Movies saying that Atheism is true.

[EternalFacepalm]

I think the only major problem would potentially getting it green lighted and approved in somewhere very pro-Christian in its beliefs like the US.

You know the US was never actually pro-Christian in its constitution, right?
There has been a lot of presidents claiming it was a Christian nation, yeah, but simply put, they were retarded.

Anyhow, I don't doubt an interesting concept could be made from atheism, I just don't know how. Atheism isn't in any way a collection of beliefs, so I guess there isn't as much to say when it comes to that.

 

[Hamish Durie]

And how would that film turn out?


"There is no god."

"Well shit."

Roll credits.

Oscar material right there.

ninja'd well played sir

 

[jspheonix]

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.

Well thats getting into your own personal perspective and beliefs, and I know this is a slight detour, but as an agnostic I see the atheist perspective of the universe the universe as a big endless thing constantly unravelling with chaos theory. Everything started with a bang, and big or small its all here because uncountable minuscule events happened. Life comes from suns bigger than any of us can really get our heads around, and you are only here because your Mum and Dad happened to meet and fall in love, and they too had to exist because of their parents and so on. I find that a bit more interesting than some guy just made it happen, but again I'm open minded.
And as for the debate, I fail to see your point, some films are and some films aren't. There are naturally going to be films where religion is a theme, and less where atheism is because religion is an easy theme to use. But as several people have mentioned, Jurassic Park

 

[Dege84]

Well... this is not really a movie but a documentary of sorts. If you are interested you can try watching Jonathan Miller's Brief History of Disbelief. It doesn't have CGI or other dramatization techniques, it's just an in-depth discussion on the many aspects of belief and disbelief and how the later evolved throughout the centuries. You can usually find in three parts, an hour each.

 

[Dege84]

You know the US was never actually pro-Christian in its constitution, right?

And some of the first presidents were actually against religion if I remember correctly.

Thomas Jefferson: ?. . . then your exclamation on that hypothesis is just, 'that this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.? ; Christianity is the most perverted system that ever shone on man.?

and Abraham Lincoln: ?It will not do to investigate the subject of religion too closely, as it is apt to lead to infidelity.? "The Bible is not my book, and Christianity is not my religion. I could never give assent to the long, complicated statements of Christian dogma."

And there should be more of them.

 

[EternalFacepalm]

[ And some of the first presidents were actually against religion if I remember correctly.

Thomas Jefferson: ?. . . then your exclamation on that hypothesis is just, 'that this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.? ; Christianity is the most perverted system that ever shone on man.?

and Abraham Lincoln: ?It will not do to investigate the subject of religion too closely, as it is apt to lead to infidelity.? "The Bible is not my book, and Christianity is not my religion. I could never give assent to the long, complicated statements of Christian dogma."

And there should be more of them.

It is also sensible to assume that the founders were largely atheist and deist.
USA was originally not really Christian at all, it's strange how if a president up for election would say he wasn't religious, it would result in political suicide.

 

[EternalFacepalm]

Double post, sorry.

 

[Denamic]

]Isn't the major point of Jurassic Park the downfall brought on by hubris and playing God? Doesn't the fact that everything keeps turning to shit after they decide to meddle in gods domain make it pretty damn theist?

No, it's about dinosaurs running rampant.

 

[mesoforte]

It's hard to approach atheism without requiring some belief structure in the idea. An atheist movie might have to have some extended dialogue/monologue to explain its position and then have no one bring up a counter argument. And why can't you counter? I cannot think of fool-proof argument to deny the existence of some sort of higher power.

Depends on what a person means by higher power. Getting someone to explain it usually just shows that the original supposition is devoid of meaning.

But that only realky works as a counter. It would be much better to see a movie where someone does the right thing a lot, and then at the very end as a footnote has the statement, "Oh', I'm an atheist," come up.

 

[Unia]

I'd say a lot of science fiction movies, especially older ones, question religion by showing some sort of future where something we'd see as trivial has become the basis of religion. Which inevitably leads to people doing dumb things for absurd reasons. Too bad I can't dredge a name from my brain atm and I know better than to venture to TV Tropes.

There's a brutal mindfuck of a movie called Cube that kind of asks questions about gods, meaning of life and all that. When it's not busy showing people get their face melted with acid. There were sequels that were largely rubbish but I distinctly remember a scene where someone had managed to escape the Cube and was asked if they believed in God.

Spoiler

He answers "no", the guy asking from the monitoring room presses the corresponding button and the poor sap gets burned to death. His co-worker asks what would happen if he said yes. The guard just shrugs and says "Nobody has ever answered that". Guess they wanted to prove the saying "There's no atheists in foxholes" to be false.

 

[Jamous]

It's because religion provides a very good story. We see films for entertainment. Therefore, as better story will usually better entertainment (not to mention public bias ), the religious films will be either more interesting or sell better regardless. So we make more about religious truth than the lack of it. I guess it goes something like that. I guess all films that fail to mention god at all could be seen as atheist, but they could just as easily be universally religious, or religious in a deeply private and/or personal sense so no one talks about it much.
I wonder what a good film -about- atheism, not featuring atheism like Contact or something but about it, could be like. Maybe someone who really relies on their beliefs has a crisis of faith, realises God isn't real and slowly goes insane as they start to imagine miracles etc. Everyone around them assures them they aren't happening and the character is torn between believing her friends (who would have to clearly be right for it to be an atheist film) or her own senses. I can't see it ending well in any way, though.
Anyway. That's my look at it. If anyone feels a burning need to know; I'm atheist.

 

[thtool]

The vast majority of movies have no mention of religion. I'd count that as a partial win for atheism. For every hero who doesn't pray or mention jesus, it helps show that religion does not actually do anything.

If jesus/yahweh/fairies actually existed, and the characters believed they did anything, then wouldn't they constantly acknowledge as such? Why didn't the characters in Saw just start praying for laawwd and get saved by miracles?

 

[Get_A_Grip_]

Paul is the only movie that comes to mind. Sort of a shame that it wasn't anywhere near as good as the other Simon Pegg and Nick Frost movies.

 

[sparkyk24]

And how would that film turn out?


"There is no god."

"Well shit."

Roll credits.

Oscar material right there.

With the idiotic comments usually posted, I just read and get annoyed most of the time. But that was pretty hilarious. I'm laughing out loud.

It's true. How would a movie suggest that Atheism is true, other than with the characters believing it? I mean, how would it even be possible? Someone gets to see what happens when you die, and they don't see anything? We see the Universe getting created, and a little flashing beacon says "No God present." I guess the narrator could say it, but as soon as you introduce a narrator, the movie becomes lame.

 

[owen4evr]

I have my beliefs others have theirs, so long as they don't shove their belief down my throat I won't shove mine down theirs.