Saturday, June 18, 2016

The Bible Stories: In the Beginning

The Bible Stories: In The Beginning includes four movies that cover the most iconic events and people of the early section of the Bible. This collection takes viewers on a journey of the inspirational lives of Abraham, Jacob, Joseph In Egypt and finally Moses.


These films highlight both the challenges these Biblical men faced as well as their strong faith in God.

Starring: Richard Harris, Christopher Lee, Ben Kingsley, Martin Landau, Lesley Ann Warren, Lara Flynn Boyle, Sean Bean

Product Details: MPAA 
Rating: Not Rated
Runtime: 645 minutes
Released: 02/2016



 Cafe Lily's Review:

I really wanted to enjoy this DVD Set.  I am always on the search for family friendly entertainment, and was interested in watching this, especially seeing that it was "Family Approved" bearing The Dove Foundation symbol.

However, I am not sure that conservative families, especially those with younger watchers, are going to be very happy with The Dove Foundation.  I was a bit caught off guard by the content in these.

There is swearing and sensuality in the Jacob DVD.  Jacob says "D**n--, and D**n it", and there is also a bedroom tent scene between him and his first wife Leah.  Granted, they are married, and its their first morning waking up as husband and wife.  However, while no skin is really showing, there is no doubt as to what is taking place, and close ups are shown of them passionately kissing.

What may be offensive to some, may be very mild for others, but I wanted to provide an honest, detailed review so families with small children wouldn't pop these in and leave the room.  

I would not consider this suitable for younger viewers, but more along the lines of PG-13.  Each family will have to decide for themselves but I STRONGLY encourage parents to preview this series first.

There is a lot of violence, some violent treatment of animals, killing of people, sacrifice and so forth.  And while all of that is biblical because that certainly happened, it could be potentially traumatic if your little one is sensitive to things like this.

I personally didn't enjoy seeing the treatment of some of the animals as these were being filmed.  In one of the movies, a dog is violently yanked by a rope around the neck, and pulled away from the middle of a gathering. I believe you can hear the dog yelp.  That bothered me as an adult, so small children may be upset by it as well.

Unfortunately, the sound quality is also bad.  I tested out other DVD's in my player, and so I know it wasn't my equipment.  The sound is muffled at times, and then the background music drowns out conversation in some places.  The sound quality is very poor and was annoying.

Abraham starts off very slow, and is not 100% accurate when compared to the Bible.  It was out of sequence and hard to follow.  We couldn't really tell what was going on for a long time.  Had I not of agreed to watch these for a review, I would have given up.

Jacob was also hard to follow and not accurate, based on the scriptures.  The first time viewers see Leah with a baby, she calls him Judah.  But according to the Bible, Judah was not her first born.  Judah was actually the fourth, so its a little confusing.


I eventually stopped watching these, because they were off putting to me. I'm not sure if The Dove Foundation actually watched all of these, but more conservative families are probably going to be caught off guard like I was, if they don't read any reviews or personally screen these before watching them as a family.

Thank you to Fish Flix for providing me with this set, in exchange for my honest review.

 

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