It seems the new film about the family life of Charles Darwin, Creation: the True Story of Charles Darwin, is already generating controversy.
The all too predictable pajama bloggers such as PZ Myers and even film critic Roger Ebert are beginning to stoke the flames of controversy over the film’s premier at the Toronto International Film Festival. But it all really started with a rather breezy article in the UK’s Telegraph: Charles Darwin film ‘too controversial for religious America’.
Telegraph “Showbusiness editor” Anita Singh (as opposed to ‘journalist’) says:
However, US distributors have resolutely passed on a film which will prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution.
How does she know it was “too controversial for religious America”? The Telegraph does not offer ANY proof. Not even a quote from a film distributor. This is just a cheap stereotype probably being used to garner publicity and support for what may well turn out to be a dull film.
Perhaps including the Gallup Poll is proof enough. This is truly a leap of logic that only a “Showbusiness editor” could make!
Besides, American film makers and distributors have no problem marketing films that offend the sensibilities of religious people in the U.S or elsewhere. One need only check the weekly movie listings for evidence of this.
Could it be the film will be a flop? Even PZ Myers struggled to say anything positive about the film…and he most likely hasn’t even seen it:
Although, to be fair, this is only part of the story. One reason it probably isn’t getting picked up is that it isn’t a blockbuster story — it’s a small film with a personal story. That’s not to say it’s a bad movie, but it’s not a Michael Bay noisemaker with car chases and explosions, or giant robots, or a remake of a 1970s cheesy TV show. That makes it a tougher sell.
Also, while it’s going to generate a little controversy from the know-nothing brigades, it’s not a movie that embraces the controversy and makes a lot of PR waves. I suspect it’s falling into the valley of the dead movies, where it’s got just enough negative vibe to turn away a segment (a small, stupid segment, of course, but theaters don’t care about the IQ of the people buying popcorn) of the population, but not enough shock value to make it a must-see movie for the controversy alone.
Film critic Roger Ebert (who hero worships Darwin and has been attacking creationists in the past year) notes that people were walking out of the press screen showing! Apparently it was a boring film. Very revealing is his comment that he hopes it wasn’t from boredom they walked out.
Maybe the U.S. film distributors know something we don’t know – it’s a box office disaster and will lose money. Certainly not because it’s “controversial for religious America.” The market is probably the History Channel or a PBS broadcast. Something for the wine and cheese crowd or local atheist clubs…
Like the play and movie Inherit the Wind, we now have another Hollywood history brainwashing. But in this instance, from the United Kingdom…
As a final note, another film showing at the Toronto International Film Festival is “Antichrist.” It’s not had any problem getting a U.S. film distributor. It is much more controversial than “Creation”:
Lars von Trier’s “Antichrist” is poised to detonate at the Toronto Film Festival. This willfully controversial director will inspire, as he often does, a storm of controversy, debate, critics clamoring to get into advance screenings that are already jammed, and a contentious press conference. Of the 400 or so films at TIFF this year, “Antichrist” was the first that sold out in advance. It was the same last May at Cannes, and that was before it has even been seen.
“Von Trier was nothing if not canny in his title for the film. By naming it “Antichrist,” he provides a lens through which to view its perplexing behavior. By naming his characters only He and She, he suggests the dark side of an alternative Garden of Eden, and then disturbing his ending becomes a mirror image of Christ welcoming the faithful into the kingdom of heaven. The title instructs us where to begin. If he had named the characters John and Mary, and titled the film “A Nightmare,” what conclusions might we have arrived at?
It even has two versions – one for Catholics and one for Protestants.
(NOTE: even some liberals were repulsed by the graphic sexual & mutilation scenes in this film.)
I rest my case…
cp
by D. Russell Humphreys
