It’s a point of polemical confusion, a mismatch of message and audience that highlights Maher’s unevenness in choosing between meaningful critiques of religion and comic effect. When Maher – an agent provocateur handing rope for believers to hang themselves with – interviews the head of a cannabis-centered church in Amsterdam, it’s not a question of picking low-lying fruit; this is easy pickin’s off the ground, and a pothead is all-too-easy comic fodder. And Maher does drop the ball on occasion, as with an interview with a neuroscientist on the biology of belief that comes across as banter on the kookiness of religious belief that misses the opportunity to discuss, well, the biology of belief. Maher does better when asking questions whose pointedness comes from having a tangible purpose; thankfully, this is true of most of the film’s interview. And here we get a glimpse – a humourous glimpse – of just how religious beliefs can veer off into nonsense. An interview with a former Jew for Jesus on the topic of miracles presents a man whose conversion came by way of miracles so miraculous, he can’t remember them (except for one involving the unheard-of occurrence of rain). Jesus Christ gets some face-time, both in the form of a performer in a Disneyland for Christians – complete with photogenic Bible pageants, gift shops and the usual tourist traps – and in the person of José Luis de Jesús Miranda, who declares himself the second coming of Christ and cribs from “Holy Blood, Holy Grail” to justify his claim via an alleged lineal descent from Christ. And these are among the relatively harmless cases.

The subtext beneath the yuks gets more serious when Maher interviews British Muslim rapper Propa-Ghandi (not to be confused with the Canadian anarcho-punk band Propaghandi), whose terrorism-charged lyrics and empathy for militancy seemingly puts him at odds with claims of racist persecution. The case is a bit weak, since the controversy surrounding Propa-Ghandi, not unlike the controversy surrounding Eminem, easily gets lost in fog of censorship, satire and political activism. But the point Maher is getting at, whether justified or not, is well taken: at what point does religious freedom cross the line into hate speech and violent action? Maher gets slightly more out of an interview with Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss, a spokesman for the Jewish anti-Zionist group Neturei Karta, in which associations with Iranian president Ahmadinejad accompany the group’s call for the abolishment of Israel. Other interviews touch on issues like Biblical literalism and the contradictions implicit with the end-time obsession some flavours of Christianity have – why bother making the world a better place if it’s going to end sometime very soon? All are comical in some respect, mostly through interviewee answers that clearly make no sense despite all insistence otherwise, and all float in the shallow end of the pool.

Funny…but Does It accomplish Anything?

That “Religulous” ends with an overwrought bit of fire and brimstone preaching on Maher’s part is what makes the film more a dose of feel-good for people fed up with nonsensical religious beliefs – and the taboo against discussion them in public – than a sustained critique of the kind Brian Flemming successfully mounted with his sharp documentary “The God Who Wasn’t There.” Maher is concerned about our ideological dependence on irrational beliefs – beliefs that feed directly into war, the environment, civil rights, and so on. It’s a fair concern, refreshing for being the real deal of political incorrectness in today’s intellectual climate. Yet perhaps the most critical question “Religulous” raises is one it never actually articulates: how can atheists, agnostics, seculars – arguably the largest minority in the U.S., as Maher points out, larger than even blacks, or Jews, or gays/lesbians – best hold a conversation with believers? Does the answer lie with the fury of a Richard Dawkins or a Christopher Hitchens? Does it lie with Bill Maher’s uncompromising satire? Perhaps there’s another way? Now there’s a subject for a film.

As it is, “Religulous” will tickle the unbelievers and tick off the believers. But in a way, it’s a shame that the film lends itself to that kind of predictable audience response pattern. Skewering the floppy rationalizations underlying many religious beliefs is fun, but whether it accomplishes anything useful, let alone fosters dialogue, is debatable.

Frédérik invites you to discuss this movie and more at his blog (frederik-sisa.blogspot.com).