Bruce Almighty

Watched Bruce Almighty this weekend. While this may not seem to be typical of the sort of thing an atheist might want to watch, I really enjoy Jim Carrey's work and wanted to see their take on this premise.

WARNING: Spoilers ahead

Most of the movie was OK, but it ended up getting a bit preachy. The primary message of the movie seems to be that you have to turn you life over to god and let him decide what's best for you. Strangly enough this is contradictory to some earlier points in the movie where the God character (played by Morgan Freeman) seems to be telling Bruce that people need to be responsible for their own lives and not depend on him so much.

During Bruce's turning point, he breaks down and starts praying in the middle of the street. After getting hit by a truck, he dies and talks to God in heaven. There he turns his life over to God and in the ubiquitous "single selfless act" that seems to be a prerequisite in all of these types of movies, Bruce requests nothing more than for his ex-girlfriend to have a happy life (ala Bedazzled). This prompts God to send Bruce back to Earth where he is now a changed man, get's back with his girlfriend, and becomes and all-around much nicer guy.

On the plus side, the movie's got some funny gags and jokes, but overall, I didn't really like the movie because of the "message" it tried to put across.

On another note...

Science has given us a great many technological advancements, and taught us much about ourselves and the history of our world and universe. But there's one thing that I'm not sure science will ever be able to explain.

Before humans started building houses with eaves and overhangs, where the hell did wasps build their nests?