Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (2008)

SILENCED SCIENCE? Ben Stein's doc about the difficulties faced by proponents of intelligent design trying to be heard ends up too heavy-handed to get a sympathetic ear

Ben Stein, the droning mensch from Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Win Ben Stein's Money, recasts himself as a slightly goofy prophet in this polemic doc, which sets out to show how proponents of intelligent design have been bullied into silence. Regardless of your personal views, Expelled's heavy-handed bias (a visit to Darwin's home gets the same eerie music as a tour of Dachau) is exasperating. By the time the camera zooms in on the word ''Creator'' in the Declaration of Independence, the whole debate seems less urgent than getting out of the theater. D