What Toynbee seems to find most hateful about religion is that it is able to express a powerful sense of faith. 'US born-agains are using the movie', she warned. Many critics seem especially outraged by this prospect of religious organisations 'using' the film to promote their faith.

And so, officially, Muslim-born Rahman is charged with rejecting Islam and not for practicing Christianity.

Appearing in court earlier this week Rahman insisted he should not be considered an infidel, but admitted he is a Christian.

He says he still believes in the almighty Allah, but cannot say for sure who God really is. "I am," he says, "a Christian and I believe in Jesus Christ." Rahman reportedly converted more than 16 years ago after spending time working in Germany.

For two consecutive years, Hollywood has been falling behind at the box office. The combined box office receipts for the five nominees for best picture did not even approch the box office revenue generated by The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe. One analysist suggested the total future revenue including DVD sales of the top five might top 250 million while The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe could, including DVD sales, come close to 800 million.

The other great think-piece of the post-Cold War period was Francis Fukuyama's "The End of History." Published in 1989, before the fall of the Berlin Wall, it argued that liberal democracy had conquered, once and for all, rival ideologies such as fascism and communism. But Fukuyama went from seeming prescient to seeming overoptimistic within just a few years. In particular, Bosnia's civil war showed how history might actually resume with a vengeance in some post-communist societies.