Religulous vs Contact

I really like Bill Maher’s show, but everybody knows he can be kind of a dick. And nothing inspires this in him more, in that talking-over-everyone-else-louder-and-louder-until-he-feels-he’s-made-his-point-but-has-really-only-been-loudest way than religion. So even though I think Bill is smart and funny, I was uncomfortable with the idea of him making a documentary about religion because I thought he’d be condescending, rude and biased. I guess I forgot those things can be funny sometimes.

Religulous is Bill Maher’s attempt to get to the bottom of modern religion in the world, although he leaves out a few (no Buddhists, Jehovah Witnesses, Amish or Hindu are interviewed, for example). Bill mainly tackles Christianity, of course, in places like a museum where dinosaurs wear saddles and play alongside cave kids, and a church at a truck stop where I worried for Bill’s safety (some people don’t like being asked anything, at all, that might make them defend, question or even state their religious beliefs.

Bill travels all over the United States, to Vatican City, and to the Middle East. My favorite interviews were in Vatican City, with an astronomer who works in the observatory, and with a priest standing outside, both of whom decried traditionalists who aren’t willing to accept science or adjust and interpret religion for modern living. The guy outside was especially illuminating; he was funny, angry and flat-out odd. You could probably make an entire documentary just about him.

And then, of course, no offense, don’t blame me, but there were hilarious and borderline creepy segments on Scientology and Mormonism. Why it is that some religions can’t acknowledge science at all, while others acknowledge what is blatant science fiction is beyond me.

Through it all, Maher does his own interviews, and remains fairly open-minded and curious. He interviews his mother and sister, a guy in Amsterdam who worships weed, and of course, some evangelists in the United States who have become millionaires by, well, lying, basically. Maher isn’t as soft on them, which is nice, because if there’s anybody who’s a dick on TV these days, it’s a televangelist.

So there are all kinds of scary religion documentaries out there, things about snake-handlers and child molestation and compounds full of wives. Do you really think I would do that to your day? Surely you know me better than that by now. Nope, next up is Contact (some of you just said, “I can’t believe you’re doing this to my day.”)

Yeah, I know, Contact isn’t exactly holding up spectacularly well. Jodie Foster is great, because being great is what she does, and Contact is yet another chance for Foster to portray the most intelligent person in any given room. Her character is named Ellie, but she might as well be called Science. Religion is played by Matthew McConaughey. Science hooks up with Religion and makes sweet talk and painless debate about faith and belief and traveling to space. Almost forgot: Ellie is traveling to space. She works out in a field of satellites and has received transmission from aliens who have been watching Earth for decades via the images we’ve put out there on TV. They’re ready for her to visit their world, and send instructions for how to get her there. It’s kind of a cool invention, even though it can only be used once, and there’s much back-and-forth in the way of science and religion talk, but eventually, Ellie gets her clearance and goes to space.

And it’s very cheesy and pretty and glow-in-the-darkish (bringing up Contact is the fastest way to get my buddy Wade to use the phrase “Pink Floyd video”), but so little happens, and man, Contact is like a day and a half long building up to that moment, and I suppose we have to rely on Ellie’s reaction to the events she experienced in space, and she was fairly blown away, so that’s something, right?

So, Contact, we’ve established, is overly-long, and cast kind of underwhelmingly (Ellie’s primary rival for the space trip is Tom Skerritt. Tom Skerritt is fine, but still: Tom Skerritt. I’m just saying. The villain is played by Jake Busey. Whatever. The only true acting peer Foster has here is Angela Bassett, in the kick-off of the boring supporting actor leg of a career that deserves far more interesting material.). But, as far as the Science versus Religion debate goes, it’s really one of the best recent fiction examples we’ve got. I bet Bill Maher thinks a lot of Contact is total bullshit. I bet he’d be fun to watch it with.

Religulous: B

Contact: B-