come anticipate Kevin Sarbo as an evil atheist philosophy professor in the new film from Pure Flix Entertainment, GOD'S NOT DEAD

how did this presumably ridiculous movie that i assumed would be nothing but a source of in-jokes become an actual success?

They should hand out Burpo kooshes at HIFR

What's the proportion of people who've paid to see this movie ironically?

don't pay money for this movie, seriously folks. if you have to go for the yuks, then sneak in.

how did this presumably ridiculous movie that i assumed would be nothing but a source of in-jokes become an actual success?

― Merdeyeux, Saturday, April 19, 2014 9:43 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

christians--they are everywhere

the success of this film is one of those depressing reminders that i share this country with millions upon millions of bigoted, willfully ignorant nutcases

We need a series of GG Allin biopics to bring some equilibrium

aleister crowley biopic IIRC

This shit used to be straight to vhs/dvd fodder :(

in some ways it's a symptom of the growth of mega-multiplexes—they need stuff to fill all those screens.

the weird thing is, these films aren't even fundie-lite like the "son of god" thing ("Jesus was a very nice man who could do magic"). these are fairly hard core "Xians are being persecuted by the godless elite!" stories—or at least "god's not dead" is.

well not as hard core as this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5o_LwqX77I

1/2 of that film is really gory violence like communist thuggos decapitating people or sending a spike through a kid's ear etc.

This shit used to be straight to vhs/dvd fodder :(

― getting strange ass all around the globe (Neanderthal), Saturday, April 19, 2014 10:15 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

actually i think the building blocks of the current success were things like screenings in churches, churches renting out single screens, etc.

nah it got limited releases and would spread by word of mouth in smaller markets (there's a similar model now w/ certain movies targeted to the hispanic audience). it's just now fundie flicks have the distribution and marketing muscle and competence of real studios behind it. the audience was always there. it's similar to how every few years hollywood will remember that black ppl exist and go to the movies.

Ave Sathanas

nah it got limited releases and would spread by word of mouth in smaller markets

yes, but before that there was a bible-belt circuit for christian movies, consisting of churches, community centers, rented-out high school auditoriums, etc.

o yeah ron ormond, etc

Frailty increased the number of believers iirc

Kind of amazed that this movie appeals to anyone, really. The premise is beyond ridiculous.

fairly sure if this came out when I was in high school, it would have been a youth group field trip to see this movie. Fundies eat this kinda faux-persecution bullshit up like hotcakes. Most liberal Christians, on the other hand, are embarrassed by movies of this ilk. On the other hand, the reason Heaven is For Real (ugh) is doing well with critics is apparently it has distanced itself from the blatant hammer-to-the-face propaganda stylings of films in this genre (I can't speak to the validity of those claims obv).

It was amusing - a similar film, Last Ounce of Courage, came out last year to really terrible reviews. And this one Christian movie critic, of the more liberal variety, wrote an extremely critical review of it on her blog, calling it "bigoted", "mean-spirited", as well as questioning its motives. Her comments section filled up with angry fundies attacking her, one of them calling her a "bigoted liberal"!

Kind of amazed that this movie appeals to anyone, really. The premise is beyond ridiculous.

― ▴▲ ▴TH3CR()$BY$H()W▴▲ ▴ (Adam Bruneau), Sunday, April 20, 2014 11:06 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah but it's the same premise as one of the most popular email "memes" w/in the evangelical milieu

yeah every negative review of one of these xian films on variety, film international, wherever automatically gets a million comments from fundies screaming that the author is just one of the hollywood liberal mafia.

there's usually one or two poor souls who actually try to explain that thinking a movie about christlove is bad doesn't mean that the same person thinks jesus is bad.

fundies not down with critical thinking, news at 11.

Well what Jesus said/did and what fundies do in his name are more or less complete opposite ends of the spectrum as far as I'm concerned. If this was really a movie about Christlove it would be all about helping poor people, healing the sick, and casting out money lenders. Not two idiots having a pride-off.

I'm waiting for the Cliven Bundy movie to come out, it will probably have the same fanbase

Bad review = "I told you so."

yeah the movie Last Ounce of Courage was about a bunch of 'courageous' Christians standing up for the 'real meaning of Christmas' when evil Atheists stop city hall from displaying a manger, and how in the end they bully the town into ignoring sep of church and state and get their way.

I saw some of it but the unintentional LOLs faded quick when I realized how much sway some of these people hold IRL

I remember when I was a Fundie, we had these green workbooks (I forget what they were called), and one of them had a sad story about how a science teacher had the audacity to teach Evolution, and how little Billy raised his hand and stammered "b-b-but I believe in Jesus and the Resurrection" and the teacher of course replies "Well I'm sorry, Billy, but Evolution is a scientific fact!", concluding with a summary of how this is proof persecution against Christians still occurs.

The workbook also said "Evolution is ridiculous! If you saw a car in a garbage dump, would you assume it had evolved from the materials around it?"

yeah the movie Last Ounce of Courage was about a bunch of 'courageous' Christians standing up for the 'real meaning of Christmas' when evil Atheists stop city hall from displaying a manger, and how in the end they bully the town into ignoring sep of church and state and get their way.

I saw some of it but the unintentional LOLs faded quick when I realized how much sway some of these people hold IRL

― getting strange ass all around the globe (Neanderthal), Sunday, April 20, 2014 1:41 PM (45 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i feel like these folks live in another country, almost literally. trying around small-town kentucky i saw tons of christmas mangers and ten commandments etc. planted just outside of country courthouses. something that would pretty much never happen around here. it's not they didn't get the memo--it's that nobody in town has any interest in challenging the displays, and prefer to ignore/defy the memo.

i admit i don't have many "christian" feelings toward these assholes.

DRIVING around

This is shit is tribal, not theological. Negative film criticism is always taken on as a personal attack by those who identify (a LOT) with the movie's subject matter/genre/etc. And since you get pissed off people on the internet who feel personally attacked, they harden up into defensive mode and respond in (perceived) kind. Want another example of this with another subculture? Folks who really likes the Star Wars prequels.

A great, GREAT deal of the screaming bullshit done by rightwing/evangelical types makes far more since if you find+replace "Christian" with "Roman" or "Klingon" or "Trekker" or "Juggalo." It's a people in a rightwing authoritarian subculture wrapping themselves themselves in a trademarked term they call "Christian" and get away with it because they grab the most screentime and we're never called on their shit in the 60s-80s by media types giving them airtime.

Since = sense.

Dysgraphia and smartphone text entry make for interesting randomized word substitutions.

There's nothing new about this. Remember a lil top grossing film called The Passion of the Christ? Same audience.

there were definitely non-religious folk that saw it ironically for the gore factor though.

one of my atheist friends came back from it and was like "dude it was awesome! Jesus got his skin flayed off!"

Atheists down w supporting antisemitic racist assholes, cool

ey I didn't say I supported that line of reasoning. but I do remember sites like Ruthless Reviews reviewing it in this manner too.

I think you are really on to something irt Christian/Klingon/Juggalo/etc maybe religion is objectively dead (due to picking fights w science, due to reading the Bible wrong/not at all) but the void has been filled with pop culture. Think about it, it makes lots of sense, there are rituals, there is idolization, there is intense attention to detail, deification of canonical works, expanded ("apocryphal") universes, etc.

For people that don't dress up, they can read People magazine and get their mythos weekly. Or live another life vicariously through following a TV series.

Kind of amazed that this movie appeals to anyone, really. The premise is beyond ridiculous.

Is there a siingle actual irl incident that this could even be seen as a reference to, of a US philosophy professor (at a state institution?) insisting on converting every student in a lecture hall to atheism/secularism?

single

as observed above I think this is based on a forwarded email, and on a Jack T Chick tract called "Big Daddy."

http://media.chick.com/tractimages67491/0055/0055_06.gif

Reality probably doesn't come into it as much as a really strong gut feeling about being persecuted, brought on by not having any evidence to back up what you believe and needing to not face that. It's kind of a plot that writes itself.

LIke that image of the professor is probably how professors look to you if deep down you have to not face that you're full of shit.

I'd definitely go see God's Not Dead if it had a scene depicting the 'atheist professor vs marine' Facebook meme.

♫ god's not dead / he's surely alive ♫
― am0n, Tuesday, November 26, 2013 8:04 PM

HOLY SHIT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLYafQUDrOk

Wait is Hercules in this or not

as observed above I think this is based on a forwarded email, and on a Jack T Chick tract called "Big Daddy."

Ah, read the previous links, thanks.

that 'most emotional scene' makes the prospect of seeing it for lols a bit grimmer.

Holy fuck, just watched that.

that was tremendous

i had to watch it on mute - it's about some fundie finding out his daughter is a lesbian (after clearly having been recruited at school) and kicking her out right?

Vance Null is known for God's Not Dead (2014), Samson (2018) and Tekken: Kazuya's Revenge (2014).

apparently "kazuya's revenge" does not live up to the standard fans of the first Tekken movie were expecting

to me that's impressive, that you take people who are like "look i loved the first tekken film but this is just crap, a real wrong turn for the tekken franchise"

when you've lost Manly Movie (re: Tekken sequel):

Manly Movie gave the film a score of 3 out of 10, commenting that:

"It's like the producers and writers have no idea who these characters are, and had no intention of giving a crap, but were advised that certain actors were free for a cameo – use them".