Brand new testament review

Sign In. The Brand New Testament Hide Spoilers.

He lives in a high-rise apartment in Brussels and never gets out of His pajamas. Read More. Directed By : Jaco Van Dormael. Find a list of new movie and TV releases on DVD and Blu-ray updated weekly as well as a calendar of upcoming releases on home video. To help you plan your moviegoing options, our editors have selected the most notable films releasing in February , listed in alphabetical order. Find release dates for every movie coming to theaters, VOD, and streaming throughout and beyond, updated weekly.

Brand new testament review

G od is real and is a mean bastard who never gets off his computer. It begins in the centre of the universe: a dingy flat in Brussels. God spends his day intentionally making people miserable, tapping out rules on his his outdated DOS computer and fiddling with his train set. He giggles as he makes sure the toast always falls jam-side down, or that whatever queue you are on will be the slowest. His wife simply called the Goddess is sweet and simple, focusing on embroidery and her baseball card collection. But year-old daughter Ea played by a fantastic young actress, Pili Groyne is observant, gaining in powers and wants to change things. Ea is going to get six additional disciples, and listen to them, thus creating a Brand New Testament. Before she can do this, she must free the world from their need for her bum of a father. Sneaking into his office, she sends a text message to everyone in the world, detailing precisely how much time they have left until they die. For some, the news changes nothing, but others radically change their lives. One guy with decades left to live becomes a daredevil, jumping off buildings but always surviving due to increasingly silly saves. Another person decides to spend his remaining years building the Titanic out of matchsticks. Most people decide that they have no interest in God.

Massively underdeveloped. This takes many things brand new testament review people question about reality and turn them into comedy bread falling always on the side that has something on it instead of the other side amongst other things. The specifics of his faith are not discussed, but his moral compass remains undamaged.

Text size: A A A. About the BFI. Press releases and media enquiries. Join and support. Using your BFI Membership.

The most powerful figure in the world is a miserable old bastard who manifests a startling contempt for humanity and an utter lack of moral qualifications and who spends each day dispensing tyranny and abuse with a few ill-advised keystrokes. In the grand satirical tradition of Monty Python and Kevin Smith before him, Van Dormael takes gleeful yet disarmingly genial aim at the God of the Judeo-Christian universe — reimagined here as an angry, foul-mouthed schlub in flannel pajamas and played with an unflattering sneer by Benoit Poelvoorde. Knowledge really is power, and in this case, it provokes the whole gamut of human reactions, from liberation to despair to stupefied disbelief. A genial mind-bender with an imaginative eye for both human eccentricity and arrestingly strange production design, Van Dormael particularly likes to explore the riddle of parallel identities, of roads not taken and experiences not pursued. But within its more modest proportions, it is no less predicated on the question of whether human beings, given the right nudge, might be willing to consider an alternate narrative.

Brand new testament review

Jaco Van Dormael has never lacked for inspired invention, but sustaining audience interest in the worlds he creates has not always proved so easy. After such a strong set-up, sustaining the story momentum and comic energy was always going to be a tough ask, and the pacing does inevitably sag as Ea hooks up with a homeless bum Marco Lorenzini , and then recruits six more apostles to contribute fresh chapters for the titular Bible update. Some of these characters — which include a sex addict, a killer and a sickly boy — register more vividly than others, but best of all is the haute-bourgeois lady Catherine Deneuve who, ignored by her businessman husband and with only five years left on her clock, enjoys an assignation with a pretty young rentboy and then finds a more enduring romantic pairing with the gorilla she purchases from a local circus. Deneuve, it is now abundantly clear, really is game for anything. Laughs reliably return every time the film cuts to the travails of God, who follows Ea through the portal which his browbeaten wife immediately seals behind him , and is mistaken for a paperless illegal immigrant. His selfish nature repels anyone who tries to help, and the indignities pile up. A ratty-faced Poelvoorde is excellent in the role, brilliantly capturing the exasperation of a man who is entirely to blame for his own misfortune.

C4h10 lewis structure

The design of Ea's six disciples is to encourage ourselves to be more communicative, to open up instead of indulging in one's own propensities, and to pursue what our hearts really crave for a repetitive troupe of a theme song for every soul. Awards Awards View All. Driving Madeleine Glenn Kenny. Expand the sub menu More Variety. It brings a very fresh viewpoint on many issues, esp. For me, this is exactly the kind of movie I enjoy, and between this and Toto I've realized that I must seek out everything by Dormael immediately there's surprisingly little. Still the basic idea alone almost warrants the running time and the viewing itself. That everyone's life would undergo some significant change if one's death could truly be known is a given, so I would have appreciated a less cynical approach. When God's daughter one rarely hears her side of the story Ea Pili Groyne learns her dad is ruining the world, she speaks with her brother JC David Murgia about leaving her weak mom Yolande Moreau and running away from home like he did. And I found it sad, rather than funny. I saw this on Amazon Prime on a slow afternoon and as a fan of religious satire I thought I'd give it a go, or at least check out the first few minutes Benoit Poelvorde is hilarious as a bitter, mean old man. Ea just picks six random people to be her apostles, and meets each one of them, one after another, telling them the same story about her mean dad and her brand new testament. If you are offended by someone making fun of topics like child abuse, bestiality, voyeurism and religion avoid this movie. Finding them seems to be the story's main drive, but in the end it becomes about each of their stories.

Catherine Deneuve romancing a gorilla. Is pairing the French screen goddess with the big hairy guy from the zoo a funny conceit?

Was this review helpful? After spending so long creating sadistic rules, it's hilarious to see him get a taste of his own medicine. The story centres on an arrogant and abusive father who is also the creator the universe, especially the designer of the lives on the earth and this tale takes place in the Belgian capital, Brussels. Benoit Poelvoorde should be mentioned for wickedly mischievous and despicable portrayal of God. Whether they are atheist or religious won't matter, if you don't think it's funny. Close Ad. One could envisage his gleefully, gently blasphemous conceit — God as a capricious boor, undone by his own feckless cruelty, his rebellious daughter Ea and a human race forced to reckon with its mortality — played as apocalyptic Bergmanesque tragedy or ferocious takedown of sacred cows. His continuous frustration and childish tantrums were brilliant and hilarious. I was looking forward for this since it was from one of my favourite directors who is a very unique storyteller. This is one of those all-or-nothing movies, if you like it you'll love it, if you don't like it you'll loathe it. To help you plan your moviegoing options, our editors have selected the most notable films releasing in February , listed in alphabetical order.