Review of I'm Not Ashamed (2016) by Gabriel C — 03 Aug 2017

You can watch this movie as a film critic or as a human being, that's your choice. This movie takes us into the heart, mind, and soul of Rachel Joy Scott, the first to be murdured in the Columbine High School Massacre, who openly professed her Christian faith to her classmates and friends.

I don't think I've ever seen a film quite like this. We are presented the inner thoughts and feelings of a young woman of faith who had a prophetic awareness of the suffering God had destined for her. We see into her life through her journals that read more like passages from the Book of Job than that of a teenage girl. This creates a paradox between the outer shallow world in which she lived and the profound depth to her faith and character.

The film critics didn't like this paradox because it seemed like the American version of the Diary of Anne Frank presented as an after-school sitcom. A paradox that cannot be easily reconciled in a feature film. Thus, the poor critical review in stark contrast to the high audience rating. Yet this was the reality of Rachel's life as it is for many teenagers and non-teenagers alike.

The facts are that police did identify neo-Nazism and a fascination with Adolf Hitler among several hate-oriented themes that influenced Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold to carry out the Columbine High School massacre that occurred on Adolf Hitler's birthday, April 20, 1999. Paradoxically, Dylan Klebold's maternal grandfather was Jewish.

This movie goes deeper into the reality of suffering and a murder victim's prescient knowledge of the martyrdom God had planned for her than any other faith-based film I have ever seen. The film resonates with those who understand what it means to suffer for one's faith. Yet for those who have no compassion for the victims and their families, it's just another film.

The irony is that the wide chasm between the negative critical response and the high-audience approval is the very essence of the deep-rooted problem with human society that this film was trying to address. An irony that seems to be lost on the majority of film critics, but not on the audience. Despite the critics, this is a cause for hope.