Mixed Reviews

Proposing to engage in a serious critique of an animated feature film is risky business. One risks the possibility of being the petulant spoilsport who insists on “deconstructing Bugs Bunny.”

On the other hand, the subject of “The Prince of Egypt” is unique for an animated feature film. Moses is not Daffy Duck. Moses is also, significantly, not the “possession” of any one people or religious tradition. Not only does the United States claim one of the highest ratios of Christian religious affiliation and church attendance in the world, the figure of Moses is centrally important to America’s large Jewish population and not an insignificant figure for our important Muslim populations as well.

Moses, in short, is a religious and cultural icon of rare importance.

As a modern piece of interpretation of the story of Moses, DreamWorks’ “The Prince of Egypt” is an interesting, frequently speculative, but consistently entertaining and creative interpretation of the story of Moses. Would I do things differently? Of course. Who wouldn’t?

I would have preferred a bit less ethnic--and a bit more class--consciousness. The biblical text, after all, notes that even some Egyptians and others left the hierarchical, centralized and oppressive Pharaonic society along with the Hebrews. Part of the Mosaic revolution, of course, was that the new society under a God of liberation was to be more egalitarian, less hierarchical and more inclusive than what was left behind. The biblical obligation to care for the poor and the disenfranchised is, notably, often defended in the Bible with the provocative reminder, “Remember, you were once slaves in Egypt!”

We got a good look at the human price paid to construct all that (impressively rendered) Egyptian architecture of national pride. Too bad we weren’t more directly encouraged to consider the human price of our own national prides--an uncomfortable message that is much clearer in the biblical texts, of course.

But let’s be fair. Like the Gospel discussions of Jesus, the story of Moses in the first books of the Hebrew Bible is stubbornly short on useful information for a biographer, screenwriter or actor.

This is at least partly because, unlike Hollywood’s obvious interests in “character development,” the Bible’s main interest is “developing the character” of that most elusive of all personalities, and not God’s somewhat less inspiring followers.

There is wisdom in the biblical warnings about trusting “images” of God. All speech, much less artistic renderings, of God is interpretation.

My own tradition, the Quakers, teaches that the most profound knowledge of God is gained in silence. In religious matters it is clear that every brush stroke of the painter’s hand, every strike of the sculptor’s chisel, and now every cel of the animator’s art, starts a debate. Only the very naive would not realize that any drawings or any words--whether they be “Christian” comic books from the local Christian bookshop or the weekly sermons of the clergy, much less the worldwide release of an anticipated feature film--are interpretations. The good news is that comparing interpretations is how we learn.