God's Not Dead (2014) movie review

God’s Not Dead…. Well, with the way this movie turned out, you’d just about come to the exact opposite conclusion.

This is going to be an iffy review for me to write. On one hand, I could very well end up offending someone religious and get a lot of flak for my opinion on a movie and the message of said movie. On the other hand, I am a movie reviewer first, and a loving, caring, compassionate person second. So if you do get offended by my opinions and/or views when it comes to this film as well as the subject matter it covers, and don’t bother to listen to an outside viewpoint because you’re so close minded… then that’s on you.

And I don’t care.

All comedic cynicism aside, God’s Not Dead is an inspirational faith film (if you really couldn’t tell). Although, using the words “inspirational”, “faith”, and “film” are extremely generous to this… feature. I think it was meant to be a movie. It had stuff going on that was on a camera, and maybe the stuff going on was a story that had a point. But it had no real build up to anything, no real payoff, a lot of loose ends, 5 or 6 useless subplots, and delivered its message completely wrong and does not represent anything in a realistic way. God’s Not Dead is simply a failure of a movie.

That’s not because it’s a faith film, though. I’m sure there are decent faith films that have been made. I haven’t heard of them yet, mostly because I don’t normally watch them, but they could be out there. Heck, most religious people I know don’t even like faith films very much. The only reason I ever watched it was out of curiosity. There was a decent amount of buzz about it last year, but I never bothered watching it until my friend suggested it. I finally did, and it’s about 2 hours of my life that no amount divine intervention can ever give me back. Not with the help of the Christian God, not with the help of Zeus, Odin, Dagda, Obatala, Enlil, or Quetzalcoatl.

The main plot of the film is about a university freshman student named Josh (I think?) who is taking a course in Philosophy. On the first day of that class, he learns that the philosophy teacher is… an ATHEIST!!!

His teacher immediately starts by telling all of his students that he is not ever going to cover the topic of the existence of God, or a god-like being. Not only that, but he tells them that God does not exist at all, and if they want to pass the class, they have to agree with him and write on a piece of paper saying that God is dead. Our first problems with the movie are obvious right at this point. Firstly, what kind of f#%king PHILOSOPHY CLASS doesn’t cover/debate the existence of a god?! Not just the Christian one, but ANY form of divine being? Heck, for all we know, the Egyptian gods could be the real ones! Or the Norse! Or maybe the real god (if there even is one) hasn’t been thought of yet! In real life, philosophy classes cover this! Isn’t the existence of god(s) a subject worth philosophically debating? Secondly, this teacher would have his ass fired if he ordered the students to give up their faith just to pass his class! Thirdly, this is not- I repeat- this is NOT how a typical atheist acts. This teacher character, along with a couple others, are written to be the most unfair, most mean spirited, most rude, cold hearted characters possible, and it’s all because they don’t believe in a mystical sky guy that’s supposed to love everyone and make them feel good about themselves and punish them for all eternity if they don’t follow ‘his’ words and worship him.

So as you can imagine, Josh can’t bring himself to write God is dead. I don’t know why he doesn’t just report it to the officials and have the teacher fired, or simply outwardly agree while secretly keeping his beliefs. He decides to challenge the teacher and debate with him over the course of three lectures over three days at the end of class to prove God’s existence to the teacher and the class. It’s more of a one sided thing, as the teacher keeps shooting down his ideas and views without a second thought.  

Josh is now tasked with trying to prove God’s existence. Reminder, he’s not trying to prove the existence of ANY god/god-like being, but specifically the Christian one, because for some reason, that’s the only possibility. And he’s not doing this because he feels like he should stand up for his beliefs, which is what I would have done in this situation. He’s doing it because he believes that “God wants Josh to defend him”.

When Josh said that, I immediately paused the movie and said the following words out loud (I tend to talk to things that can’t talk back. Don’t judge me): “Does this kid really think that the divine being that he believes created the entire universe, this infinitely vast and amazing universe, with all the countless stars and planets, with all the different life forms on our world alone, and the countless life forms that could be on other worlds he’s believed to have created, has an ego so fragile that he feels threatened by an insignificant little speck of dirt on just ONE of his many slightly larger insignificant specks of dirt that we call a planet and needs ANOTHER insignificant speck of dirt to defend him? If there is a god (or gods), then I think it (or they) would be disappointed that he thinks so small about it (or them).”

This kind of small mindedness in a character just to send a message of faith is what makes this entire movie seem so contrived. The same could be said about literally everything and everyone else in this entire movie, but especially for Josh.

But enough about that storyline! The movie has about 5 or 6 more side plots to it that take up more of the movie than the main one. There’s a pair of pastor guys with car troubles, a Muslim girl that’s converted to Christianity (oh what fun), a grandma with alzheimer's, the teacher having drama with his girlfriend, a reporter girl having cancer, and a few other, smaller bits that serve absolutely no purpose. If the movie only focused on Josh trying to prove God’s existence to his class, this would probably only be a 15-20 minute short on YouTube, and it really does feel like that’s how this was supposed to originally be.

None of these side plots are any better written than the main one, and I’ll explain why that is, one by one.

1: The Vehicularly Challenged Pastoral Duo Subplot is actually alright. I may even say it’s the most entertaining part of the movie, mostly because funny things actually happen in it. But still, that’s not saying much. It could still be removed from the movie entirely and not make a darn bit of difference to anything else. And it doesn’t make up for the rest of the movie’s flaws. Also, the two of them act like total asshats at the end, and I’ll get to that later.

2: The Ex-Muslim Teenaged Rebel Girl Subplot is the most cringeworthy of them all. She doesn’t want to be as traditional of a Muslim as her father wants her to be. She takes off her Hijab/hat-scarf-thing/whatever it’s called when her dad isn’t around and listens to Christian sermons on her phone when she’s at home. I can see why she would want to leave her religion for another. She doesn’t like that her father’s beliefs are disruptive to her social health. It’s obvious that she wants more personal freedom, and I completely understand. But then comes the part where her dad finds out that she no longer believes in his god and… it doesn’t go well. He hits her several times, to the point where she’s crawling on the floor and crying, and he throws her out of his house. So this girl is now homeless and doesn’t know what to do, and she turns to the Vehicularly Challenged Pastoral Duo for help. This story is never developed any further than that. We see the girl at the Christian concert at the end, so… did she just get over the fact that she has been disowned? Is this supposed to teach us that it doesn’t matter if your family hates you for your beliefs, throws you out of your home, disowns you, and you have nowhere to go for shelter and support in life… that it’s okay because you believe in Jesus? That’s sending the wrong message! It doesn’t matter how much personal comfort that girl’s beliefs give her! She needs actual physical help!

3: The Elderly Woman with the Attention Span of a Goldfish Subplot is just there to have one more message hammered into our brains. She can’t remember her own daughter’s name, but she’s able to give a long-winded, ‘emotionally deep’ speech to a businessman character about how “the devil gives people happy things in life so they turn away from God” or some stupid thing. The speech scene comes out of nowhere and it makes no sense as to why the businessman is even in her house when I don’t think there was an implication that he ever even knew her earlier in the movie. And isn’t it funny how she’s able to give that big religious lecture and completely forget who she was talking to the instant she’s done? If the filmmakers wanted to drive in a message, they could have done it some other way. The grandma speech was simply out of place.

4: The Atheists Will Never Know Love Subplot involves the atheistic teacher having relationship drama with his Christian girlfriend. Of course, since these filmmakers have no idea that atheism and heartlessness are indeed not synonymous, the teacher acts like a complete jerk to her, too. This is supposed to tell people that atheists are rude, cold-hearted people with no regard for other people’s beliefs or feelings and that they can never truly love someone without the belief in the deity that sacrificed his son (which was also himself) to himself so he could save the people from himself. After she ends it with him, he never has the chance to reconcile with her because he gets hit by a car and dies. Oh, spoiler alert.

5: The ‘God Gave You Cancer So You Can Love Him More’ Subplot also delivers its message in the wrong way. This reporter girl (who acts like a whiney little brat) gets cancer and is going to eventually die. Her boyfriend breaks up with her for it, and I guess we’re supposed to assume he’s an atheist, too, because everyone who acts like a jerk in this movie is automatically an atheist. No religious people act so horribly, right? Right? Anyway, it’s obvious that she becomes religious in the end to take comfort in her situation… but that still doesn’t help. She’s still lonely and is going to die. But it’s fine because… she believes in God now? Is that how it’s supposed to work?

6: The Chinese Kid With Daddy Issues Subplot is the most pointless one of them all. When the main character starts trying to prove that God exists, this random Chinese kid starts telling his dad about it. His dad doesn’t want him talking about God, and… it never goes anywhere further. Does the kid reconcile with his father? Is he disowned, too? What happens? It serves no purpose! This movie would be so much better (and less painful to watch) if it got rid of all these subplots!

All the subplots combined take up more of the running time of the film than the main story. That shouldn’t happen. If the movie would focus, that’d be nice. And I’d only have to focus on explaining why the terrible writing of the main story is so terrible.

None of what Josh says to ‘prove’ the existence of a God makes sense. He also tries to prove the beginning of the universe involves God. He says that the big bang theory is very similar to the part in the book of Genesis where God said “Let there be light”. Apparently that was the start of the universe… but… that also doesn’t make sense. If you actually read Genesis, you’ll see that it says God made Earth before he made light. So that argument’s debunked.

Josh also says that there’s no way the universe could just have created itself. There’s no way it could have just… been here. A student then asks a very good question: “If God created the universe, then what created God?” Josh shoots down that question by saying that it doesn’t apply to the Christian God, because he wasn’t created, and that refute only works on created gods. So just to clarify… there’s no way the universe could simply have always been here, nor could it have been created by itself. But it is entirely possible for a god to have have always been here, without creation at all. That makes a lot of sense.

One thing Josh said that simply made me angry is “without God, there’s no reason to be moral”. That is utterly wrong. There’s plenty of reasons to be moral without believing in a god, like friendship. Love. True compassion and caring for fellow human beings. Atheists do very much like friends and love. You don’t need a god to see the beauty in the world. You don’t need a religion to have morals. If you can’t tell right from wrong without the help of a god, then you lack true empathy, and I would advise you to reanalyze your situation in life.

Josh makes so many other arguments with holes in them big enough to drive a truck through. But he does actually say ONE logical thing in all of his arguments. Josh says that it ultimately comes down to choice whether people believe in God or not, and that the teacher character was wrong to take that choice away from the students. That is the most logical thing said in the entire damn movie. But that grace of logic didn’t last. Of course it couldn’t last.

The very next thing Josh does is ask the teacher why he hates God. The teacher answers this by saying that he DOES hate God because when he was 12, his mother died of some sickness. He prayed endlessly for her to be saved, but she died anyway. And that’s why he hates God.

This is supposed to teach people that atheists don’t believe in God because something bad happened to them that made them lose faith, or that they hate him. You can’t really hate something that you don’t believe in, though. Josh even says that! But here’s the thing… this is not why atheists are atheists. Not even close. Of course, maybe something bad happening to them in their life would make them question their faith, but for most atheists, nothing happens at all! They just become atheists because of the knowledge and evidence provided to them to make them think otherwise about the existence of any deities.

So… the teacher isn’t even an atheist! He still believes in God, and hates him! He’s more of an anti-theist! The writers seriously do not know a single thing about atheists or atheism!

Yes, there's more BS in this movie. It's unending, I know. 

Josh has his share of drama as well. His girlfriend ends up leaving him because he’s challenging the teacher. He risks failing the class, and for some reason this affects her. I don’t think that’s how it works in reality. She can do just fine in that university by herself. Whatever her boyfriend does should not affect her. And the movie treats this situation as if Josh would fail his entire 4 years at college if he fails that one philosophy class, when he would be completely fine in real life.

With the not-really-an-atheist teacher, his drama with his girlfriend is never resolved. She leaves him, he tries to find her, but gets hit by a car and dies… but not before the Vehicularly Challenged Pastoral Duo arrives to make him repent for all his sins! I have tried to think of the words to describe how horribly sickening this scene is. Not because of blood and gore (because no good Christian movie would allow that to be shown), but because of the whole repenting scene. It’s simply… a different type of disgusting. During all this, the other characters are having a blast at the big Christian Concert! They don’t even know the teacher is dead!

The Vehicularly Challenged Pastoral Duo treat this whole thing as a victory! “Yay, we converted a not-really-atheist before he died of drowning in his own blood! Imagine how awesome he’s doing in Heaven!” Well, I think he’d much rather be alive. Do you know how awesome being alive is? It’s amazing. I for one love life. I could care less about whatever afterlife there might be, because it’s much more fun caring about this life. Oh how I love existence. I bet that teacher character sure loved existence, too.

You know what would have been a really neat plot twist? If Josh’s defense of his beliefs was all part of a test. What if the teacher made everyone write ‘God is dead’ to see who would stand up for their beliefs and not let anyone tell them what they can and can’t think? What if that was the first test? I think it would fall into a philosophical class, right? Don’t philosophers stand for what they believe? If that was the plot twist, that would have made this movie SO much better! And what if the teacher was still an atheist anyway but let his students believe what they want to? That’s what a real atheistic teacher would do! That would have made it one of the more notable faith films out there but instead they went the route of “everyone believes in God in the end” and that is just stupid!! People need to know that not everyone believes in a god! They had the potential for something good but threw it away!

In conclusion, God’s Not Dead is without a doubt one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s got everything wrong. The writing, the characters, the acting, the messages, all of it is WRONG! It doesn’t represent atheists properly and it doesn’t represent religious people properly. Everyone in this movie is either cruel or stupid. It fails as a movie altogether, and will probably turn more people into agnostics rather than reinvigorate their faith! The only good part was the music. It sounded decent. Especially the Newsboys at the end. I thought they had good music. But that’s all the more quality this movie ever accomplished.

FINAL RATING: 3 / 50

STORY: 0 / 5

ACTING: 0 / 5

CHARACTERS: 0 / 5

DRAMA: 0 / 5

INSPIRATION: 0 / 5

SOUNDTRACK: 3 / 5

TONE: 0 / 5

ENJOYABILITY: 0 / 5

REWATCH VALUE: 0 / 5

OWNING VALUE: 0 / 5

If you’re a religious person, then good for you. You can keep your faith. Nobody is stopping you. That’s yours. You can see the comfort in your faith that others can’t. And if you’re an atheist, good for you. You can see the world in all its natural beauty and love it for what it is. You love this life and don’t need the promise of another one to feel happy or be moral. And if you’re an agnostic and don’t know what to think, I hope you find the answers you’re looking for. I just want everyone to not believe a single word this movie preaches. It’s wrong. Atheists are not vile, immoral people. I should know. I know atheists. I have atheist friends. I am an atheist myself. We don’t act like the characters in God’s Not Dead (and other faith movies) in reality. We generally keep to ourselves and let people believe what they want. If we so choose to discuss our atheism with other atheists, that is our business. We do not force our atheism upon others, like the teacher character does in God’s Not Dead. If you do happen to meet an atheist that is a complete obnoxious jerk that tries to tell you what you can and cannot believe, then think of that person as the atheist equivalent of a Jehovah’s Witness. We don’t like them. You don’t like them. Nobody likes them. And they do not accurately or positively represent our community. We are human beings that have emotion.