According to Box Office Mojo, Expelled is estimated to have
– earned $5,282,000 in 10 days.
– it is currently ranked 6th in political documentary, 12th in Christian, and 15th in documentary.
– It is currently ranked 13 in films, but every film ranked above it was released in far more theatres.
Meanwhile, John Lennon’s widow, Yoko Ono, is suing the Expelled filmmakers over their use of his 1971 song Imagine, ranked all time # 3 by Rolling Stone. The producers claim they cited it under fair use for commentary and criticism.
The Expelled producers replied to Ms. Ono, “Let it be,” adding,
Premise did not pursue a license for the song and had no obligation to do so. Unbiased viewers of the film will see that the Imagine clip was used as part of a social commentary in the exercise of free speech. The brief clip – consisting of a mere 10 words – was used to contrast the messages in the documentary and was not used as an endorsement of EXPELLED.
But the irony of this lawsuit was not lost on the film’s star Ben Stein, “So Yoko Ono is suing over the brief Constitutionally protected use of a song that wants us to ‘Imagine no possessions’? Maybe instead of wasting everyone’s time trying to silence a documentary she should give the song to the world for free? After all, ‘imagine all the people sharing all the world…You may say I’m a dreamer But I’m not the only one I hope someday you’ll join us And the World can live as one.'”
John P. Meyer at Pegasus News thinks, as I do, that
Frankly, it looks like the instigators of the lawsuit are playing right into the hands of the filmmakers, who’re naturally (and in time-honored fashion) taking the approach that “all publicity is good publicity.”
Apparently, Ms. Ono is trying to stop the distribution of Expelled, but there she certainly hasn’t the advantage of originality. At least one group of fans has sent me a message urging that people see the film soon in case she succeeds.
In case she succeeds? Huh, what? I can’t think of a better way to be sure that a billion people see it.
Meanwhile, if you want to hear and see Lennon’s Imagine, go here, and here’s Lennon with the other Beatles, in Let it be.
Also: Just up at The Post-Darwinist
Darwin dating: Only a Darwinist would think of something this vulgar (honestly!)
US politics: Churches should holler for Jesus and schools should indoctrinate Darwin?
The miracle of the disappearing prof: St. Charles Darwin’s fanatics make Prof. Nancy Bryson disappear
Blogging: Crocodile, crocodile, cry me some tears (The circulation-bleeding New York Times feels sorry for people like me. Yeah really.)
Blog seeks the firing of Baylor U’s anti-ID president
Darwinism and atheism: No connection whatever?
Expelled: Did Darwin really lead to Hitler? Better question: Did the suggestion lead to free publicity?
A kind correspondent wants to know why I am not in Expelled (“Well, for one thing, I wasn’t kicked out of anything for making the intelligent design controversy my major beat. Oh sure, people laughed at me in 2001 when I said it would be one of the biggest stories of the decade by mid-decade.”)
Reasons to Believe: Reasons to Believe: Old Earth Creation ministry thumbs down on Expelled film – claims there is no persecution of ID theorists
New for blogroll: Atheism is dead
Just up at The Mindful Hack
Things we know but cannot prove: Another nail in the coffin of materialism.
Excerpt: “We are at an undisputed edge of naturalism in computing and math. There is no TOE. Does science have a TOE? If so, will we ever know we are at the edge?”
The fours be with you! (You will be “fours”ed to cooperate with this words/numbers game. (Hey, it’s Friday night!)
Altruism: Why it can’t really exist but why it does anyway
Evolutionary psychology: Eliot Spitzer is a kludgebrain!, psychologist opines (but so are we all)
Mind and medicine: The placebo effect – Did your doctor just prescribe you a quarter teaspoon of coloured sugar? Maybe …
Materialism: When the store is on fire, hold a fire sale:
Excerpt: So this is the latest pseudo-explanation of the soul? I could do better myself! How about this: Minds that are accustomed to think in terms of a future have difficulty grasping the idea that there is no future after death.
Way simpler, to be sure, but materialists wouldn’t buy it because I forgot to drag in the Paleolithic cave guys telling stories around the fireside – the staple of evolutionary psychology.
Fitna: A thoughtful Muslim’s response The predicted riots largely didn’t happen, but where to go from here?
Excerpt: And while we are here: Dial-a-mob/rent-a-riot behaviour is NOT copyright to Middle Eastern Muslims. I ran into the same thing among the American Ivy League elite in May 2005, when the New York Times bungled a story I broke on my other blog, The Post-Darwinist, claiming that a film about to be shown at the Smithsonian was “anti-evolution.” It wasn’t; it did not even address the subject. But zillions of Darwinbots, as I called them, behaved exactly as if it had. It’s a good thing that no one gives them sharp objects to play with.
Rupert Sheldrake’s guide to New Atheism (which makes it sound like New Coke, really)
Can a transplanted heart lead to transplanted thoughts? Well, maybe, but the mechanism might be fairly conventional.
Why science without God destroys itself: Because the alternative idea of a multiverse is a step into magic, that’s why