Movie Review: Noah

3.5 stars out of 5

If they told us in Hebrew school that Adam and Eve had a third son named Seth, well, maybe I was absent that day. Regardless, Cain and Abel seemed to get all the press. Seth was the Zeppo of the family. The Chuck Cunningham.

Now, Darren Aronofksy is out to settle the score. Seth-le the score.

I had very little idea what to anticipate when I went to see Noah. I’d watched Aronofsky’s previous four films and loved three of them (Black Swan, The Wrestler, Requiem for a Dream) and hated, hated, hated the other (The Fountain). So my odds were pretty good, except, were we treading into the same murky metaphysical waters (ahem) that made The Fountain (ahem-ahem) so completely incomprehensible? Plus, the commercials looked a little bit stupid.

Well, I didn’t find Noah to be stupid at all. Maybe not brilliant. But certainly not stupid. And there’s even a character named Ahem-Ahem. No, wait, sorry. Shem. And Ham. Noah’s boys.

And unlike The Fountain, this film is not ridiculously convoluted. Quite the contrary. In fact, for a long while I wondered if maybe it was a children’s movie. Should I be reviewing Noah for Media Darlings? But as it went on, it seemed a little more grown-up. Or maybe a children’s movie for adults? Bible stories for atheist cinephiles? I don’t know, I just don’t know.

I do know that Russell Crowe is pretty terrific as Noah, descendant of Seth. He is the textbook driven man. The obsessed guy. Noah must FINISH THE JOB regardless of the effect it is having on his loved ones.

Jennifer Connolly is his mostly supportive wife. (Lord knows it ain’t easy.) She suggests building the ark out of sand and fog, but is ultimately outvoted. Connolly is solid throughout and has one powerful scene that she totally, totally rocks.

In addition to his sons Japheth, Shem, and Ham (Logan Lerman, who at a young age has quietly pieced together a nice little career), Noah adopts Hermione. Emma Watson muggles her way through this admirably.

Ray Winstone is the villain (descendant of Cain, boooooo!) and he’s also very good in the movie. We don’t like him, not one bit.

Anthony Hopkins is old but not as old as Methuselah, who he portrays. Methy summons that old black magic to cast a little spell on poor Hermione.

I read in the credits that Nick Nolte was in the movie. And I’m thinking, how did I miss Nick Nolte? There are only, like, eight people on the entire planet. But now on IMDB I learn that he played one of the stone giants. Talk about typecasting.

So, yeah, there are these stone giants in the movie. Kind of like prehistoric Transformers. And you’ve got evil bearded Winstone gathering an army to attack Noah and his ark. So it all starts to feel a little bit Lord of the Rings-y. And yet still, not stupid.

And there are two Patti Smith songs in the movie. And that’s pretty good, right?

There are some scenes where I thought, hey, this is really nice filmmaking. Then there’d be a recurring CGI snake and I’d think, eh, this could be better. And also, I probably spent too much time wondering: If Adam and Eve only had boys, then how did….?

I am not quite sure why Darren Aronofsky made this. But it is still pretty good, even if it took him more than six days.