Review of Religulous (2008) by Josh S — 22 Jan 2010

I can't possibly give this a bad review being that you get to see the sides of faith, skepticism and complete ignorance to their own extremes. Bill Maher is a high and righteous zealot for his own beliefs and is just going about showing how ludicrous Christianity (and primarily Christianity) is, giving the last 20 minutes of his documentary over to other religions which is the most interesting part of the film. I have seen crazy baptists and mormons and catholics portrayed over and over again, I wanted to see what the views of other religions are. This film to me is harmless. I watched this film thinking I would be educated on what atheists, agnostics and other non-believers had to say, yet it is the same spiel that I have been hearing since I was 13. To me, Maher drones on like the pastors and ministers he pokes fun at.

One main thing is, Maher only targets the freaks of religion in order to back his claims. Instead of getting legitimate interviews with actual churchgoers, he settles for the celebrities of organized religion. Yet that is not necessarily his problem. He is documenting American Christianity, and that is not his fault that he was subjected to such a watered-down view of faith and Christianity. His ability to cut off his subjects with random observations is his power. And when he isn't allowed to cut them off, he leaves. Yet, he does provide legitimate arguments that are hard to answer.

I myself have a lot of searching to do, yet it would take more than a celebrity icon to sway my beliefs. I do recommend this for any believer or non-believer to check out and form their own opinions on what to believe rather than succumb to an organized set of rules that were placed to keep you complacent. It is appalling at what happened over these past thousands of years and I commend Bill Maher for expressing his distaste for organized religion. I cannot truly say anything rather bad about the film other than the fact that it is a very simple view on the craziness of religion.

The main problem I had with this film was the ending. Where Maher falls prey to the typical "bad documentary" ending. In his final rant, Maher defeats the purpose of his own idea by viciously claiming to eradicate all religion (along with explosive sounds), with a really violent attitude and approach. This shows me how simple minded this guy really is. His speech at the Oscars show this as well. Basically he is setting himself up as his own god...the church of Bill Maher his holiness...

See it. But you don't really have to believe it.