Review of Saving God (2008) by Jason P — 16 Oct 2008

This really is one of the best Christian films in the history of the genre. I won't go into detail on the plot , as the synopsis pretty much covers that.

The three biggest knocks by non-believers about "Christian movies" are always the same - 1) The acting is terrible 2) The production is low quality and 3) It's too preachy. I will address these concerns one at a time for this review.

1) THE ACTING IS TERRIBLE: From top to bottom, the cast of SAVING GOD did an outstanding job. Ving Rhames is fantastic as Armstrong Cane, as he brings a humanity and a authenticity to a man called by God to win back his neighborhood. He is particularly great and making us believe that this could be a real person. Cane is not a perfect man, and he doesn't have a perfect life, or a perfect Christianity. Dean McDermott's Blaze is so much more than the stereotypical bad guy. As someone who is not especially familiar with his work, I was quite impressed by his portrayal of Blaze and the range of emotion that he brought to this complex character. Ricardo Chavira is excellent as well as the "successful" pastor , Rev Danny Christopher. It was bold in making another believer an antagonist in the film, and Chavira's portrayal of the character was just incredible. However, stealing the movie in my opinion was Dwain Murphy as Norris. This young man played Norris with so much authenticity that I immediately wanted to watch "How She Move." A relative unknown amongst the bigger names Murphy more than held his own on the screen with veteran actors like Rhames. Murphy's Norris is the heart and soul of this movie, and his portrayal was truly worth the price of the movie alone.

2) THE QUALITY IS TERRIBLE - Again this is simply not the case with Saving God. The direction and cinematography are outstanding, and the overall look of the film is much better than it's modest budget(by Hollywood standards)would normally allow. It looks as good as most of what you can see in the theater and better than most movies in the Christian movie genre.

3) IT'S TOO PREACHY - This is difficult to argue, as the criticism is so vague. However, I have found that many Christian films have a tendency to be telling a great story, and then interrupt that movie with a sermon, so that someone can get saved. This is again, not the case with SAVING GOD. The beliefs of Armstrong Cane are the core of the film, so when he is "preaching" it is a natural part of the life of this man, and don't get in the way of the story, but instead are a part of the story. In my mind the criticism of too preachy is only fair if the message gets in the way of the movie, which is certainly not the case here. There are some people that would say that it is preachy, and like I said that is subjective. I don't think that this movie is preachy at all.

I'd recommend SAVING GOD to anyone who enjoys a great drama, and isn't afraid to shed some tears while watching a movie. Give this movie a chance, I think you'll be surprised by what you get.