Disorder Reviews: Noah (2014)

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Martintox

Mister Disorder
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Apr 3, 2020
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I have a new album and a new Disorder Reviews blog. I have recently recovered from a stroke, and I am now in serious debt.

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NOAH


Director: Darren Aronofsky
Producer: Scott Franklin, Darren Aronofsky, Mary Parent, Arnon Milchan
Screenplay: Darren Aronofsky, Ari Handel
Music: Clint Mansell
Actors: Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connelly, Ray Winstone, Emma Watson, Logan Lerman, Douglas Booth, Anthony Hopkins
Release Date: 28 March 2014
Genre: epic Biblical drama

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It may be due to the very nature of Aronofsky's work that he's doomed to eternal controversy. Though he has received universal acclaim for films such as The Wrestler, many of his best-known works have polarized audiences and critics, whether for good reason (Black Swan clearly being a take on Persona) or not (Requiem for a Dream supposedly being an overly negative portrayal of drug use, which I find particularly insulting because I died of a heroin overdose once, it's not a rosy thing). I have already more than adequately conveyed my appreciation for this director in my review of Black Swan, and I am certainly not the only person to love nearly everything he has put out; however, I find that his 2014 title Noah provokes a divide among his most devout fanatics in the same way that his other releases would a more standard film-watching community, albeit for a very different reason. If his previous works were too avant-garde, then this one is the opposite, a total concession to Hollywood and the Christians of America. However, a closer inspection quickly dispels these foolish notions -- at its core, it remains an Aronofsky film, and perhaps his most original one due to its exploration of more esoteric domains of Christianity.

It only takes cursory knowledge of the Abrahamic religions to know the story of Noah. Seeing the corruption and violence of the world, God decides to cleanse it through a great flood, but not before instructing the virtuous Noah to build an ark in which he is to preserve himself, his family, and two of every animal on earth. After 150 days of flooding, the ark hits shore on the mountains of Ararat, and God makes a covenant with all living creatures, promising that such an event will never happen again. Noah follows all of the broad strokes of the story, but with this being an Aronofsky project, there are many nuances that distinguish it from a mere live action episode of VeggieTales. Particularly notable is its usage of non-Biblical texts: for instance, the Watchers (angels cast out of Heaven after helping humanity of their own agency) are based on the Book of Enoch. There are also some environmentalist and political undertones: the descendants of Cain, who are at the source of the world's corruption, are depicted as an industrialized society, and there are pieces of imagery relating to the murder of Abel that are meant as a parallel to current world events.

The addition of such elements already does well to spice up the film, but the most interesting addition for the faithful and filthy secular alike is its development of Noah's psychology. Anyone accustomed to Aronofsky's movies should not be surprised; he loves to present people so involved in a certain goal or obsession that their lives begin to fall apart. However, most of those characters began to unravel because they saw their aforementioned goal slip through their fingers through various circumstances; in the case of Noah, it may well be a little too within reach, as he believes that he and his family must die along with the rest of humanity. In other words, he is a Christian nihilist, as he feels that his continued existence is a betrayal of God's will. The film does great work in conveying his difficulty coming to terms with the idea that he and his family should somehow survive when everyone else has died in the flood. While I'm not entirely sure what to think of the very end, where he once again embraces the idea that God does hold inherent value in his existence, he has such difficulty coming to this conclusion that I'm willing to let it slide.

The story aside, it's worth remembering that Noah is the director's most expensive movie by far, with a budget more than three times that of The Fountain, and it shows. It's a very visually extravagant work, with plenty of special effects and extras, especially in the action sequences that remind you that this is, indeed, a Hollywood production. It's also possible that executive meddling may have prevented Aronofsky from going even further than he already has with the non-Biblical elements, and I suspect that Ray Winston's role as Tubal-cain, though interesting in its own right as a philosophical opposite to Noah (instead of renouncing his existence for God, he renounces God for his existence and attempts to get into the ark), may have been another concession so as to have an explicit antagonist in the story. Even so, there are some brilliant sequences, especially for a Hollywood project: the most memorable one may be Noah's retelling of the creation of the world, making use of the same kind of fast-cut editing that made the likes of Requiem for a Dream so iconic.

It's rather difficult to tell where Noah precisely slots in relation to the rest of Aronofsky's catalogue; for all its merits, I'll concede that there may have been some restrictions in its production that, in addition to the subject matter, will make this little more than a footnote in his filmography. It should definitely not be your first pick if you want to get into his work, but it's still a very worthwhile viewing for a well-versed fan or a Christian nihilist who wants to see what is perhaps the very first big budget depiction of this faith.

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PERSONAL RATING: ***½
RECOMMENDATION RATING: ***
LETTERED RATING: A

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Latif

Senior Member
Apr 13, 2020
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So, who else votes in the poll before actually reading the review?
I suppose I am in the minority here, since I actually read the review first and then cast my vote (for what little it is worth).
 

Fat Hippo

Prepare to be Gnomed
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May 29, 2009
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I suppose I am in the minority here, since I actually read the review first and then cast my vote (for what little it is worth).
And yet we voted for the same thing.
It must be fate.
 

Sneed's SeednFeed

Elite Member
Apr 10, 2020
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Brave of Aaronofsky to keep the scene where Noah would have to enact incest to perpetuate his bloodline.