One night, Noah has a vision of a terrible flood he visits his grandfather Methuselah ( Anthony Hopkins), who slips him a mickey via some hallucinogenic tea, leaving Noah convinced that he must build an ark to save the animals of the world while the creator wipes out the wicked with a great flood. Years later, Noah ( Russell Crowe) and his wife Naameh ( Jennifer Connelly) try to instill his values in their sons. As such, Cain’s heirs pretty much wiped out Seth’s, until the only one left among the latter is young Noah, who witnesses the murder of his own father. In the case of “Noah,” we not only have to allow for quite literal deus ex machina - a lot of story elements can only be swallowed with a healthy dose of “because God willed it, that’s why” - but we’re also forced to deal with the practical implications of a story that ends up with a handful of people being left to repopulate the planet, most of whom are already related by blood.Īs “Noah” tells it, the world was divided after Adam and Eve’s expulsion from the Garden of Eden and Cain’s murder of Abel - the line of Cain built decadent cities and exploited the resources, and the line of Seth lived in peace and harmony. The tricky thing about adapting Bible stories into drama is that the characters tend to have only one or two dominant traits rather than emerging as richly complicated people.
See video: Emma Watson Introduces New ‘Noah’ Trailer, Full of Epic Apocalyptic Destruction (Video)
“Noah” has its share of interesting ideas, from rock-covered fallen angels to Noah’s idea that he and his family should be the last human beings on earth, per his interpretation of what “the creator” tells him, but the film winds up feeling like a bit of a soggy slog, both overblown and underwritten. Unlike the thousands of CGI beasts of the land and air who hitch a ride on “Noah,” Darren Aronofsky‘s highly-anticipated epic is neither fish nor fowl in no way is it a straightforward Bible tale (and given the brevity of Genesis’ account of the flood, such a thing would be next to impossible) nor is it the sort of unfettered freak-out that fans of “Black Swan,” “Pi” or “The Fountain” would expect from its director and co-writer (with Ari Handel).