Evan Almighty

Soon after Evan Baxter (Steve Carell) has been elected to Congress, God (Morgan Freeman) appears to him and tells him to build an ark. Once Evan's crisis of faith is dealt with, he and his family set to building it. As his beard grows longer, and his ark gets bigger, the members of the public think he's crazier and crazier.

This loose sequel to Bruce Almighty (and the story of Noah) is good family entertainment. It's pleasant enough watching for a lazy Sunday afternoon. However, the bland script means it's far from being the film it should have been.

Steve Carell is a great comedian and leading man, as shown by The Daily Show, The 40 Year Old Virgin, and the remake of The Office (which is, if you'll excuse the sacrilege, even better than the original). In Evan Almighty, he isn't given much to work with beyond hitting his thumb with a hammer, and a lame attempt at a running gag about a dance. He, like the rest of the cast, acts well, but would have done so much better if he was working with a script with some real jokes in it.

The subplot with the dodgy politician (John Goodman) riding roughshod over nature for reasons of greed has been done time and again. it's a good message, but it's all too predictable.

The special effects are a mixed bag. In scenes where the animals are in the background, you forget they're special effects. In some of the flood scenes, the compute generated water looks amazing. However, there are scenes where the animals are more central to the action where the composite pictures haven't been done as well as they could have been, and so the mood is broken.

There's much to be disappointed about in Evan Almighty, but it's still a fun watch. It's bland, cheesy and embarrassingly light on jokes, but it still has a certain charm. Just think what it could have been like with a decent script.