Noah

Monty Python had a sketch in which Renaissance painter Michelangelo stands before the Pope, who chastises the artist for his highly inaccurate painting of the Last Supper. As their exchange goes on, they reveal some hilariously looney creative liberties taken in the painting (which might explain why Leonardo da Vinci got the job). Similarly absurd artistic license is taken in Darren Aronofsky’s take on Noah’s Ark. But instead of aiming for a bit of goofy comedy, the writer-director appears to be completely serious. Which only makes the rock monsters that much more ridiculous.

I’ll repeat that: there are rock monsters in this movie. Seriously.

I’m not a religious person myself, but to me, films based on biblical stories seem to exist on their own level, less bound to regular critical analysis because they’re less about pure drama than their message (same reason you don’t judge the Bible like you would a novel). Even more radical and controversial interpretations of the scripture, like The Last Temptation of Christ, still feel like you’re watching more than just a piece of entertainment. Well, Noah chucks this sentiment overboard completely (by the director’s own admission, to be fair), and with it any sense of spirituality. The aforementioned Pythons' Life of Brian had a more biblical feel than this, and that was a comedy.

It’s still the basic story of Noah’s Ark, but the film fills it out to feature-length (and then some) by piling on all the worst elements of blockbuster reboots from the last decade or so. The rock monsters (they’re actually fallen angels, but no less ludicrous for that) are just one of many examples of a medieval fantasy aesthetic the movie’s going for, as if to cash in on the Game of Thrones/Hobbit zeitgeist we’re in currently. The landscape onscreen looks less like the Old Testament than the post-apocalyptic devastation of The Road Warrior, minus the cars. And Russell Crowe’s Noah is a brooding, burly badass who dispatches enemies in hand-to-hand combat as effortlessly as any action hero. It almost seems like an intentionally, gleefully sacrilegious B-movie that was lucky enough to get a massive budget. But Aronofsky's tongue isn’t in cheek; again, he's playing it seriously.

The controversy surrounding the picture was seemingly framed by the media as nitpicking from religious groups for not following the Bible to a T. After actually watching the film, their displeasure is much more understandable. Many of the creative liberties building up to the great flood go beyond merely creating drama to pure silliness. But the change I’d imagine they most objected to comes afterwards, when the protagonists are riding out the storm aboard the Ark. Let’s just say that obeying the Creator’s (the word “god" is never spoken) every command means doing some horrible things, and arguably turns Noah into a brutal psychopath. Whether or not he’s actually doing the work of the Creator is never clearly stated, but he decidedly comes off as more of a madman than a prophet. By comparison, the viewpoint of the villainous Tubal-cain (Ray Winstone), the leader of the evil men who get washed away, seems almost more moral and reasonable. It’s a very strong stance for the movie to take, offering a lot for the audience to think about. But it’s not a pleasant narrative, and, like the rest of the picture, it’s faulted by flat acting and dialogue. A lot of biblical films have stilted dialogue, but you could give them a pass because this usually stems from quoting Bible verses, which don't always translate onscreen. But after taking so much creative license already, surely this movie could have cooked up some better lines for its cast.

There are some other interesting ideas. For example, the spent, resource-exhausted scenery adds an undercurrent of environmental allegory. The evil of Tubal-cain and his followers only pulls enough punches for a PG-13 rating, but is more than sufficiently savage and cruel. The divine visions experienced by the title character are haunting and beautiful, conjuring images of not only the story of Genesis, but an unmade epic adaptation of Milton’s Paradise Lost. But alas, all these are only trappings that never grow into anything more. The movie is a mess of too many ideas, with as many or more bad than good. Aronofsky should have made a choice and either made a more serious respectable adaptation that nonetheless explored his ideas and opinions, or just gone all out with the blockbuster elements and given us a completely and utterly stupid biblical action travesty.

Actually, on second thought, I think we can live without the latter.