God exists. He lives in Brussels with his wife and daughter. God is a self-centered sadistic bully who, out of sheer boredom, created people to torture them. Most of his time he spends creating (Murphy's) laws by which the world will function, with the sole purpose to annoy, frustrate and harass humanity as much as possible, and the rest of the time he causes wars, accidents, and natural disasters. When his son tried to stop this terror and change the world for the better he ended up crucified. And now his ten-year-old daughter has had enough and she takes matters into her own hands. She runs away, appoints six apostles and writes "The Brand New Testament."

Ea: How do you choose apostles? Jesus: Pretend like you know, no one will question you.

This surreal and absurdist black-humorous drama deals with eternal questions of the meaning of life, death, and love. Some accuse it of trying to impress by the quasi-philosophical depth, but I disagree with that. I would not say that this film fakes anything in any way. I have the impression that Jaco Van Dormael has come up with a good idea and simply let it grow and take its course, without restrictions and censorship.

The cast is excellent, and particularly prominent are Benoit Poelvoorde, in the role of crazed God, and young and cute Pili Groyne, who carries almost the entire movie, uniting the child's innocence and naivety with the wisdom and determination of the new messiah. Directing, cinematography and music are simply magical, and although the film has some technical shortcomings, it didn't bother me at all. I would say that some scenes pay homage to other films. I think I recognized "The Eighth Day", which also was written and directed by Jaco Van Dormael, then Kubrick's "The Shining" and Darabont's "The Shawshank Redemption", as well as several others for which I am not so sure.

This is the official Belgian submission for the 2016 Academy Awards. Competition must have been really strong when it did not pass. If this and my recommendation are not enough for you to watch it, the fact that it was created by the same man who was responsible for "The Eighth Day" and "Mr. Nobody" should prevail.

8,5/10

It's a question we've all asked ourselves at one stage or another: what if God were Belgian?

On the first day, He created Brussels. Shortly after, He created a geeky-looking Adam and a voluptuous Eve (it is noticeable that whereas all the men in this film are homely sorts, many of the women are very attractive). One thing led to another, and Adam and Eve duly begat humanity. After that God retired to a flat with his wife (a goddess in her own right but now more interested in her baseball card collection) and their daughter Ea. But He is a vengeful god and after one parental beating too many Ea downloads from His computer to people's mobile telephones the exact duration of their remaining life. She then runs away (to Brussels, naturally) with the intention of creating her own Testament, for which she'll need some Apostles. The film features God's hapless efforts in Brussels to find Ea (without identity papers, He is suspected of being an illegal immigrant),as well as the various stories of Ea's Apostles (she chooses a sex addict, a beautiful yet lonely woman, a killer, a lonely man, a dissatisfied wife who finds love with a gorilla, and a young boy whose mother's over-protectiveness results in him having the least time of them all to live - just fifty days).

As God, Benoît Poelvoorde provides a masterclass of comic timing (not to mention gurning) as he gets maced by an old woman, beaten up by a priest and fails to walk on water. Young Pili Groyne, as Ea, is streets ahead of most child actresses, giving a believable performance of an unbelievable character. In fact, there's good acting throughout - even Catherine Deneuve expands her range beyond the standard 'slightly harassed' facial expression with which she coasts through many of her films.

While I didn't find this film as laugh-out-loud as many of those in the cinema did, there's no denying it is funny - and shows the Belgians as having an almost British-like sense of self-mockery. I can't give higher praise than that!

To many, this movie will seem blasphemous, but I think God has a sense of humor. After all, he appeared as a George Burns impersonator in that movie about himself back in 1977, a wonderful story actually that everyone should take a look at.

I thought this picture had pretty good potential starting out, particularly with those Laws of Universal Annoyance that the script writers came up with. Like #2129, the phone will ring whenever you get in the bathtub. But then, and perhaps because this was a European picture where they take religion even less seriously than we do here, the film starts hitting on all the liberal points of view as they regard one's personal view of God and relationship with the Almighty.

For one, the God (Benoit Poelvoorde) in this picture is a reprobate, swilling beer and generally making a nuisance of himself to his family and the rest of the world with those annoying laws of his. The apostles God's daughter Ea (Pili Groyne) selects are an assortment of random misfits, which include a killer, a sex maniac, a woman (Catherine Deneuve) who established a bestial relationship with a gorilla, and a ten year old boy who wants to be a girl. Yup, just the sort of role models one would seek out if attempting to save one's soul from the hell fires of damnation.

The one concept the story did a fairly decent job with had to do with Ea's release of the dates God had on file for when everyone in the world was going to die. In a less than absurdist film, this idea could have really been explored without the farcical elements like that guy Kevin (Gaspard Pauwels),who apparently didn't get the download that all bets were off after Mrs. God inadvertently rebooted the computer. That everyone's life would undergo some significant change if one's death could truly be known is a given, so I would have appreciated a less cynical approach. Personally, I'd like to think I was going to live forever, and in the meantime, so far, so good.