Wednesday, September 21, 2011

God on Trial

TV film, 90 minutes, 2008

The enormity of the holocausts that have taken place within living memory raise fresh questions about existence of any order of justice in the world. What kind of God could have let this happen? The present film is set in Auschwitz and the prisoners in the camp many of whom await the chambers on the next day set up a kangaroo court to put God on trial, specifically to examine whether he his been true to his Biblical covenant with the Jewish people to take care of them. The drama is neither able to project the gravity of the questions about theology which twentieth century experience raises, far less to make out a case for faith in spite of them. The film is set in the unlighted interior of a dormitory and haggard victims harangue around a stool, mostly expressive of anger about the grief they have passed through. It's a depressing film unilluminated by passion. This drab, verbose, lack lustre drama does not rise above quibbling over the text of the Jewish scripture, failing even to bring the great enigma into focus, leave aside its resolution.

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