Noah is an idiot!

I went with my wife to watch Noah this weekend. I really looked forward to the movie, because the trailers seemed to promise a grand epic and an interesting hero’s journey. Set free of Biblical constraints, they could weave in other ancient flood stories, all the apocalyptic genre (movies like Knowing and 2012), and really blow this thing out of the water!

What did we actually get? Well, there were a number of things that were just plain weird, but I could go with them:

• The ancient world had an advanced industrial civilization which spanned the entire planet. — This is actually an intriguing scifi premise in its own right. Unfortunately the movie did nothing with it.
• Fallen angels (which BTW are supposedly good, despite disobeying God) encased in chunks of rock. Everything, including how they talked, moved, and even some of their characterization, was like the Ents from the Lord of the Rings movies.
• Noah’s family is vegetarian. It seems they live off lichens scraped from rocks. Not a very rich diet. Then one of his sons picks a flower because it is pretty, not because he is starved out of his mind. Noah gives him a lecture about only taking what you need.
• All the animals, across all species on the planet, are put into dormancy for an entire year using knock-out smoke, which somehow has no effect on the humans who have their faces right in it.
• A seed from the Garden of Eden produces an new river of life and an entire forest of trees … instantly! Next thing they do is cut them down to make the Ark. The work site looks like the lands surrounding Saruman’s tower. (Did I mention that this movie is a relentless LoTR wannabe?)
• The skin of the serpent that tempted Eve is used in ceremonies passing the father’s blessing on to the child. On odd thing to cherish.

The thing the really threw me off was the development of Noah’s character. The movie repeatedly took a direction that I did not expect. Sometimes going in the unexpected direction is good art. It shows you a fresh point of view and keeps the story from being stale, but it only works if it has some good logic behind it.

As a foil for rapacious industrial civilization, Noah should be someone who loves life and balance with Nature. When he encounters three starving men who have just shot a animal for food, he should have ran (and let them have their meal, since the animal could not be saved anyway). But no. He fights and kills all three, despite one pleading for mercy. Then Noah and his sons make a funeral pyre for the animal. I guess the three men are left to rot on the ground. This lack of remorse for the loss of human life is contrary to both the Biblical concept of righteousness and most usual environmentalist philosophies. It was so jarring I couldn’t absorb it. I want to think of the hero as someone sharing something resembling my values.

Next we see him do everything he can to save his family, even to the point of sacrificing himself. He becomes a surrogate father to a young girl, and protects her like his own child. Good hero.

His sons complain that they have no wives, so they can’t reproduce like all the paired animals that show up. Noah says the Creator will provide. Then he goes on a mission to find some wives from the camp of humanity. He sees a young girl being dragged away and … traded for meat? I fully expected him to rescue her and bring her back for one of his sons. But no. He despairs of humanity and decides everyone must die, even his own family.

Here is where the character of Noah really flies off the tracks for me. The key driver for the rest of the movie is his decision whether humanity should repopulate or not.

First I expected him to close the door of the Ark and leave himself and his family outside. But no. He felt the Creator still needed them to take care of the animals.

They sit and listen to the screams of dying people outside. One family member suggest throwing them a line. I expected they might reel in a couple of girls for the sons. But no. Noah hardened his heart like Pharaoh.

When Ila reports herself pregnant, and therefore fertile, Noah’s first reaction should have been, “Oh, a miracle! The Creator wants us to repopulate after all!” But no. He decides the Creator’s will is for him to kill his own grandchild, particularly if it is a girl. He was clever enough to work out the Creator’s plan from a few dreams and visions, and they have a lot of time to sit around and think during those 9 months on the boat. This is absolute idiocy!

However, if Noah were logically consistent with his own idiocy, he would have immediately pitched Ila over the side and let her drown. But no. They wait to see what comes out. Twin girls! Exactly enough for his other sons. At this point Noah should connect the dots and understand the Creator’s implicit will in the miracle. Instead he goes through an agonizing scene where he almost kills the children.

There is little to say about the rest of the movie. Noah drinks away his sorrows, but finally reconciles with his family. He blesses life, the rainbow appears, credits roll. What is missing is that moment of revelation that he was completely wrong for the last half of the movie. He remains an idiot to the end, but perhaps a slightly redeemed idiot.