Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. You know my thoughts on Bill Maher and Larry Charles' flick, but we got another review from regular voice Art Snob. He seemed to enjoy the film as much as I did, but is concerned with the impact it's going to have. I won't speak for him any more, so without any further introing, here's Art Snob!

RELIGULOUS

(Note: the official pronunciation is with a hard “G” – the “lig” rhymes with “big”.)

It’s kind of moot to discuss Bill Maher’s RELIGULOUS on its considerable merits. U.S. right-wingers have carte blanche to make ANY accusation about a perceived “liberal” movie they want to without ever being gainsaid in the mainstream media and without ever actually seeing the movie. (Witness: Bill O’Reilly re BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN, Charles Krauthammer re SYRIANNA, and some guy named John McCain re FAHRENHEIT 911.) Mark my words, they’re going to be going to town on this film in the same dishonest fashion, and it’s going to work. Michael Medved (the only right-winger who actually WILL admit to seeing the movie) will support everything they say while gleefully pointing out that it isn’t doing anywhere near the business of director Larry Charles’ previous effort, BORAT (theater counts and vast dissimilarities between the films be damned). Major theater chains will be intimidated from exhibiting it (I predict Regal will be the first to cave), newspapers will be intimidated from advertising it, and protestors will be present at every single independent theater that exhibits it. It will easily make a profit due to its limited production costs and free “forbidden fruit” publicity, but if Maher and Charles have any ideas of scoring political points with this film, they’re delusional. Americans don’t vote rationally – they vote viscerally.

(Note: I’d LOVE to be wrong, but I wish that I could make book on being right. If I was Howard Dean, I’d beg them NOT to release it during the campaign season as planned. This is going to be a lob serve to conservative opinion makers, providing a ripe campaign distraction that will help Rick Davis & co. ensure that this is not a campaign about issues. It can ONLY benefit the political right.)

OK, enough prognosticating. For the sake of formality, here is what a major Maher fan (I’ve been watching him regularly since “Politically Incorrect” was on Comedy Central, got HBO when “Real Time” began, and have found him to be a welcome “keeping it real” voice throughout the Bush era) thinks about the movie itself:

The premiere was on Saturday night, and it was a total sellout, with a more than three blocks long ticket holders line and a huge rush ticket line. Also, protestors (about 20) marching in a circle in a fenced area near the theater entrance with placards reading stuff like “Pray for Bill” and “Hate + Fear = Religulous.” (One of Maher’s best lines of the post-screening Q & A came when somebody asked him if he’d staged the protest as a publicity stunt: “No … if I’d of staged it, it wouldn’t have been so lame.” Funny for now, but this protest was NOTHING compared to what’s going to be happening in the States.) The enthusiastic crowd was particularly impressive considering that Maher’s show doesn’t air on HBO Canada – if you want to see him up here, your only options are YouTube or a friend in the States with a Slingbox.

I said in my previous post that the acid test for me was going to be whether or not the film made me laugh reflexively and often. The short answer: yes. In traveling to various religious sites around the Globe (the Vatican, Salt Lake City and the Creationism museum among them), Bill puts his congenial (never condescending or smug) demeanor and rapier wit to excellent use, gently and good-naturedly deconstructing the entrenched beliefs of the interviewees with probing, sincere questions occasionally punctuated by his trademark off-speed quips. He’s as non-confrontational as Michael Moore is in your face.

The editing of the film is outstanding, and there was genuine applause when Bill and Larry asked the editors to take a bow. There’s all kinds of archival footage (stuff like scenes from old religious movies, old Maher standup routines where he made religious jokes, statements from politicians, etc.) cleverly interwoven with the current material. Also clever: on-screen messages suggesting what people are thinking. There’s a scene where a Muslim official Bill is interviewing is interrupted by a cell phone call, excuses himself for a moment, and you see a hilarious suggestion as to what the official is text messaging.

I do have a legitimate cavil with the film that I’ve seen others mention as well: a few too many of the interviewees are just TOO easy to take apart – almost caricatures. The best interviews are the ones Bill has with conflicted intellectuals and professionals trying to reconcile their beliefs with their work. I got the last Q of the Q & A, and inquired as to whom the biggest names they tried to interview who turned them down were. Charles explained that they aimed high, but that there are simply too many layers in religious organizations to get to the top with the time and resources they had. There are plenty of famous faces in the interwoven clips, but a fundamentalist Senator, a Vatican astronomer, and a retired priest are about as high as you get up the theological ladder as far as the interviews go. Bill’s concluding statements are pretty strong stuff, but they’re undermined somewhat by some of the buffoons he interviews along the way, particularly a guy in a fancy suit who claims to be the second coming of Jesus.

Like FAHRENHEIT, the film makes clever use of popular music (the Doobie Brothers’ JESUS IS JUST ALRIGHT WITH ME, and the Talking Heads’ WE’RE ON A ROAD TO NOWHERE are among the numbers used). What I can’t understand (unless they haven’t heard it or couldn’t get the rights) is why they didn’t use Ozzy Osbourne’s I DON’T KNOW for the closing credits … it’s SUCH a perfect match for the film’s tone and POV; better than IRON MAN was for IRON MAN. (Any member of Bill’s staff or entourage reading this, PLEASE make sure that he’s heard it.)

One thing Bill said during the Q & A was very interesting, and set up a huge laugh. He said that of all the groups that hate him, the one he most fears are Australians -- they went ballistic over a Halloween costume of questionable taste he wore after Steve Irwin died a few years ago and have sent him his most toxic hate mail. After he explained this, a guy in the audience with a thick Aussie accent called out, “*I* still love you, Bill!” and the audience roared with laughter.

The bottom line is that your enjoyment of this film will be pretty much dependent on your enjoyment of Maher. Easy for me and another memorable TIFF viewing experience to chalk up, but I have to say that upon reflection, I’m very apprehensive about what the political fallout from this film is going to be. There was a poster for the film on a truck that circled the block while the lines were forming that showed three monkeys in Hassidic Jewish, Pope and Muslim garb doing the see no/hear no/speak no thing, and I shudder to think of what a provocation this strong is going to set off in America. I have visions of truckloads of red meat being delivered to Fox News, Clear Channel, the McCain camp, the RNC, etc.

Bill praised the independence of distributor Lionsgate Films (the same Canadian firm that distributed FAHRENHEIT in 2004 when it was too hot for any American distributor), saying “they’re one company that can’t be intimidated by people calling in saying, ‘if you don’t pull the film, we won’t buy your toothpaste.’”

Maybe so, but it isn’t going to stop there … not by a LONG shot. The tentative release date is October 3rd. Enjoy the calm before the storm.