The Unbelievers

source: The Unbelievers

For a film covering such curious individuals as Dawkins and Krauss, it doesn't actually seem that curious about anything other than its very myopic perspective: that science cancels out religion. Irritated and irritating.

This film is essentially preaching to the choir. Which is fine, but not really entertaining. Nor does it seek intelligent debate. When you have a film that opens up with someone saying "Science is beautiful and right, and religion is not beautiful and not right" - you know what you are getting into here - people who are just as closed minded as those they are accusing of such. What I don't understand is why these people who pride themselves on being smarter than everyone else have nothing better to do than to try to convince believers of any religion that having faith is wrong by means of trying to make them feel stupid. If it makes people happy why are you interfering? What baffles me is how these so-called geniuses condemn "religion" so readily and yet can't accept the concept that a higher being is responsible for their scientific findings. Funny enough one of them even says "to assume the truth without asking the questions leads you nowhere" - yet he is assuming within his own beliefs - which is that natural selection etc occurred without the presence of a deity. Anyway, people these days don't want to hear anything contradictory to their own world-view so this film that attempts to be smart is actually very dumbed down, knowing that it is essentially just telling a certain group of people what they already want to hear. Because it refuses to understand the other side of the debate it is not brave, it is not exciting and it is not intelligent. But Ricky was in it so I'll give them a couple stars for that.

This movie has been criticized for its lack of entertainment value and also because it's not convincing. I disagree with the entertainment part, because it entertained me. The only thing I found annoying was the sound-mixing. It's a short period of the lives of Dawkins and Krauss, and was not meant to make people stop believing in god. It is more about what these two guys are trying to do, how they do it and why they do it. It's basically promotion for their movement, and I see no problem with that. I was a bit disappointed though, for various personal reasons and expectations, but the overall thing is kinda good at what it does. If you don't know about Dawkins and Krauss, this is the movie for you, because it is what the movie's about. Don't expect religious vs atheist debates in this documentary, like I did, because these are not included. They are all over the internet by the plenty though, so if you want you can check them out. It's an interesting documentary to understand what atheism is about, what it is willing to do and who are the big names of the movement. Not necessary, but you can still watch it and learn something out of it. I know I did and I'm a atheist.

I have a very academically oriented cousin. He knows my points of view and how the intellectually curious mind is so highly prized by me. Because of that he recommends films he finds mostly on Netflix which he thinks I will enjoy. He surely knows me well as he suggested a documentary film gem entitled "The Unbelievers" which threw a strike right over my cerebral plate. It is a wonderful documentary which I would like to distribute on street corners telling electoral ignorance the ever important difference between truth and fiction. The film involves snippets of a variety of world-wide talks and discussions between Richard Dawkins, the evolutionary biologist and author of "The God Delusion" and his colleague Lawrence Krauss, theoretical physicist and cosmologist author of a "Universe from Nothing." I offer the following quotes from the documentary to whet your appetite for it: "If we live in a world where certain things are not subject to question we live in a world where thinking has stopped" "One might think that the religious beliefs of political candidates should remain off limits in public discourse. I don't think so, at least not when candidates wear their religion on their sleeves; then it becomes fair game." "Before Darwin life was a miracle so one could not ask "Where did the diversity of life come from?" What Darwin showed were very simple laws of biological beginnings with NO miracle. Did he prove it? No, but it was plausible. Now there has been 150 years of proof that natural selection and genetic mutation essentially could produce all the complexity of life from very simple beginnings to the most complex over billions of years" "How can how the universe works upset people? Instead of being threatened or having our faith threatened by the discoveries of science we should force our beliefs to conform to the evidence of reality instead of the other way around. People shouldn't be threatened by science." I cannot recommend "The Unbelievers" strongly enough. Watch it, learn and know!

The sole executive producer of the film is Lawrence Krauss who is also one of the main subjects of the film. So if that seems like a bit of self-promotion propaganda that is exactly how the movie feels. If you are an Atheist or a Theist looking for a film about the best arguments of Atheism and intellectual stimulation from two of the leading proponents of Atheistic thought, you won't find it here. If you're an Atheist looking for mindless hero worship of Atheist leaders, this is your flick. This isn't a documentary it's a promotional piece. We don't learn more about the subjects, we don't really learn more about the subject. There is no plot, no hero's journey, no 3 act structure, or even a story line. The editing is nonsensical. At one point it seems to be edited to show (we assume unintentionally) that Lawrence Krauss is a hard worker and in demand while Richard Dawkins isn't. It is filled with meaningless images that don't set the mood or even transition well to the next scene. This film was poorly conceived, poorly made, poorly edited, and is a waist of time.

The Unbelievers (2013) 7/10 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2636522/ This presentation of Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss on tour is packaged as a tour highlights reel. They go into a venue, we are given a few lines of speech, discussion or debate and then it's off to another venue and a few more lines. We see a lot of the people who attend these lectures/events. I believe the purpose of the movie is, this time, not conversion to reason but to show that it is becoming more and more accepted and acceptable to 'come out' as an atheist. There is a cynical, to my mind, application of marketing acumen in that the film is bookended with clips of comments from 'celebrities', thus giving us reassurance that this all must be important and true! Well, first ya gotta get the rubes in the tent! My cynical beast will go lie down in the corner and let the grownups make the world safer for honesty. The most liberating thought I have ever had: I am a temporary biological event existing in an indifferent universe.

Renowned scientists Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss cross the globe as they speak publicly about the importance of science and reason in the modern world. The film starts off with some unusual interviews, such as Woody Allen and Cameron Diaz. Ricky Gervais is a bit more well-known for his views. Then we go to Lawrence Krauss on tour, and it is odd to see empty lecture halls (maybe this is normal and it would just be odd for places like Madison). What this film shows is that atheism needs a new face, as Richard Dawkins and the late Christopher Hitchens are such divisive figures. Lawrence Krauss is an improvement, as he is not nearly as polarizing. This is evident when they share a stage and Krauss is more compromising. The approach, if it is to be successful, ought to be pro-evolution, pro-science and not anti-religion. Religion is not the enemy. Dawkins makes an interesting parallel between the idea of a middle-aged person turning old and a species becoming another: when does one end and another begin? This is, of course, the big question. If a pre-human did not give birth to a modern man, what was the process? To top off the film, the "Rally for Reason" is an incredible sight and must have been one heck of an event, with all the usual faces (like Penn Gillette) plus some special guests like Eddie Izzard, Adam Savage and James Randi. Where else can college professors be treated like rock stars?

I recently saw this film at Filmbar in Phoenix, and I was left dissatisfied. I feel like the film wasn't sure what it wanted to be, ultimately causing it to fail on two fronts. IF the point of the film was to just show you the working life of Dawkins and Krauss, that's fine, but it seems to do a lot more than that and if a biased way. The directors are clearly fans and the film is edited with that influence. I am an Atheist with no argument to make for religion, and I was left feeling that we can do better. If the film IS trying to make an argument for Atheism and against religion, it's a pretty poor one. The film seems to imply that no one who is religious values sciences, the multiverse, physics - things any fair person should know is not true. It ignores that there are many scientists now and in history that had faith. The film behaves as if fundamentalism and Bible literalism are the bulk of religious opinion. I don't believe that is so. Also, there are some statements about history as it pertains to religion that are false, and easy to dispel. In short, I think Atheism is a positive embracing of secular ideals, but I don't think the way to inspire it in people is to parade celebrity endorsements, imply superiority, and belittle people who believe differently than you. When this is your method, it seems like the cult of non-belief instead of rational thought. We can do better than this.

Being an atheist in the public is really an interesting subject. Especially in the US it's a sensitive area, so I was told that this movie would be about this. Well, it's not really, but the bigger problem is, that instead we get a 70 minute self-hooray, which was even for me as an atheist just too annoying after a while. I would've loved to see in the movie deep thoughts, which I could show to a religious person and make him think. Instead we get a lot of pointless montages with bad cuts, where someone says something and the crowd goes nuts. What exactly was this movie made for? Atheists watching this won't get really more connected to the subject, religious persons won't even have the interest to keep watching after latest 10 minutes. The movie had the potential to make something good, it had 2 good personas, but it was ruined by a really bad concept/directing. Just considering the main movie (without the off-speaking of guest-stars) doesn't even reach 70 minutes, just shows how low on ideas they were.