Review: Religulous: A Conversation with Bill Maher and Larry Charles

In earlier posts, I mispelled the title of this one "Religious". The actual title is Religulous, a combination of the words "religious" and "ridiculous". This review isn't really a film review. We got to see a ten-minute trailer of the work-in-progress documentary Bill Maher and Larry Charles, followed by a 45-minute live conversation with the two men, more clips from the movie, and then a Q&A with the audience. It was often hilarious, sometimes insightful, and altogether entertaining. I can't wait to see the film, which is in post-production and should be out sometime this spring.

The movie looks like it will be Bill Maher traveling around the world talking to people of various sects of the big three western faiths (Christianity, Judaism & Muslim). When asked if they had a hard time, knowing who he was, getting people to talk on camera, Bill answered, "No. [People of faith] are media whores, just like everyone else."

The clips were pretty hilarious. One audience member criticized them for displaying the imagined transcript of a text message typed by a Muslim Cleric ("Death to Bill Maher. LOL :-)") when their conversation was interrupted by a seemingly anachronistic 21st century gadget. I thought the gag worked pretty well. Some people have no sense of humor. Most of the humorous moments, though, stood completely on their own, without embellishment.

In conversation, the two men discussed their religious backgrounds. Bill is the son of a Catholic father and Jewish mother. Larry is the son of a secular Jewish couple, but grew up in an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood, admitted wanting at one time to be a Rabbi, much to his father's dismay. Bill made the point that he's not without spirituality, but that he finds many aspects of religion to be a bit preposterous. He went on to say that exploring his own spirituality to be "on his long-term to do list", right behind "getting laid and smoking more weed". Ah, Bill...