone the Old Testament had. Each plague makes your skin crawl and makes you shiver. The delivery on the suffering of Egypt is very well done.

Again, the Moses-to-God relationship is the one big pitfall. I thought the relationship portrayed in The Prince of Egypt was more appropriate than what they did here. Your faith doesn't have to suffer if you don't want it to, this movie may have been grueling and violent and strayed from convention a bit but I think the title of the movie best describes what the main idea was for them.

Making a movie out of a very famous bible story and highlighting the divide between a King ( in this case Pharaoh) and a God ( in this case the God of the Hebrews). This story tells of God's wrath upon those who believed in slavery and oppression and how a belief in God can overcome an Empire and a king.

(much less blasphemous than Noah) This movie could have been great but it fell short. The project in general is so large and detailed and attempting to make it happen is hard at best. The large scale and huge spectrum took away from the importance of Moses and his journey and failed to center in on him as much as it should have.

There are merits though. I say its worth at least one try.