No, it doesn’t.
I will spell out the objections about the movie that I raised in my previous post:
-
The fact that Bibles are rarer than other books is incoherent.
-
The fact that people with religious inclinations don’t know how to pray is unrealistic.
-
The Bible has been printed in 6 billion copies so far. In the movie, Carnegie has his henchmen scour the land in search of one copy. They regularly bring him the books they find but the Bible is never among them. Carnegie is one of the few people who can read and he reads every day. What does Carnegie read? Books. What do Carnegie’s henchmen bring him regularly? Books. What can’t Carnegie find? The most frequently published book before the apocalypse. The writer wants the audience to accept this incoherent premise because, even though it is not probable, it is still possible. I for one would accept it if the movie wouldn’t include people with religious inclinations who don’t know how to pray.
-
The scenes when Eli shares a prayer with Solara, who in turn teaches her mother how to pray are really unconvincing. When considering religion as a social act, one should note that, despite the existence of holy books, believers first come in contact with religion by means of certain ceremonial practices and oral traditions that to a certain extent can and do exist separately from the written text. The idea that the destruction of holy books would lead to the disappearance of rituals and prayers goes against everything cultural anthropologists know about how humans function in a group. A totally unrealistic claim, in my opinion.