Ridley Scott and Missing the Point of the Book of Exodus

Ridley Scott and Missing the Point of the Book of Exodus | Fr. Robert Barron | CWR blog

Exodus is not telling a story primarily of political liberation (though that is part of it), but rather a story of spiritual liberation from false gods

Exodus is not telling a story primarily of political liberation (though that is part of it), but rather a story of spiritual liberation from false gods

Father Robert Barron is the founder of the global ministry, Word on Fire, and the Rector/President of Mundelein Seminary. He is the creator of the award winning documentary series, "Catholicism"and "Catholicism:The New Evangelization."Learn more at www.WordonFire.org


Ridley Scott’s new film “Exodus: Gods and Kings” features Moses, the Pharaoh, hundreds of thousands of slaves making their way across the floor of the Red Sea, all ten plagues, the burning bush, and even the angel of Yahweh in the form of a petulant eleven year old boy with a British accent.

And yet, the movie is spiritually flat, as though its makers had read the Biblical story but understood precious little of its theological poetry.

Many commentators have focused their critical attention on the portrayal of the angel as an annoyed little boy, but in itself that choice didn’t bother me. Let’s face it: it’s next to impossible to represent God in a cinematically adequate way. For Charlton Heston, the God of Mt. Sinai was a disembodied voice (actually Heston’s own, dramatically slowed down) and flashes of fire. I’m not at all sure that this was better than Ridley Scott’s version, and in point of fact, the weird kid caught something of the unnerving, unsettling, more than vaguely frightening quality of the God disclosed in the Old Testament.

The problem is the way the relationship between Moses and the God of Israel is presented.

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