Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed Review

I went to watch Ben Stein's "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" tonight with some friends, and I am completely overwhelmed with thoughts about the film. It was so provocative that my friends and I, in spite of how late it was, sat down to discuss it for more than an hour. If you have not seen this film, I highly recommend it. Atheist, Agnostic, Theist, whatever you may be. Although Stein himself is a declared theist, and there was bias evident in the production, I think it has potential to spark some great dialogue.

Before I make my statements about the film, I want to admit that yes, as a Christian I am biased, but by the same token, someone who would argue from the Neo-Darwinist perspective would be biased as well. However, I find it interesting that one of the film's points is that if we all just admit our biases, it would allow a more reasonable atmosphere for honest, quality dialogue. That statement may sound naive and illogical, but if you watch the film I think you would understand it a bit more.

When I went in to watch the film, I expected a documentary full of ruthless, biased journalism tactics, but hoped to at least learn a little bit more about the Intelligent Design Theory. I was misled.  Surprisingly enough, I felt as if I heard more from the Secular Humanist perspective, and I was additionally impressed to hear from a scientist who converted from Christianity to Darwinism! Any theist who tackles that in their presentation gets major points in my book.

Anyway, I will admit that there is some bad to go along with the good. Throughout the film, he incorporates elaborate montages, mixing images of Nazi and Communist Germany to parallel the idea of the Secular Humanists in Academia suppressing freedom of speech among Intelligent Design scientists. Although as a Christian I do feel this is a viable comparison, I can also see how the adversary would argue that it is overwhelmingly exaggerative and demonizing. However, in his comparison he is not trying to suggest that Secular Humanists are mass murderers, but rather expose their intolerance of Intelligent Design Theorists, and how they "build a wall" to suppress this alternative explanation from being taught, researched, written about, etc.

The argument about how biased Stein's film tactics are could go on forever, but as a student of both film AND journalism (YES, I'm playing that card), I have to say that it is almost IMPOSSIBLE to be objective when reporting on something, ESPECIALLY through the film medium. Any great director will use high content images to tell his story, and I think Stein did a fantastic job. Being completely unbiased in reporting is not feasible, especially concerning something so integral to one's philosophy, but I feel that Ben Stein managed an incredible feat in comparison with someone like, oh, I don't know, Michael Moore?

There is so much to say about this film, but if I keep going I'll never stop. I'll probably write it all down in my journal before I go to bed tonight, and when I watch it again next week I'll probably find even more things to write about. If you'd like to talk about it with me, by all means contact me! I'd love to discuss it further.