This is, literally, one of the worst movies I've ever seen - and I've seen Howard the Duck and Leonard Part 6...and compared to this, those movies were Oscar contenders. I wanted to abort MYSELF about 20 minutes in, because I saw where this film was going. But I stuck with it.
Where do I start? The anti-choice/"pro-life" propaganda? The AWFUL Christian rock soundtrack that pervades the entire film? The complete and utter suspension of disbelief (or brainwashing) required to buy even the slightest detail in this film?
The main problem with movies made by Christian people is that they structure them around the way the feel life SHOULD BE, rather than how it actually is. This movie is infused with the propriety of adults, when it's supposed to be about KIDS - Christian or not. A bunch of broke college kids on a road trip. Despite the fact that they embark on said road trip in a VW camper with the "untouchable love interest/good Christian boy's" cousin, who looks like the biggest stoner outside of Dazed and Confused...yet no sex, no smoking, no drinking, not even so much as a cigarette, because good Christian kids don't do those things...right. They talk about vegetarianism and baby turtles instead.
And despite being "broke college kids", they buy multiple hotel rooms, because it's just too taboo for them to share a room together?! Really? Jesus doesn't want boys and girls to sleep together, even platonically?! That's not proper? I guess I'm going to hell then.
Not to mention that the girlfriend of the love interest/good Christian boy is one dimensional and pure freaking evil! Yet despite his holiness, he chose her,over the oh so holy, mild mannered heroine of this tale. But of COURSE they don't have sex! She has to share a room with the leading lady with epilepsy, and MOCKS her for it! How Christian!
But what really, really, REALLY bothered me about this film were the fallacies imparted concerning abortion. So I'm supposed to believe that this "doctor" agreed to perform an abortion on someone 24 weeks pregnant (TWICE the legal limit of 12 weeks), didn't notice the mother was having twins despite the exams and ultrasounds required before the procedure, and when attempting to abort the one baby he thought there was, only got an ARM?! ONE arm?! And this "doctor" then said "Ho-hum, this abortion's done!" NEVER HAPPEN. Lies and Christian, pro-life propaganda. BS.
Though to back this up, the nurse (Roxy from Dead Like Me, an AWESOME show :() says that kind of thing happened ALL THE TIME with this "doctor". Also lies. Despicable, misleading, horrible lies, from a sect of people who give a crap UNTIL a baby is born - and then say "why'd you have a baby you couldn't afford?" when a woman requests public assistance.
But I digress...
What I found most detestable was the casting of an actress who had actually undergone an abortion to play leading lady's bio mother. An actress turned born again Christian, should I say. This, to me, was the most horrible, victimizing, cherry-on-top-of the right wing sundae that was this movie. Because I could feel her emotion, her regret, her guilt. These film-makers used this woman in the worst way a woman can be used, and true, she allowed it. But I feel for her. I don't begrudge her whatever comfort this movie gave her. But to me, Christians live in a world of "do as I say, not as I do." I would have rather seen this woman sympathize with girls in the same position as she was than take part in a movie that vilifies them.
All this being said, I feel that, minus the propaganda, this COULD have been an awesome movie. It's a great concept, that I could have gotten behind, had it been treated with some dignity and truth. But Christian movie makers tend to Disney-fy everything to the extent where it's no longer believable. Your kids make mistakes, just like the rest of the us. You don't need to set an example. We sure aren't looking to you for one.
Where do I start? The anti-choice/"pro-life" propaganda? The AWFUL Christian rock soundtrack that pervades the entire film? The complete and utter suspension of disbelief (or brainwashing) required to buy even the slightest detail in this film?
The main problem with movies made by Christian people is that they structure them around the way the feel life SHOULD BE, rather than how it actually is. This movie is infused with the propriety of adults, when it's supposed to be about KIDS - Christian or not. A bunch of broke college kids on a road trip. Despite the fact that they embark on said road trip in a VW camper with the "untouchable love interest/good Christian boy's" cousin, who looks like the biggest stoner outside of Dazed and Confused...yet no sex, no smoking, no drinking, not even so much as a cigarette, because good Christian kids don't do those things...right. They talk about vegetarianism and baby turtles instead.
And despite being "broke college kids", they buy multiple hotel rooms, because it's just too taboo for them to share a room together?! Really? Jesus doesn't want boys and girls to sleep together, even platonically?! That's not proper? I guess I'm going to hell then.
Not to mention that the girlfriend of the love interest/good Christian boy is one dimensional and pure freaking evil! Yet despite his holiness, he chose her,over the oh so holy, mild mannered heroine of this tale. But of COURSE they don't have sex! She has to share a room with the leading lady with epilepsy, and MOCKS her for it! How Christian!
But what really, really, REALLY bothered me about this film were the fallacies imparted concerning abortion. So I'm supposed to believe that this "doctor" agreed to perform an abortion on someone 24 weeks pregnant (TWICE the legal limit of 12 weeks), didn't notice the mother was having twins despite the exams and ultrasounds required before the procedure, and when attempting to abort the one baby he thought there was, only got an ARM?! ONE arm?! And this "doctor" then said "Ho-hum, this abortion's done!" NEVER HAPPEN. Lies and Christian, pro-life propaganda. BS.
Though to back this up, the nurse (Roxy from Dead Like Me, an AWESOME show :() says that kind of thing happened ALL THE TIME with this "doctor". Also lies. Despicable, misleading, horrible lies, from a sect of people who give a crap UNTIL a baby is born - and then say "why'd you have a baby you couldn't afford?" when a woman requests public assistance.
But I digress...
What I found most detestable was the casting of an actress who had actually undergone an abortion to play leading lady's bio mother. An actress turned born again Christian, should I say. This, to me, was the most horrible, victimizing, cherry-on-top-of the right wing sundae that was this movie. Because I could feel her emotion, her regret, her guilt. These film-makers used this woman in the worst way a woman can be used, and true, she allowed it. But I feel for her. I don't begrudge her whatever comfort this movie gave her. But to me, Christians live in a world of "do as I say, not as I do." I would have rather seen this woman sympathize with girls in the same position as she was than take part in a movie that vilifies them.
All this being said, I feel that, minus the propaganda, this COULD have been an awesome movie. It's a great concept, that I could have gotten behind, had it been treated with some dignity and truth. But Christian movie makers tend to Disney-fy everything to the extent where it's no longer believable. Your kids make mistakes, just like the rest of the us. You don't need to set an example. We sure aren't looking to you for one.