Starring: Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connelly, Emma Watson, Ray Winstone, Anthony Hopkins, Logan Lerman
Directed by: Darren Aranofsky
Synopsis: A man is chosen by his world’s creator to undertake a momentous mission before an apocalyptic flood cleanses the world.
A film like Noah was always going to divide opinion. The fact that a story told over a couple of pages could be expanded to a movie with a run time over two hours means there is more than a little ‘padding’ taking place. I have no idea what people with religious beliefs thought of the movie, but seeing as I have none, I thought it was OK. Not great, not even nearly great, just decent.
To be honest, and I’m not sure what this says about me as a person, but the only think I actually know about the story of Noah is that he built an ark and all the animals went in two by two. I know nothing of the surrounding story, and to be honest again, having watched Noah, I still don’t think I’m any the wiser.
Noah, played by Russell Crowe, gets a premonition from ‘the creator’ that mankind will meet it’s doom when the heavens open. Noah decides that he will save all the animals and start all over again, without the interference of man. Upon his and his family’s journey he stumbles across some fallen angels who bizarrely (and the films most discussed aspect) have taken the form of giant rock monsters (think Transporters or the big talking Tree’s in Lord of the Rings). Noah is a man on a mission and gradually seems to lose his marbles, as I suppose you would with a burden as big as his.
As a film I think Noah provides more than it’s fair share of visual treats and chest thumping, Gladiator-style, action. And as am not a religious man and have no real idea as to the original (true?) story then I could happily sit back and watch it for what it was, two hours of mostly engaging action drama. It wasn’t without fault or flaw mind. Crowe is still a polarizing leading man for instance. Great in Gladiator admittedly, I’ve never warmed to him since. Connelly was good as his wife, Emma Watson and Logan Lerman as his kids less so in my opinion. I thought there was some good film techniques and imagination used by Aranofsky during the movie, but stuff like the rock monsters felt a bit like they were in it just to make the film more of a ‘blockbuster’. And as is usual nowadays, it was probably at least 15-20 mins too long.
Despite the lukewarm reviews however, I had enough fun watching Noah to give it a score of:
