Rent God's Not Dead (2014)

Watch it - God's Not Dead review by Swambi

I would substantiate the critic's review. The film is well made, well shot, has good music and a range of sub-plots and which sustains interest throughout. If you are an out and out atheist, don't bother, but otherwise the interaction and debate between Christian and atheist proposals is excellently presented, thought provoking and worth considering long-after you finish the film. Plenty of human interest, but personally I felt the last part of the film was the weakest, with a 'death-bed conversion' and a concert (ok if it meets your taste).

The question is Is God dead? - God's Not Dead review by IG

The premise of this movie is to ask the question is God dead in the context of a young Christian student having to go against his university professsor as he refuses to accept the premise that God is dead.

Generally well acted and if you are open minded will make you think.

Of course there are some stereotypes but please look past these to grapple with the issues.

Holy Soap Opera Very Over-lathered - God's Not Dead review by CV

Writing as a Christian believer myself I am afraid I have to say that this was a bad film in many ways. The characterisations were flat cartoon-like caricatures, the soap-opera-like slew of dramatic incident and relationship issues were completely unbelievable and the stereotypical Christian life-experience just did not ring true. When evaluating a film it will not do to judge it on its intentions, noble and well-meaning no doubt they were but on its artistic and dramatic integrity of which this film falls far short.

There is so much tub-thumping that one feels preached at and patronised as everything is spelt out so graphically: the atheist professor is depicted as a kind of Medieval Mystery Play devil while the believing student is very carefully portrayed as meek, extremely-well read and knowledgeable, a David and Goliath parallel. Amy is loneliness personified, the professor's partner, Mina, the downtrodden and persecuted angel-like figure; you also have the patient Pastor Dave and his jolly friend who embraces all frustration with a "God is good" and beaming smile. All these figures could be the stock conventional characters in a play like Everyman which little human depth. As the film is supposed to be real and convincing I am afraid it fails.

The already established relationships between the professor and his partner and that between Josh and his girlfriend seem to have had an impossible pre-history. The first relationship one would assume to have been sexual, (inconsistent behaviour with the saintly Mina) and the second one raises the question of whether there had been discussion of what Josh's faith means to him. Do I not understand American culture or would a professor's guests at a dinner party really all openly humiliate his partner; would a highly intellectual professor get so emotional in front of his class: would Mina (an exemplary Christian we are to believe) storm into her partner's place of work, rudely interrupt a conversation and blast a very personal matter in public? Why were was Pastor Dave so blase after the fatal traffic accident? I could go on.

There are many incidents themselves such as the repeated car failure that are so contrived and eventually become predictable,

The final scene where every Christian introduced in the film flocks to a Christian rock concert and are seen dancing in near ecstasy gives the impression that this is the zenith of Christian experience. Personally, I prefer a Bach cantata, poetry and the quietness of nature for spiritual uplift which seems a million miles from the depiction of Christian living in this film! It is very uncomfortable to have to give this film a low mark with its honest motives but this film, obviously not fantasy, has to meet the same standards of any other film and sadly this one is a long way behind.