Film critic and BAD/BMD guy Jordan Hoffman conducted a really interesting interview for The Times of Israel with Rabbi Shmuley Boteach - "America's Rabbi" - about Darren Aronofsky's Noah. Here's an excerpt:
There is also a fantastical element to this movie, and that may surprise some audience members. There are prevalent characters called “The Watchers” that are these enormous rock creatures.
I thought the interpretation of the Fallen Angels was brilliant. Very Hollywood. I don’t buy it at all, but it was a very novel interpretation of these beams of light encumbered by a material shell that captures them. If you look in the Midrash, the Fallen Angels, they fell for women – they fell for “gross carnality.” A mix of the spirit and the physical, captured and trapped in a coarse, cumbersome physicality that makes even mobility a challenge.
Yeah, it looks great, but definitely tips “Noah” into “Lord of the Rings” territory, so it’s interesting you liked that part.
Well, I didn’t approach the movie as the Bible, I approached it as Hollywood. Something loosely based on a story in the Bible. I’m not sitting there with a Bible open trying to read in the dark to test the accuracy. No, I thought that aspect was very unique.
But if they were going to try to show the transformation of Noah from a good guy to an isolated right-wing nut-job I would have liked to have seen a little more Joseph Conrad “Heart of Darkness.” They could have showed that a little more gradually. Instead, when he hears he’s going to have a granddaughter he says he’s going to kill her. You’d think he’d keep it to himself instead of announcing it!
He was always open with his family, I guess.
I suppose.
But do you think the film wants to show him as a right-wing nut or someone who is struggling and trying to interpret what God wants him to do.
Okay, so now let’s get into adherence to the Bible. There are parts that are impressive and accurate. When he is speaking about Creation to his family, as the story has been handed down to him, the way he describes it is shown as an evolutionary interpretation. But the Bible can lend itself to an evolutionary interpretation! The Torah says the mineral, vegetable, animal and the intellectual. So evolutionists, that can be guided by the hand of God. It was done very smoothly and impressively.
The entire interview's very enlightening and a fun read, so check it out!