Roger Ebert “Reviews” Stein’s Movie, Expelled

A while back, I blogged about the conspicuous fact that professional movie critics shun overtly religious films. It’s not debatable. Perhaps they don’t want to give press to Christian movies. In the meanwhile, they gush over mediocre films that promote liberal agendas. It’s so obvious it’s actually funny.

Anyway, Roger Ebert proved me wrong by reviewing Ben Stein’s movie, Expelled, No Intelligence Allowed. OK, never mind that the movie came out in April, that it’s finished it’s theater run, and has already been out on DVD for 2 months; he reviewed it so I can no longer say he never reviews conservative films.

Ebert prefaced his review with these words:

I've been accused of refusing to review Ben Stein's documentary "Expelled," a defense of Creationism, because of my belief in the theory of evolution. Here is my response.

It’s odd that someone would begin a review with a comment like this because it sure sounds defensive. If I were a professional critic, I would be too embarrassed to write a review AFTER a film was no longer showing in theaters. But I guess he felt obliged since I’m apparently not the only one who accused him of blatantly avoiding a movie because he disagreed with it.

However, if you read the rest of the review, you can see it’s not much of a review at all. It’s more like Ebert defending evolution, calling creationists stupid, attacking Ben Stein personally, and only occasionally referencing the movie. Even those few references to scenes in the movie are, in my opinion, misrepresentations. For example, in the above quote, Ebert characterized Stein's movie as, "a defense of creationism." The movie is no such thing.

Actually, I’m not going to even count this as a review. It’s more like an admission that Ebert didn't review the movie because he thinks creationists are stupid. It’s kind of ironic in a sense. Stein’s movie isn’t really about evidence for intelligent design (or creation); it’s about the concerted effort of militant evolutionists to squelch any debate or disagreement with their theory. In this scathing “review,” Ebert is actually engaging in the very behavior the movie seeks to highlight.