January
31
Summer Comedies: Religulous Stars Maher
Here's the one-sheet for the upcoming comedy Religulous, which has been described as "the nonfiction film about the greatest fiction ever told." This anti-religious interview doc springs from the fevered brows of producer-star Bill Maher and director Larry Charles. Lionsgate opens it in NYC and LA on June 20 and nationwide on July 2.
Statements from filmmakers Bill Maher and Larry Charles are on the jump:
Since starting on Politically Incorrect in 1993, it has been my pleasure over the last decade and a half to make organized religion one of my favorite targets. I often explained to people, “I don’t need to make fun of religion, it makes fun of itself.” And, then I go ahead and make fun of it too, just for laughs.
With religious fanatics like George Bush and Osama bin Laden now taking over the world, it seemed to me in recent years that this issue -- this cause of debunking the man behind the curtain -- needed to have a larger, more insistent and focused forum than late night television. I wanted to make a documentary, and I wanted it to be funny. In fact, since there is nothing more ridiculous than the ancient mythological stories that live on as today’s religions, this movie would try to be a real knee slapper. Unless, of course, you’re religious, then you might not like it.
Who could I get to direct me on such an epic quest? In reality, there was only one man, and his name is Larry Charles. I hope that together we fulfilled that quest. Which really isn’t that hard, considering that comedically speaking, the topic of religion is pretty much hitting the side of a barn.
As a comedian, religion has always interested me -- it was the single easiest subject to make jokes about. I think that tells us something: comedians look for things that don’t make sense, that are illogical.
Even as a young comedian, routines I did that got the biggest laughs and got me invited back on the Tonight Show were the religious ones -- like the one about being half Catholic and half Jewish and bringing a lawyer into confession: “Bless me father for I have sinned -- and I think you know Mr. Cohen . . .”
Politics is a rich area, but even politicians, although they promise some ridiculous stuff, don’t approach the level of, for example, the Mormon practice of promising couples a planet to rule over in the after life if they have a really good marriage on earth. They give you a planet -- kinda like when someone gives you a certificate that says a star has been named after you -- except here, they really give you the star!
Join me in the final battle between intelligence and stupidity that will decide the future of humanity. Coming soon to a house of false idols near you.
--Bill Maher
Ok. An old God, a very buff old God that lives in space decides to create the first man from earth dust, then makes a woman from that man’s rib. They get to live forever if they don’t eat the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge, but the woman is tricked into eating a piece by a talking snake and all future humanity is cursed. Or, how bout this one? This same space God who lives in the sky and has power over everything decides he wants a son, so he impregnates a woman but she remains a virgin. And, the child can walk on water and raise the dead. But his father, the sky God, sends him on a suicide mission to save humanity. After he dies, he rises from the dead and flies into space to be with his father (who is also him.)
Greek myths? The latest installment of the “Lord of the Rings”? Disney’s new animated movie? No! These are the foundations of Western religion. The tenuous shaky belief systems that our entire civilization rests upon.
What do you believe, why do you believe it, and why do you need to believe it? Can we be good without God? Is religion a calling or a mental illness? Were Jesus, Moses and Mohammed prophets and visionaries, or crackpot nut cases who today would be put away? Is religion an obsessive-compulsive disorder?
Comedian, acerbic commentator, raconteur, skeptic, seeker Bill Maher and I set off in search of answers to these questions in a raunchy, rude, irreverent, outrageous, and shocking nonfiction film about the greatest fiction ever told.
Set to the rhythms of “Sympathy for the Devil” and “Jesus Walks,” from the Western Wall to the Vatican, from self-professed messiahs to self professed Pariahs, we will not only expose the hypocrisy and corruption in organized religion but the absurdly hilarious logic that holds it together.
We will talk to clergy, extremists, scholars, politicians, ex-cons, the man on the street and even the man upstairs (that's right, we interview God.)
The funny will be scary, the scary wildly funny. The crazy will seem sane and the sane absolutely and undeniably crazy. All lines are blurred. All bets are off. We will get inside, on top of, behind, and in front of religion.
--Larry Charles
Subscribe to this blog's feed
i just saw a preview screening of this movie and it is hilarious! bill maher does not disappoint, he is funny and extremely smart. great movie!
Posted by: jessica | April 09, 2008 at 08:44 AM
Mormon's don't believe they're going to get their own planet in the afterlife.
He needs to do research before he goes making these kinds of statements, let alone a "documentry" movie on religion.
Posted by: Hayley | September 20, 2008 at 09:14 PM
I am a believing card-carrying Latter Day Saint. And yes, I find my people to be quite humorous sometimes...indeed, quite often. Watching a fellow Latter-day Saint from Utah wax eloquent about the kitsch they call Mormon art...now that's comedy. But it's not doctrine...nor is it Mormonism.
And talk of being promised a planet? Rubbish. It's the stuff that Mormons joke about probably more than Maher does. I have seen several Mormon marriages at this point and I have yet to hear a single word about being promised planets. Sure, the idea is that that we become like God. And God has children aka us. So therefore we'll have children as well. but I neither know nor care much about planets. It's tricky enough learning to love like Jesus.
Frankly, the last time I've heard serious talk about being given a planet was probably with that awkward fellow who drinks Mountain Dew in his mother's basement...
Posted by: Russell Stevenson | September 30, 2008 at 08:20 PM
A planet! Woohoo! I get a planet! With lzrs pew pew! And dinosaurs in 4x4s vrummm vrummm! And a cyborg beep beep boop bop bip!
We Mormons may believe in a more detailed afterlife than most religions, but is there anything that says we get a planet? No. Sadly. A dinosaur in a 4x4 sounds pretty cool.
Posted by: Eric | October 02, 2008 at 01:12 PM
A Planet? That's a new one. Maher is certainly irreverent and unrepentant in his mockery, but that is a wonderful thing about being American! Let the idiot have his say, just like the rest of us.
Me too, I'm "Mormon". It never ceases to amaze me how many cool new things I am told I believe. A planet! I can't wait! Do people really think we are that stupid? (must be)
Oh well, got some Kool-Aid I'm a makin'....
:)
Posted by: Robbie | October 09, 2008 at 06:23 PM
It's too bad that people will see this film and believe him. Mormons promised planets? I've been a Latter Day Saint my whole life and served a mission; I've never heard that before.
Posted by: Bryce | October 13, 2008 at 06:55 PM