Comparing The Biblical Story Of Noah And The Ark

Noah, premiering on March 28, 2014 is definitely one of the more controversial movies of this year. It adheres to the basic biblical story of Noah and the Ark, but has many extra biblical elements to keep the viewer incased in the viewing experience, creating a more conflicting setting for Noah to grab the audience’s attention, and adding modern visual effects to attract attention. Overall, it wasn’t received too well by non-religious reviewers, the VIEWERS of the movie seemed to enjoy it, grossing over $300 million at the box office. As the motion picture still adheres to the basic biblical story of Noah and the Ark, it has many differences outside of that basic narrative. By doing this is helped create a new structure that was more
appealing to the audience and caused more jeopardy in the story. God did not speak directly to Noah as he did in the bible, nor was he called God. He was titled the creator, Noah would be given visions by the creator and would have to interpret them. He went to his grandfather Methuselah for help interpreting the first vision in the movie. He became very conflicted and troubled by these visions, growing more and more foul in a way. In the bible, he never got this foul, he did get upset with the Lord and was getting fed up, but not to the extent as the motion picture presents it. Also, the movie introduces the audience to the Watchers, the fallen angels of the Lord encased in rock as punishment for sinning and disobeying the Lord in heaven. They help Noah build the ark and protect him from the King who tries to get on the Ark with his people. In the biblical story, none of this happens. Noah and his own family build the ark themselves. Animals in the movie are entirely innocent and in the bible this is not so, men and animals are guilty of sin and all but the ones that Noah gathered were killed by the flood. In the film, he does not physically go gather any animals, they all come themselves, male and female, in giant herds of species separated by walking animals, to birds, to bugs and creepy crawlers and so on. Although in the bible they were said to have come two by two and he never once says this in the movie. Another major difference in the characters is their ages, Noah was supposed to be 600 years old when the flood came and his sons almost one hundred years old, for obvious reasons of unreasonable film making, they are a younger age for the movie.
In the story in the bible, Noah’s three sons took their wives onto the ark. There are also some similarities; almost every sentence has a biblical reference to a verse in it. Also there is a raven and a dove in the movie, which while left out in many children’s bible stories, is actually in the true bible story of Noah and the Ark. Some of these differences could be a distraction, but the director makes sure you focus on the true story and not get incredibly distracted by the new and crazy elements. The Watchers are probably the biggest distraction in the film but it depicts them in a way that shows their use and meanings. God and Noah were really close in the bible, he had a direct line of communication with him, as I stated earlier, the creator showed Noah what to do in visions. The king stowed away on the ark in the motion picture, in the bible, there were no stowaways and Ham was much less of a menace. Noah never tried to stop his family from reproducing, he would not have killed anyones baby ever.
You see multiple times in the movie that the skin of the serpent is treated as a family heirloom, that is not the case for the bible story. In the story, they gather around an altar to conclude what had happened on the ark instead of blessing the family with the skin of the snake like the movie depicted. The time was also off, the movie made it seem much longer than the forty days and forty nights that the bible suggests. The two are very different, yet deeply similar. The movie reminisces the bible story many times and lots of those times, no one will even notice. The movie was a good reflection of the bible story.
While not always being accurate or containing the same material, it was entertaining. I really enjoyed how I could tell what was a part of the real story and what was a part of the movie. I liked how Methuselah was involved a lot more, he did not look 900 years old though. Noah was depicted well until he went crazy, deranged killer on his granddaughters and almost killed them. They didn’t have the length of the bible story, but that is kind of obvious as a movie can’t last for years. I think that the movie is really something that people should see. Christians are scared to watch these movies that have biblical stories that aren’t accurate. The truth is, there is no way any of these can be accurate 100% of the time. They would become way too long and repetitive. I was reluctant to choose the movie because of friends telling me that it’s not good, but in the end I knew I really wanted to see it and it will be fun to see the differences and similarities between the biblical narrative of Noah and the Ark. Does God show up in this movie? For sure! Is it totally true? NO! That should not deter someone from watching something. It has good morals and a valuable story, I highly recommend it for everyone to see in their life. While it may not be totally kid friendly, I would say by the time a kid is thirteen years of age, this movie is totally appropriate for them. In reading the real story first I really could
immerse myself in the story of Noah and visualize the parallels of both stories. I have discovered a new type of enjoyment. I want to do this now with more bible stories and movies that are of biblical nature or have derived from a bible story. There are so many and I think the immersion in this kind of analysis is a great new tool to learn these skills of comparing and contrasting. Whatever you believe, you can learn from this and I have definitely learned from it. Noah, is definitely a recommendation of mine and this analysis definitely made me like it more.