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Dear Person at Nettime-ann:
Please consider posting this to your list.
Thanks,
Julian
21 October 2006
RE: Documentary: “Atheism” 71 minutes, 2006; a documentary by
Julian Samuel
Hello:
If interested please contact me for more information:
Julian Samuel, director
e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
*
Montreal film-maker Julian Samuel’s “Atheism” confronts religion
and its discontents by introducing the views of a physicist who
refutes the Big Bang, and with it the possibility of a creation; a
novelist who uses post-Newtonian concepts as a story-telling
device; two experts on Islam; a Christian thinker from within the
church; an atheist, originally from an Islamic country; and a
philosopher who topples the world of miracles by subjecting them to
the rational waters of logic upon which, it emerges, one can’t
walk, despite surface tension.
Interviewees:
Tariq Ali, author,
The Clash of Fundamentalisms
Fadi Hammoud,
Journalist and
Middle East specialist
Alison MacLeod, author,
The Wave Theory of Angels
Christine Overall,
Professor of Philosophy, Queen's University
Jean-Claude Pecker, astrophysicist
Collège de France and Académie des Sciences, Paris (retired)
Noomane Raboudi
Specialist on Islam
John Shelby Spong
former Episcopal
Bishop of Newark, NJ.
*
Reviews and commentary:
Atheism By Julian Samuel
a short response by Sylvat Aziz
This visual essay, comprising scholarly and accessible interviews,
should prove to be universally provocative in the most positive
sense. Comparisons between science, revealed and other religions,
artistic values and histories place a premium on reason. Although
the title/topic is exceptionally large and in its nature
sociopolitically charged, in this case theism and atheism are
discussed intelligently and expertly using language that avoids
jargon. A most refreshing circumstance. One can find a sensitive
clarity throughout, a sense of humour in the background, poignant
and at times with a bite, that extenuates the fragility of complex
systems of human thought discussed herein.
Although the video strays from strict documentary form, dogmas,
beliefs, habits and so on are discussed without promulgating a
particular dogma, belief, habit.
The more abstract visual references insinuated in the video; the
use of stained glass windows, overlaid gestural calligraphy,
references to religious icons and ritual practices, allusions to
biological beginnings and other visual elements, are sometimes more
successful than others but on the whole, these serve as a practical
as well as symbolic matrix for the interviews, adding a relevant
visual textural interest. The framing is direct and strong
avoiding clutter, making content confident.
In the main the value of this essay lies in its humane, non-
proselyitizing position and the thoughtful responses to questions
concerning many facets of this very complex, essentially human set
of ideas.
*
Le film "Atheism by Julian Samuel" interroge sur la question
d’absence de Dieu dans la vie du monde. Le documentaire nous plonge
rapidement dans les réflexions et positions émanant des divers
interrogés. Cette démarche produit un remarquable tableau des
éventualités. Les questions d’encrage religieux prennent place.
Les croisades, les guerres, l’Inquisition et le mystère. Par
opposition, elles sont suivies par d’intéressantes interrogations
d’ordre scientifiques et philosophiques du réel.
Pour l’auteur une œuvre d’art doit questionner. C’est à cela que
nous assistons. À travers des interviews, Julian Samuel sonde
subtilement les sensibilités de ses interlocuteurs pour ensuite les
confronter avec les siennes. Cette démarche très instructive sur
les positions athées possibles a aussi pour but sa propre auto-
reconduction. L'auteur tente une confrontation et essaye de
réaffirmer, une fois encore, le choix qu'il avait fait à l’âge de
ses 16 ans. Les loyaux de Julian Samuel, à voir impérativement. Ce
film va vous saisir.
Robert Wiechec
*
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