Many film critics are claiming that the new sci-fi movie After Earth -- directed by M. Night Shyamalan and starring Will and Jaden Smith -- is really propaganda for the controversial religion Scientology.
The Hollywood Reporter rounded up observations made by numerous media outlets, from the New York Times to the Wall Street Journal, who claim to see unsubtle Scientology references, imagery and messaging in the movie.
In After Earth, controlling one's emotions, particularly fear, is the key to the survival of this futuristic society, behavior which many critics see as a nod to some of the tenets of Scientology. (Although he's never openly said he was a member, rumors have swirled for sometime now that Will Smith was a Scientologist.)
THR points out this passage in Manohla Dargis' review at the NY Times: "Casual students of Scientology may find their ears pricking up at those maxims because fear and its overcoming receive a lot of play in Dianetics, a foundational text by the creator of Scientology, the pulp science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard."
Likewise, The Wall Street Journal's Joe Morgenstern labeled After Earth a "sermon" on Scientology: "Is that the production's subtext, or are there reasons yet to be uncovered why humor and humanity have been essentially banished; why everyone looks pained; why the very notion of entertainment has been banished in favor of grinding didacticism, and why Mr. Smith, who has been such a brilliant entertainer over the years and decades, looks as if he has undergone a radical charismaectomy?"
Morgenstern even went so far as to link the film to Scientology's greatest big screen misfire: Battlefield Earth, starring Scientologist John Travolta. Another recent film that some have claimed is a veiled homage to Scientology? Oblivion, starring Tom Cruise, who is perhaps the religion's most famous member.
Source : ign[dot]com
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