Islam and Life: Dangers of Hollywood’s religious movies taking artistic license

Before watching the movie Noah. I had certain anticipations, Firstly due to the reviews that the film received and the vehement criticism from religious backgrounds and secondly because of the cast that the film had lined up. Russel Crowe, Ray Winstone , Anthony Hopkins and our Emma Watson (who was brilliant by the way).
Little need to say after watching the film I was completely disappointed, there were times that I actually drifted away during watching the film, even at the most epic moments (eg. when the flood arrived).
Two things I could not understand about the film. One is why was there evidence of a post industrialised world, such as old metal tubes and broken down Heavy Machines, It could not be interpreted to be a twist that somehow Noah was living in an industrialised world as all the evidence around him was of a primitive society, even the descendants of Caine who were living in a “community” but it was clearly primitive. So it was very hard to understand what the director was trying to say here: Was he trying to say that time was cyclical and somehow Noah’s age has come after our age of industrialisation “and technology” and as a result, time just keeps going round and round in a circle until someday we get it right? Like Hamm says at the end of the film to LLa (Emma Watson) when he is leaving his family and going off on his own “may be one day we will be kind”…To me this was the only thought inspiring part in the whole thing.
Leaving Noah’s environment aside, I could not find any other part of the movie that was thought provoking or truly moving even in an emotional way let alone a spiritual way.
Noah himself (as depicted in the film despite Russel Crowe doing his best effort) was not a deep or inspiring character. The director failed to reflect adequately on the spiritual part of him as a man and a prophet, how he may have struggled with the revelation that an apocalypse was about to come in the form of a great flood and he is ordered to build an arch as a great deal of humanity was to be eliminated. After all Noah was also human and as far as I can tell he lived within a community (although in the film it was shown that he was completely isolated). The director has failed to show completely how Noah may have struggled when he knew that people he lived with were about to just die and this was an order from God. And as with most of the prophets Noah’s faith was tested, when he felt compelled that he had to kill his son shem’s Children after they were born (as shem’s wife was supposed to be barren and this was not in the revelation according to Noah), again the director failed to show the depth of despair that any human would experience in such a situation when their faith in the ultimate conflicts with their love for their family and dear ones. Coming to think of it Noah’s faith in his God was not visited in any depth nor was his relationship with God explored in any way as to make him a sympathetic Character to the viewers, so that anyone watching although not in least religious would at least identify with Noah as man in his despair, frustrations and inner conflict, however none of that was reflected in the film as far I could gather. And the biggest shame of all is that the film completely failed to show Noah’s relationship with God and his real prophetic experience, how as a human he relates to his God, believes in him tries to serve him and is further commanded to carry out his orders in ways that leave him under considerable inner tensions and conflicts between his emotional ties and his faith in his ultimate creator and as a result completely leaves the viewer unjustly unable to appreciate the relief and the joy that Noah experiences when God finally does not require him to kill his grandchildren as a sign of God’s mercy in looking after his servants who genuinely try to serve him even when they experience conflict. I accept that this view of mine might be very well from a religious point of view, but I don’t think that is misplaced as the film claims to try and reflect the biblical story and after all Noah himself is a religious character, so all of these are valid consideration.
From the point of view of Artistic license, though I am not quite clear on its definition but in legal terms if a work of art tries to recreate another it should stick to it verbatim and acknowledge who that work belongs to otherwise its breaching the original artist’s copy right. I am not here trying to imply that religious texts are works of art. But let’s pretend hypothetically that religious texts belong to the communities of those who believe in them and that they somehow own the copyright or in other words are the custodians of these texts and are under a duty to protect them from corruption and invalid reinterpretation in this case by artists etc. Then it follows that these religious communities have all the right to resist any invalid interpretations of their scared texts and to demand that such works are not carried out and legally enforce this in an ideal world.
If Artistic license means the freedom to be inspired by sources then if might be that the film Noah is a satire for lack of a better word. It is not the story of Noah but the director recreation of a story that may have inspired him (and not deeply in this case it seems).
I cannot see anything wrong with the religious communities in this case demanding that the film Noah does not carry the name Noah and the director calls it something else and clearly states that it is not the religious story of Noah but inspired by it. Artists do that every day why should it be any different for religious communities.
In any case this film in particular failed in all counts, even as a Hollywood block buster in my view… But what remains is that it carries the name of Noah and as a result remains of concern for the religious communities.

Sakina Elmahdi
London

Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuhu,
I have not seen the movie Noah, and I used to watch movies more in the past, but nowadays find too much violence or sexuality or foul language, so I don’t watch movies really. However, occasionally, I find a period piece movie that interests me, and I’ll tolerate some minor foul language, etc. There is a movie on Netflix titled Daniel which is quite good, although it is slanted towards Judaism near the end, but it really shows true love in Daniel, peace be upon him, for the Almighty Creator, and great actors are chosen, I think.
In this interview/program, the sheikh makes a great point about counteracting these non-religious filmmakers with movies made appropriately in an Islamic manner. I would love to see this happen, as well as the catching up with the times as he said by offering studies in the arts in our Islamic universities.
Why not? Most Muslims I know either love movies already, or would be willing to watch a film that won’t offend Islamically. I hope to see this comes to pass, InshaAllah.
Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuhu,
Laura