Expelled Reviews

The Real Detroit Weekly is one of those free advertisers you can pick up on most downtown street corners in big cities. Some people read them for their announcements of local cultural events, others read them for their erotic personal ads, and still others use them to stay warm while living on the street. As sources of news and educated opinion, though, they’re of even less use than the politically correct mainstream media.

Last week’s issue of the Real Detroit Weekly included a piece by Jay Davis attacking Mark Mathis, one of the producers of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. Titled “Unevolved,” Davis’ piece calls Mathis “not qualified” to evaluate scientific aspects of evolutionary theory. In particular, he blasts Mathis for being unaware that “scientists have witnessed speciation, the arisal of a new species from an old one.” Davis is indignant that Mathis has “just produced a film about evolution, and he’s never heard of the fact that speciation has been observed and thoroughly documented in the scientific literature? I’m stunned. I send him peer-reviewed research confirming this fact via e-mail.”

[Note: For a more comprehensive defense of Ben Stein’s documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, please see: NCSE Exposed at NCSEExposed.org]

I saw “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed,” the controversial new documentary film by Ben Stein on the intelligent design debate, at one of the private screenings that was part of the grassroots marketing for the film, and I was disappointed. That’s right. Here I made a trip all the way to Louisville, Kentucky from my home in Danville (almost 2 hours away), I go get a big bag of popcorn and a drink, climb the steps in the stadium seating at the Tinseltown Theater for the private screening and, as it turns out, not a single, solitary Darwinist tried to sneak past the big, scary looking octogenarian security guards to try to get in.

So I watched the movie instead, which was excellent. Now I know why the Darwinists are having such a fit–and spending so much time and effort throwing it: This is a powerful expose of academic intolerance. If this one gets wide exposure, they get a well deserved black eye.

“Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed” is effective in its presentation of its views. It is by turns funny, ominous, clever, illuminating, and entertaining, which is more than you can say about some of the reviews of this movie which are merely hostile. Apparently their strategy is to convince people that the movie is not very good, something they have spilled a lot of ink trying to do.

There are several things the critics are saying to accomplish this apparent objective, some of which have nothing to do with the quality of the movie at all.

Brent Bozell III’s column at Townhall says he was invited to preview Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, the Ben Stein film that screens for the public at a reported 1000 theaters this weekend. “I went into the screening bored,” he writes. “I came out of it stunned.” This makes a point that needs underscoring. Anybody who is bothered by the malign conformity of contemporary politics and culture in academia and the media should be paying attention to the evolution debate. It isn’t marginal. It’s central. The refusal to allow debate and the reckless determination to punish dissent aren’t limited to the sciences, but they are crucially present there. Materialist science is being allowed to define all reality far too often and, Read More ›

From Edward Douglas at Comingsoon.net: Summary:The filmmakers’ intentions are kept deliberately vague–is this about free speech or about teaching religion in the classroom?–but it’s a surprisingly entertaining and informative doc that at least tries to address the debate over intelligent design from another angle.Story:Ben Stein takes a look at intelligent design and how scientists and teachers who’ve dared to address it have come under attack from the scientific community using Darwin’s theories of evolution. To read more, click here:

From Dave Berg at National Review: I like rebels, especially ones who go against type. Take Ben Stein in his latest film, Expelled, which comes out this Friday. Dressed in a sport coat, tie, and tennis shoes, he’s not who you expect — the deadpan, monotone-voiced but ever-likable teacher he portrays in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and The Wonder Years.Stein retains his characteristic deadpan affect, but this time he’s playing himself — a deceptively erudite and well-educated interviewer, who is passionately skeptical of evolutionary biology and its leading proponents. To read more, click here.