Rather disconcertingly, the film builds towards a vision of the apocalypse, the destructive fate that religious conflicts have in store for us -- a version of the future any hellfire preacher would be proud of.

I'm all for a documentary about the mass hysteria of our warring creeds, but stand-up satirist Bill Maher turns out to be the wrong man to make it.

Maher has gone for easy targets. He comes up with the odd funny gag, but you get the feeling that he is as dogmatic about his doubt as the believers are about their faith.

Maher asks that we step away from ourselves for a moment to consider our own doubt. Some will be unable to do this and will angrily reject Maher’s message [...] Some will embrace the film for punctuating their own feelings of skepticism.