MovieChat Forums > The Message (1977) Discussion > Cinematically Pretty Irritating!

Cinematically Pretty Irritating!

posted 8 years ago by Agnimitra
4 replies | jump to latest

No offence intended to anyone but it gets really irritating to watch a film which expects you to suspend your disbelief off limits by not ever showing it's Protagonist. OK, there's a reason for that but then the narrative could have been chosen from someone else's POV. It just never makes sense almost in all the starting parts of all the scenes involving Prophet Mohammad. You are left wondering what happened?

So, I pretty much couldn't digest what was being said around because it was all like "Someone is trying to tell a story about a bunch of people who heard some beautiful things from a man & started following him. Except that someone refuses to tell the words itself from the source (i.e The Prophet). It is told by some people to some other people that they heard it from this man that god has spoken to him & they are all acting like they have heard it themselves in the 1st place. So it is pretty irritating & confusing."

OK guys one question? Especially to all my Muslim friends out there. If Mohammad's image cannot be portrayed in any art form then why even allow a it to be shown partially (His Back, Veiled face, Shadow)?
Not showing him contradicts one of the biggest beliefs of Islam that ultimately Mohammad was just a human because not showing him creates an unconscious over glorification of the man. It is like he is a divine creature throughout the film. Too Pious to be portrayed by mere humans.

[–] barish25 8 years ago

I think that the main reason he is not portrayed is so that people won't idolize him as a divine being and even start worshipping him. And it makes perfect sense when you see Buddhists praying to a statue/portrait of Buddha, or Christians with Jesus for that matter and etc. Hope this helps.

[–] bn_filmz 8 years ago

People in the 7th Century saw Muhammed with the own eyes. Did that make them worship or idolize him as a divine being?

And more importantly: Does the Koran allow you to worship or idolize humans? If not, how can it be a problem that we see, that he's just a human being like you and me; that he looks like one of us? And furthermore: in this case it would just have been an ACTOR you saw - NOT the real Muhammed.

In the Bible it is forbidden to make pictures of the Almighty God, which makes sense, because none of us has any idea how a spirit looks. But Muhammed was not an angel or a god - he was just a human being. So how can it be wrong to show people a person with a face, eyes, nose and mouth, arms and legs?????

It simply doesn't make sense.

[–] prplayer 8 years ago

you're not kidding

so many movies, so little time

[–] KungMartin90 8 years ago

Not depicting the prophet Muhammad, is a common misconception among muslims, mostly among Shi'a Muslims. The source comes from the Quran, which mentions that any reproduction (in imagery or whatever) of God's living and breathing creation, is disallowed. Infact it is also mentioned in the Bible's 10 commandments.

So if they were to follow this commandment from God properly and logically (atleast through their interpretation), they wouldn't show anybodies face in the movie.

Then again, there's also a Sunni concensus that video recordings aren't in the same league as photographs, or any other form of reproduction/imagery. Which is why many Sunni muslims don't mind being recorded, whereas they will not allow photos, for example. As far as I understood, it's because a video recording is just a reflection of what's going on.

As also mentioned by someone else, look at most religions out there. Images, of all kinds of living things. Animals, sub-Gods, demi-gods, diety's, etc, that are very commonly worshipped and prayed to. Infact many religions pray to normal human beings. Something that monotheistic religions like Christianity, Judaism, and Islam have always disallowed.

Heck, look at our biggest religion, Christianity. Depictions of Christ all over the place, idols all over the place, despite the ten commandments disallowing it. See what it lead to. Idolization. People pray to someone other than God, just like God forbade. Jesus never claimed to be God, ANYWHERE. Infact Jesus many times, IN THE BIBLE, says that there are many things he can't do, which God CAN do. So why are they praying to Jesus? You get where I'm going with this.

Source: I am a muslim convert. I have heard this stuff from a local Sunni scholar who has studied in Madina Islamic Unversity.