“The Ten” is billed as an irreverent comedy (rated “R” for crudeness) that ridicules the Ten Commandments; it opens on August 3 in select theaters. Here is what film critics are saying about it:
· “Only Christians with a very liberal sense of humor are likely to enjoy ‘The Ten.’ Even lay viewers will need to be tolerant of gags as envelope-pushing as anything in ‘Borat.’” [Variety]
· “[Gretchen] Mol stars as a 35-year-old virgin who gets deflowered—in lusty romance novel fashion on a trip to Mexico. Her hunky lover boy’s name? Jesus Christ.” [philly.com]
· “The Ten is, I guess, sacrilegious in the strictest sense of the term….” [slantmagazine.com]
· “The Ten is cohesive in the irreverence of its scenarios (in my favorite, Jesus Christ—Justin Theroux as a disheveled, overly hirsute carpenter….)” [notcoming.com]
· “Mol plays a mousy librarian…who travels alone to Mexico and has a wildly sexual fling with a local handyman named Jesus H. Christ (Justin Theroux in long hair and beard).” [AP]
· “They’re almost gleeful in their crudity; grinning ever-wider as they seem to ask the audience just who this bit of blasphemy is hurting.” [eflimcritic.com]
· “Comprised of ten blasphemous vignettes, each inspired by one of the Biblical Commandments, [it] goes out of its way to be irreverent and hilarious….” [emanuellevy.com]
· “The Ten is as sacrilegious as 1979’s The Life of Brian….” [filmstew.com]
· “‘The Ten’ is comprised of 10 blasphemous and hysterical stories that put the insanity back in Christianity.” [Roger Ebert]
· “(By the way, I did mention that conservative Christians may find this film offensive?)” [independentcritics.com]
Catholic League president Bill Donohue had this to say: “If Hollywood were to substitute Muhammad for Jesus, it is a sure bet that many of these same critics wouldn’t find the humor in it. Moreover, we’d all be watching the fallout that such a movie would engender on the evening news.”
