nihilistic_tyranny

Oh how I wish this had a budget.

Much of Jesus Hates You Now appears to be an irreverent student film that someone likely made to anger their teacher. Its frame story isn't pretty, some of the camera work is pretty off, and it just doesn't possess the cinematic qualities of a "real movie." It feels a bit like most other YouTube uploads in that regard, and it suffers for that.

It feels wrong for my primary criticism to involve the filmmakers lack of resources, because what's been done here is, at least in my opinion, quite exceptional. It's the kind of film that I certainly expect most viewers to turn off after less than ten minutes, and at the same time, it's a borderline-Dadaist journey into the absurdities of traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs that uses its psychotic tendencies to shed light on the obvious but oft-overlooked logical fallacies of this particular brand of Theism.

Normally, I'd expect such amateur work to tackle this subject matter by directly calling upon tired and basic concepts like Pascal's Wager. Instead, Jesus Hates You Now delves into the dark nature of omniscience and omnipresence (among other things), and what it ultimately has to say is both hilarious and alarming.

I have tremendous respect for any artist who is able to make a film with little money or equipment, but I try to never let that affect my rating. Aside from aforementioned frame story, the surreal and disturbing nature of literally everything else kind of blows me away. When we're not watching the antagonist tie up and attempt to deprogram the protagonist, we're watching the deprogramming video itself, which is likely far more insane than whatever led Kevin to this cult in the first place.

I love this film for all its surreal excesses, and I'll definitely watch it again.

I firmly believe that After Last Season is the worst film ever made. Other than that, however, I don't have much of a hierarchy for my least favorite films - at least I didn't until now. Domination of the Becoming is easily the second-worst movie I've ever seen.

This film has everything you could ever throw into a post-apocalyptic movie - vampires, zombies, vampire-zombies, vampire-demons, angels in human form, an abandoned backstory about the mark of the beast, prostitutes!, vague impressions of potentially being a Christian film, every kind of continuity error imaginable, a first act SO TERRIBLY EDITED THAT IT PHYSICALLY HURTS YOU, and an opening title card that says, "7 years later." 7 YEARS LATER FROM WHAT???

I haven't been able to track down a solid number for the budget, but I saw one estimate that said $500,000. And yes, I'm writing out the whole number with every zero intact so that you can marvel at the insanity of that budget to quality ratio. That number may be wrong, but even if it is, spending any money on the creation of this film would be a travesty.

This is streaming on Prime, and I desperately want to recommend it for the spectacle of its sheer ineptitude. However, each stream generates revenue for the filmmakers, so please - use your preferred shady method of obtaining the film if at all possible. These people don't deserve your money for birthing the gnarliest dumpster-baby imaginable.

Most of this film involves a woman trapped on an island, alone. Still, don't expect this film to be boring. The use of visual storytelling is quite impressive, and while it's not quite a masterpiece, it doesn't drag the way the premise implies it may.

Highly recommended for anyone who loves horror, or has a Castaway fetish.