There's a lot of hilarity in the first half of the film, including a line from Arkansas' Senater, when asked, "You're one of the few people in our country who actually exercise state power over this country. I always worry about people like you. of people would believe in a talking snake or something." The Senate replied
well, you don't have to pass an IQ test to be in Senate. Then Bill Maher's face sank, and so did Senator's.
Since it is a movie for the general public, it is inevitable that the film will make people feel that many doubts and attacks are actually hitting some places that are easily refuted. Fundamentalism is easy to refute, and most of the firm believers are ordinary people, not "political comedians" like Bill Maher who are proficient in language skills, logic and debate. Religion is not truth. It is a fact, most believers will definitely not say that religion is false, but I still believe it. But the meaning of religion's existence is not entirely in truth or falsehood. Maybe I don't feel the bad side, there is something inherently evil about those scriptures or teachings. Many times people rely on need support and for various reasons they cannot get it through relatives and friends and they turn to religion. Sometimes religion acts as the last straw for people's psychological balance. Many religions do bring good, if not intentionally.
Bill Maher is more accommodating than Richard Dawkins and more penetrating than Jon Stewart's questions. There are many scenes in the film that make me want to pull Bill Maher over and not let him embarrass others, as Bill Maher himself said, they are nice people.
While totally expected, a few things still impressed me. People with totally opposing beliefs can still sit together and have a calm, sensible conversation, when unpleasantness happens, it's only at the worst that "i don't wanna be part of it" or "i don't want to continue" this." This kind of non-aggressive non-cooperation. Rarely did I see anger, impatience, personal attacks, belittling, and other emotions that arbitrarily spoil the atmosphere of discussion due to disagreements. Extreme fanatics are a minority, and the filming will not deliberately choose people who speak well. Ok, the above doesn't include muslims.
The film slowly mentions the Muslims, and their intolerance, they say that the Netherlands has become so tolerant now that they can tolerate intolerance. This I have mentioned before, and more fundamentally underlying this intolerance is the grievances that the environment will bring to the people there, and these grievances form the psychological motivation for intolerance. When a person's behavior is restricted and his personality is suppressed, he becomes more hostile to the outside world, and has a desire to control the people around him. Through these, he can fight against the inferiority caused by the environment. This is also the source of my previous criticism of "The Tide", which portrays dictatorship and autocracy as a happy and warm family without showing that kind of xenophobic emotion. This intolerance can spread, and when people approach it, people themselves become it.
This film may not be a rigorous academic questioning. It spends a lot of time to catch some easy bugs, and there is a relatively strong summary propaganda language at the end. But if you need to see some technical jokes, this movie is the first choice. Even though my English limits me from not being able to fully understand every point of the joke, it still allows me to be drawn to watch the whole movie without any difficulty. And it can really motivate people to think about some questions, which may be better than providing an answer directly.
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