Tom Shadyac, the director and writer of the two Christian based films, Bruce Almighty and Evan Almighty, said in an interview, “there is no more Jesus freak in this room than me”. In that same interview, he mentions that being surrounded by the Bible growing up, he felt the need to spread the word through these Christian films. However, this has changed Shadyac’s perspective of the flood in a way where he describes a forgiving God, as opposed to a God that wants to ruin humanity because of their evil doings, as referenced in the Hebrew Bible, Quran, and book of Genesis. Although most Christians would believe the original story, Shadyac aims to portray a family/friendly film and a positive outlook on God and humanities relationship with God and one another. 

In the movie Evan Almighty, Evan Baxter, played by Steve Carell, loses his job and is asked by God, played by Morgan Freeman, to build an ark. In present times, this was seen as absurd and completely out of the ordinary. Soon enough, like Noah, Evan trusted God and built the ark. 

When the flood occurs, Evan allows everyone in the community to come onto the ark, even after they all denied that the flood would happen. We can see that Shadyac wanted to show the viewers that, even after all communities denial and sin, God would protect and forgive them. This is extremely important because it goes against the covenant that God had in place for Noah in the original story, which was just to have his family on the ark. 

The ‘God’ in Evan Almighty mentions that people focus on the wrath and judgement from God when instead they should be focusing on believing in each other and standing by one another. Although this may seem comforting, in Biblical terms, the flood was a way for God to punish mankind for their violent and rebellious ways.

Directors Choice

Whats the problem with showing the original story of Noah’s Ark? We have to remember that Shadyac is a writer and director of “comedic” films. This means that he has a natural intended audience, being families looking for entertainment and laughter. The original story would only bring seriousness and sadness to the viewers watching the movie. 

We have to keep in mind that this film is also rated “PG”. That being said, a majority of Shadyac’s audience for Evan Almighty was young kids. Showing kids God’s true intentions of ruining humankind for their evilness in the world, would indeed put a bad image in their head and wouldn’t be “kid friendly”, even if that’s what happened in the original story.

Money, Money, Money

There is no question as to why Tom Shadyac chose to create another Christian based film after the large attention and publicity towards Bruce Almighty. Bruce Almighty grossed $485 million worldwide, more than any of his other comedic films, such as Ace Ventura: Pet Detective ($107 million), The Nutty Professor ($273 million), Liar Liar ($302 million), etc. This created a large amount of potential profit to be made with creating Evan Almighty, however, the film only grossed around $173 million worldwide. Even though this film made no where near the gross of Bruce Almighty, it was another way for Shadyac to spread the word of the bible through his version of the flood story.

Nathan Fasanaro

Author

Hi! I am a first year here at Colgate University and a member of the Mens Lacrosse Team. I am undecided for a major but plan on doing Political Science. I hope you enjoy reading my posts!