Noah

This film was a huge disappointment, though, to be fair, I don't know what I was really expecting.
First of all, Noah (Russell Crowe) is not the kind, innocent, truly good at heart man I was led to believe exists in The Bible. Now, he is not corrupt like the evil descendants of Cain, torturing and raping women for the fun of it. Noah has killed, in order to save himself and his young sons and refusing to allow others in to the Ark despite his family's pleas that the room does exist. And then, even worse, he believes that the Creator didn't even want humans to survive the great flood, so they would all kill themselves. However, he did have a fatal flaw by saying that he and his wife would go first. Considering no one else was behind that plan, I doubt that after his death, the rest would have followed.
Probably the bigger problem is that these rock creatures, called Watchers exist in the film. They are eventually on Noah's side and protect the family from the Evildoers, sacrificing themselves in the process. Of course these are fictional beings so why exactly did the screenwriters, which include the director, Darren Aronofsky, decided to do that, bringing the historical value of the film way down.
Another problem is Ham (Logan Lerman), middle son of Noah. He is jealous of his older brother, Shem (Douglas Booth) who loves the adopted daughter of Noah and his unnamed wife (Jennifer Connelly), Ila (Emma Watson). Ham finally finds someone (Madison Davenport) in the village of the Evils (my word, not the official one), but when he helps her escape, her foot is caught, but because the rains have begun the Evils are running, Noah does not stop to help Ham so his love interest is trampled to death, leaving him feeling forever bitter to his father. In fact, Ham is so bitter that he helps the Head Evil (Ray Winstone) to defeat Noah in the Ark, in the ridiculous climax scene, but he realizes that Head Evil is, well, as the name says, evil, even eating the precious animals on the Ark. So Ham ends up killing the Head Evil, becoming a man. Once the storm clears and land returns, Ham sets off on his own, leaving the rest of his family behind to find his own path.
Now, back to the original problem, of Noah wanting his family to die. Naturally, his wife is dead-set against it and tries to talk him out of the whole thing, saying that good exists in all their children. Noah agrees but says that bad also exists in all of them. But what really sends me over the edge is when Noah goes to kill his newborn granddaughters. Which requires some background. Though Ila and Shem are deeply in love, Ila is barren. At first I though this was because of a bad stabbing her stomach received when she was younger. Fortunately, this is remedied when Noah's grandfather (Anthony Hopkins) brings his blessing upon her, for she has lived with the family for ten years. I predicted that he would make her unbarren, or fertile, and I was right. Ila does become pregnant, or in her words, with child. She believes that this is a good fortune, that the Creator has smiled upon the family, though Noah doesn't agree with her. The plan is that she and Shem will leave the Ark to have their baby away from Noah's grasp, but her water breaks before that can happen and with Connelly's help, delivers the baby while Shem stands guard so Noah won't come and kill it and then a second little girl is born. Boys would have been the better outcome because Noah wouldn't have killed them right away, they would have lived to old age and died as the last man on Earth. Noah will have none of that, and goes onto the top of the Ark where Ila is. I have never had children, but I would think that it would completely deplete you of your energy so I have no idea how Ila climbed to the top holding both babies. She sings them to sleep but Noah cannot stab them, because he loves them. I was so grateful that this didn't happen. My friend, who saw the film with me, said that if the babies were killed, she would never see a film with me again. So fortunately that didn't happen.
Fortunately, the film also has a happy ending, with Noah reconnecting back with his family, though this comes after a touching moment with Ila when it should have been his wife, saying that goodness still exists. The family, sans Ham, is together and Noah blesses his granddaughters, knowing that the future is bright.
Despite all the problems I have with the film, the acting is quite good, though some accents are all over the place. And because it's Hollywood, most of the actors are too attractive for their roles, their teeth too straight, too few scars on their bodies, hands not callused enough for building that huge ark from scratch. Still, they saved the film from being a complete disaster.
I did like the set design and the use of herbs in the film, to put the animals to sleep and to diagnose Ila's pregnancy. Sure, that's a small thing, but certainly one of the most interesting.
The special effects are fine, you can't truly tell that the animals aren't real. The cinematography and editing are fine.
The problem is in the screenplay itself. According to IMDb, the screenwriters used a graphic novel based on the Biblical story as a main influence which makes sense considering everything. I don't understand why they made the choices they did for the film, wondering exactly what message they were trying to send, wondering why they thought this film would be a success if they made the decisions they did. Of course, religious figures don't like this film, if I was deeply religious I would probably also be offended especially when the source material didn't need to be changed to create an intriguing film. Grade: B-