Review of The Believer

It is almost a sort of shame that the ever-hot topic of racism/anti-Semitism nearly outshines the more central struggle with spirituality and religion that Danny is going through. Many fascist/skinhead types seem to confuse or blend race and religion when considering Jews and Judaism. Danny certainly seems confused in this, but comes around toward the end of the film when he suggests to the fascist big-wigs that the way to eradicate Jews is to love them, absorb them (because, he believes, Judaism thrives on being hated, separate). My notion of Judaism has long been the same as that of Christianity and Islam: ALL adherents thrive on being hated, on being an underdog, and lose their power when they are most widely accepted and tolerated (Christians seem to have gotten more of being thrown to the lions than the Romans did, and Islamic pride seems to get stronger the worse the rest of the world treats its disciples). These religions are like three awful, brutish brothers, always at each other's throats, and, in the end, essentially nihilistic individually. Because of this, I can understand Danny's spirituality problem (but am left wondering why he did not consider religions outside of the three great desert religions of the middle east). Danny has few anchors to the earth (pagan?) world, a pair of kind old friends (from youth, the most pagan time in life), his weird but spiritually hungry lover (who seems to be looking for anything to fill a hole in her soul ...which is where Christians get so many of their converts); but there are many more negative influences present in the film, and these absorb him. Add to this the fact that he considers his god a bully, and Judaism more about doing things than believing (which is true with many Christians and Muslims), and you've got a foul spiritual mix. Once ousted in the papers, Danny would clearly not find a home in either of the two worlds he is a part of, and so suicide seems an easy solution (a physical solution, just like pumping iron and beating up kids in the street). Danny's fatal flaw seems to be that he keeps questioning and cannot just accept faith and submit to god (which works within the box of the film, though thankfully not in the universe outside of the three desert religions!). The final sort of afterlife scene was my favorite of the film and shows this clearly: Danny's former teacher stands in the stairwell, trying to get him to engage in a discussion on a religious argument while Danny keeps running up the stairs. "There's nothing up there," says the teacher, but Danny keeps going. A rather frightening image when you think about it ...and one adherents to the religion can keep for themselves.