Movies saying that Atheism is true.

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Sep 14, 2009
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Forlong said:
gmaverick019 said:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0815241/

it isn't ENTIRELY atheist... but it definitely is up there i would say
I like how ironic the title is.

To be honest, atheists don't make for a lot of good story telling, unless they realize their wrong in the end. The whole arc aspect of movies works against atheism in movies. Wait, should "atheism" be capitalized?
yeah i lol'd the first time i saw it.

and sometimes i think atheists go about it the wrong way for "supporting" atheism...

use science or creative logical thinking for expressing your views in a movie format or tv show format, don't just sit there and go "HUR LOL GOD ISN'T REAL HURR", that's fucking boring and all your doing is concentrating too much on being "edgy" anti religious, not what an atheist actually articulates by.
 

martin's a madman

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Daystar Clarion said:
And how would that film turn out?


"There is no god."

"Well shit."

Roll credits.

Oscar material right there.
Haha, made me laugh.


Atheism isn't thematic, there's not a way to make a story around someone not believing.

I mean, there are documentaries debunking intelligent design from the perspective of modern science, if that counts.
 

Asita

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PedroSteckecilo said:
If you've read through the whole series you'd know that...

God and the Angels are just powerful beings ruling like tyrants over mankind, religion and heaven are a lie and primarily exist to control people.
I have read the entire series (and I still don't like Pullman's endings). I'm also familiar enough with religion in general to know that the concept of deities is vast enough that the 'just powerful beings' argument doesn't hold that much water in the scheme of things (It's not uncommon, for instance, for deities to be killable). The figures in question explicitly and purposely line up with those of the church. It's never a question of whether the entities exist (hence not atheism) but whether or not they're worthy of worship (hence misotheism or maltheism).
 

Steve the Pocket

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Hmm. I hadn't thought of it much before, but it's true. Even movies, books, and TV shows that aren't explicitly religious in any particular way will often incorporate God as a minor character. So Long and Thanks for All the Fish is a perfect example; the guy who wrote that was about as hardcore of an atheist as you can get, and yet it ends with the characters finding God's Last Message to His Creation. And why not? The book just before it in the series had Thor as a character. Even if you don't believe they exist, you can't deny it makes for more interesting stories than the alternative, at least as long as you're willing to take artistic license. Same reason people who don't believe in ghosts still like watching Ghostbusters.

And speaking of artistic license, this brings up another point. Yes, there are tons of stories that take place in universes where God explicitly exists. But very few of them could really be said to be pushing a religious viewpoint or even line up with the dogmas (dogmae?) of existing religions. They mostly just use figures from religion as jumping-off points for Makin' Stuff Up. (For example, It's a Wonderful Life had guardian angels who can appear to people and don't get their wings until they've successfully saved someone's life. I dare you to find that in any religious text.) It's a little hard to do that sort of thing with the same figures' nonexistence.
 

demoman_chaos

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"Religulous" comes to mind. Basically goes through all the religions pointing out the dumb things in all of them (including Islam, how he was not kamikazee bombed I still don't know).
 

Thaius

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Really? I've kind of seen the opposite. Plenty of movies portray things like evolution, lifestyles that intensely oppose religion, and the lack of God's existence in a positive light. I'd even go so far as to say the majority of media these days simply assumes their audience is not religious. Then there are films like, in more direct response to your question, Paul.

But when a Chronicles of Narnia film comes out, people go crazy because it was written by a Christian who wrote the story to closely parallel Christian values and biblical stories (even though the story stays entirely allegorical and not once brings those concepts into real life). Any movies made with distinctly Christian themes (not "this was a time period when people believed in God," but a film actually about Christian values and ideas) are banned to little Christian retailers and very, very rarely see theaters. And of course, Christianity being the most common religion in the US, there's even less of any other religion.

Really, that thing I said about most media assuming the atheism of its audience speaks volumes. Most things I see simply treat everything as though there is no god; it's not a matter of being about how there's no god, it simply assumes its audience already knows that. And that's a lot more indicative of an atheistic society than if there were a bunch of movies directly about atheism.

EDIT: Admittedly, most explicitly Christian films suck, but I think that's largely because of the lack of a mainstream audience (and thus, budget). Though part of it too is that Christian aesthetics over the last century or so have become plagued with the idea that in order for art to be Christian it has to be about God and salvation and the happiness brought by them. It's rather unfortunate, since that's simply not true and it's holding Christian art back in some areas, though novelists like Ted Dekker and bands like Red overcome this extremely well.
 

TheRundownRabbit

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I think its because a movie advocating Atheism would attract too much unnecessary attention and protest and I thin producers just want to avoid that kind of thing because they know how intolerant people can be.

WOW! A thread mentioning atheism pops up on the Escapist and not a single argument breaks out, PRO-GRESS!!!
 

spartan231490

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IamQ said:
I just thought of something. There have been several films saying that god and the devil, heaven and hell exist, and no one has batted an eye.

But I wondered, have there been any movies saying that atheism is right? That there are no gods or anything supernatural?

Maybe there have, and I just haven't seen them. If that's the case, then please enlighten me.
Yes, there have been several, books too. I won't say the title, but the most amazing book series I've ever read ended in a way that said that the afterlife effectively didn't exist. I didn't say the title cuz it's a bit of a plot twist that I don't want to give away. Night Angel series by Brent Weeks is a bit agnostic, maybe leaning full-blown atheist. HMM, I can't think of any others off the top of my head, but there are definitely a few movies that I've seen as well. I can recall a piece of a quote, where he basically explains how there is no heaven or hell or god or devil, and then says "get over it." but I can't recall the movie. HMM, oh well.
 

LarenzoAOG

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gmaverick019 said:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0815241/

it isn't ENTIRELY atheist... but it definitely is up there i would say
Completely off topic here but is your avatar a fucking Beetle Borg?
 

spartan231490

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Haseo21 said:
I think its because a movie advocating Atheism would attract too much unnecessary attention and protest and I thin producers just want to avoid that kind of thing because they know how intolerant people can be.

WOW! A thread mentioning atheism pops up on the Escapist and not a single argument breaks out, PRO-GRESS!!!
Don't tempt me.
Anyway, there have definitely been movies. If I find some ambition, I'll call up my movie nerd friend and ask him, he should remember at least a few. I know I've seen some, but I can't recall which. :(
 
Sep 14, 2009
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LarenzoAOG said:
gmaverick019 said:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0815241/

it isn't ENTIRELY atheist... but it definitely is up there i would say
Completely off topic here but is your avatar a fucking Beetle Borg?
damn straight it is.

u jelly? /trolling

joking aside, it is, it was basically the B movie version of power rangers to me and i recently got my brother to watch them so i put that up
 

Mcupobob

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Cheery Lunatic said:
Man From Earth is probably the closest I've seen.

But the director was a bit of a dick with his opinion though.
I hate it when movies shoehorn in religion, the movie would've been brilliant if it hadn't been for that part...
"Your not Jesus!!!" Loved that movie, though that part was a little stupid especially the whole "I slowed my heart rate" crap.

OT: The thing is, like it or not Religion is interesting. Heaven, Hell, demons, angels and all that Jazz. I don't see how a movie about atheism would come across as anything more than pretentious.
 

ajemas

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Wait...What said:
Jurassic Park???
Creationists deny that dinosaurs existed (i think, correct me if im wrong) so saying that they did exist is somewhat atheist.
Some creationists think that, and other think that Dinosaurs and humans co-existed. Also note that some creationists should stop trying to debate facts and refute irrefutable evidence related to evolution and argue against something else, like that gravity is the devil pulling you down, or that sunlight is actually the reflection off of God's perfectly sculpted abs.
 

LarenzoAOG

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gmaverick019 said:
LarenzoAOG said:
gmaverick019 said:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0815241/

it isn't ENTIRELY atheist... but it definitely is up there i would say
Completely off topic here but is your avatar a fucking Beetle Borg?
damn straight it is.

u jelly? /trolling

joking aside, it is, it was basically the B movie version of power rangers to me and i recently got my brother to watch them so i put that up
I fucking love Beetle Borgs, mad does that bring me back, thank you for making my day.
 
Sep 14, 2009
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LarenzoAOG said:
gmaverick019 said:
LarenzoAOG said:
gmaverick019 said:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0815241/

it isn't ENTIRELY atheist... but it definitely is up there i would say
Completely off topic here but is your avatar a fucking Beetle Borg?
damn straight it is.

u jelly? /trolling

joking aside, it is, it was basically the B movie version of power rangers to me and i recently got my brother to watch them so i put that up
I fucking love Beetle Borgs, mad does that bring me back, thank you for making my day.
haha hell yeah!

idk if you do, but if you have netflix, the whole cartoon series is streaming on there (watched about 2/3 of it this past month or so)
 

DanDeFool

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Mark Chipperfield said:
well you could claim that all movies that don't show a presence of any religious statemant at all are atheist. But truth be told, isn't atheism a bit boring, that we just rot and the we all end up dieing in the end because the world can't last forever. I would rather believe there is something out there then believe nothing at all, because otherwise that would be depressing and boring.
Yeah. What might be more interesting is a movie where there is a God and an afterlife, but it's totally different than what our current religions think it is.

Maybe we should try some dystheist fiction; where God created humanity only to revel in our continued suffering, using religion only to prop us up with false hope while intending to send us all to Hell anyway, and where Lucifer was condemned because he was actually on our side. THAT would be interesting.

P.S.: It's not "dieing", it's "dying". Look it up, it's one of those weird exceptions in English.
 

LarenzoAOG

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gmaverick019 said:
LarenzoAOG said:
gmaverick019 said:
LarenzoAOG said:
gmaverick019 said:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0815241/

it isn't ENTIRELY atheist... but it definitely is up there i would say
Completely off topic here but is your avatar a fucking Beetle Borg?
damn straight it is.

u jelly? /trolling

joking aside, it is, it was basically the B movie version of power rangers to me and i recently got my brother to watch them so i put that up
I fucking love Beetle Borgs, mad does that bring me back, thank you for making my day.
haha hell yeah!

idk if you do, but if you have netflix, the whole cartoon series is streaming on there (watched about 2/3 of it this past month or so)
EDIT: Thank you for making my week.