YEAR ONE
HEADLINE: ** Poorly Made AND Offensive **
Title: YEAR ONE
Quality: * Acceptability: -4
SUBTITLES: None
WARNING CODES:
Language: LL
Violence: VV
Sex: SS
Nudity: N
RATING: PG-13
RELEASE: June 19, 2009
TIME: 100 minutes
STARRING: Jack Black, Michael Cera, David Cross, June Raphael, Juno Temple, Olivia Wilde, Hank Azaria, Oliver Platt, Vinnie Jones, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Xander Berkeley, Paul Rudd, and Harold Ramis
DIRECTOR: Harold Ramis
PRODUCERS: Harold Ramis, Judd Apatow and Clayton Townsend
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Rodney Rothman
WRITER: Harold Ramis, Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg
BASED ON THE NOVEL/PLAY BY: N/A
DISTRIBUTOR: Columbia Pictures/ Sony Pictures Entertainment
CONTENT: (PaPaPa, AbAbAb, HoHo, H, B, FR, RHRH, M) Very strong, very lightly mixed, pagan worldview with very strong anti-biblical and even anti-Semitic content mocking Abraham, the father of Judaism and Christianity, and mocking Seth, the righteous son of Adam and Eve, strong homosexual allusions, man wonders what if God does not really exist but then prays to Him just in case He does, and references to both gods and God, sometimes both at the same time, plus misleading, revisionist history of the Book of Genesis places Adam and Abraham at the same period of time for comic purposes, with people also going to Sodom but there is no mention of Abraham's brother Lot; 17 obscenities (including one "f" word), no profanities, jokes about passing gas, prisoner hanging upside down urinates on himself, and man eats animal feces in a joke about tracking other people's footprints in the forest; strong comic, action violence (but not very gory or bloody) includes soldiers attack caravan, a decapitation, people hit over the head with heavy sticks or light clubs, woman cast into a sacrificial fire, man falls into fire, boy throws three stones at man's head, scaffolding falls on man, fighting, slapping, Cain hits Abel in the head with a large stone multiple times with some blood, man accidentally spears another man in the back but the wounded man is able to walk around because the wound is not very deep, mountain lion leaps on a young man, etc.; strong sexual content includes implied fornication in one scene, men talk about wanting to lie with women in their tribe, woman tells man she likes girls, sex jokes about male genitals, effeminate high priest lusts after young man and forces him to rub oil on his very hairy chest while he lies down on his back and says how much he likes it, orgy scene with clothed people kissing and bare-bellied women dancing suggestively in the room, some double entendres, Abraham verbally condemns the sexual sins of Sodom, etc.; upper male nudity, shots of female cleavage and women show their midriffs at times; alcohol use and implied drunkenness; no smoking or drugs; and, lying, selfishness, pride, arrogance, and human sacrifice rebuked, although the story of Abraham and Isaac is mocked and misinterpreted to deprecate Judaism and Christianity.
GENRE: Comedy
INTENDED AUDIENCE: Older teenagers and adults
Please address your comments to:
Michael Lynton, Chairman/CEO
Amy Pascal, Chairman - Motion Picture Group
Sony Pictures Entertainment
(Columbia Pictures/TriStar/Screen Gems/Provident/Triumph Films)
10202 West Washington Blvd.
Culver City, CA 90232-3195
Phone: (310) 244-4000
Fax: (310) 244-2626
Web Page: www.spe.sony.com/
SUMMARY: YEAR ONE stars Jack Black and Michael Cera as two Paleolithic hunter gatherers who meet Adam, Cain and Abel, Abraham and Isaac, and try to stop two women from being sacrificed in the city of Sodom. YEAR ONE is an extremely lame and vulgar comedy that viciously mocks the biblical story of Abraham, the father of the Jewish faith, and Christianity and Islam.
IN BRIEF:
YEAR ONE stars Jack Black and Michael Cera as Zed and Oh, two Paleolithic hunter gatherers who get thrown out of their tribe. On their way to the City of Sodom, Zed and Oh see Cain kill Abel, meet Adam and Abraham, and escape slavery. In Sodom, they discover that Zed's younger sister Eema and the girl that Zed likes, Maya, are slaves of the royal family. They also discover that the city is sacrificing virgin women to convince the gods to end the terrible drought. Zed ingratiates himself with the Princess, the king's stepdaughter. Can he and Oh save Maya and Eema before they are cast into the flames, even though Maya may not be a virgin?
YEAR ONE is a very lame, lowbrow, and lewd comedy that viciously mocks Abraham, the founder of the Jewish faith, and Christianity and, in part, Islam. Even most of the clean comedy bits are uninspired and asinine. Beyond that, there are crude verbal and visual jokes about sex, passing gas, homosexuality, vomiting, urinating, and eating animal feces. How this production got past a major Hollywood studio is one of the great mysteries of our time.
NOTE from Dr. Ted Baehr, publisher of Movieguide Magazine. For more information from a Christian perspective, order the latest Movieguide Magazine by calling 1-800-899-6684(MOVI) or visit our website at www.movieguide.org. Movieguide is dedicated to redeeming the values of Hollywood by informing parents about today's movies and entertainment and by showing media executives and artists that family-friendly and even Christian-friendly movies do best at the box office year in and year out. Movieguide now offers an online subscription to its magazine version, atwww.movieguide.org. The magazine, which comes out 25 times a year, contains many informative articles and reviews that help parents train their children to be media-wise consumers.
