Some movies that have religious undertones or overtones, or are about one deity or another, are often found to be repulsive by devout religious people. I don't quite understand the revulsion as long as the movies are done in good taste. God, after all, must have a sense of humor or we mere mortals wouldn't have any sense of humor ourselves.

The Good Guys

I can't remember every movie I've watched over the course of my lifetime, but some in particular have stood out for one reason or another.

The oldest movie I can remember with angels in it, one named Clarence in particular, was "It's a Wonderful Life". Clarence was a guardian angel who saved George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) from death by suicide in 1946. Although it's a black and white movie, it's still popularly broadcast on TV around Christmas time each year. A gender-reversal remake was made for TV in 1977, called "It Happened One Christmas", proving that Hollywood can't think of new ideas while reusing the same plot lines.

I remember when "Oh, God!", the comedy about the mix-master himself starring George Burns in the title role, came out in 1977. I also remember how people were saying it was sacrilegious. It was a fun movie, with John Denver as the protagonist. I was only 16-years old at the time, but I remember seeing it for the first time on the big screen. The odd part of the movie, that I reflected on later, was that Jesus was never mentioned. I found out much later that some religions believe in God but don't believe in Jesus. The movie inspired two sequels: Oh, God! Book II (1980) and Oh, God! You Devil (1984). The last one featured George Burns in dual roles as both God and Satan. It was a little ridiculous, if you ask me.

Other comedies that featured God, but no angels, include "Bruce Almighty" (starring Jim Carrey) from 2003 along with a sequel called "Evan Almighty" (starring Steve Carell) in 2007. Morgan Freeman played God in both of those films.

An unusual comedy called "Dogma" was released in 1999. I actually saw the movie by accident because I wanted to see more movies with Jay and Silent Bob in them. Anyway, all sorts of angels and demons are in the movie, along with God and a ghost.

I cannot remember seeing anything other than a religious movie with Jesus in it. That strikes me as odd. There had to be at least one, right?

The Bad Guys

I don't think anyone can forget the original "Exorcist" from 1973. I was only 12-years old at the time and it scared the, pardon the pun, devil out of me. I've watched it several times as an adult and now I just get a kick out of watching Linda Blair spin her head around and curse. This movie purported to show what demonic possession was like. There were two sequels, but I didn't watch either one due to bad reviews I'd read ahead of time.

The Prophesy series of movies, starting with "The Prophecy" in 1995 were all about what was supposed to happen beyond the end of the book of Revelations. The baddest of the bad was the angel Gabriel, played to the hilt by Christopher Walken. He reprised the role in "The Prophesy II" and "The Prophecy 3: The Ascent", both of which were released directly to video. At the end of the second movie, bad guy Gabriel was turned into a human, something he regarded as a "monkey". By the end of third movie, his attitude had changed and he returned to being an angel.

Okay, well, that's enough. There are way more bad guy movies like that than there are good guy movies. The reason, I think, is that a lot of people can believe there's a devil of some kind responsible for all the evil in the world, yet they can't believe there's a God or anything else responsible for all the good in the world. In my opinion, you can't believe in one without believing in the other. It just doesn't make sense otherwise.

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