Sunday 19 May
 
 

The Last Stand

Early in The Last Stand, the small-town sheriff played by Arnold Schwarzenegger says, "It's my day off. Should be a quiet weekend." That's the new way of saying, "I've got one week to retirement," because it signals — with flashing neon and everything — that life is going to royally upend those plans.
05/17/2013 | Comments 0

Texas Chainsaw

One of the most inconsistent franchises in movie history is the one beget by Tobe Hooper's 1974 classic, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. How does one follow all those less-than-beloved sequels? Lionsgate's latest in the series — the seventh — has a solution: Ignore 'em.
05/17/2013 | Comments 0

Captain America: Collector’s Edition

Not long after Batman changed Hollywood in the summer of 1989, every studio wanted to have the next comics-based blockbuster. I remember visiting Penn Square Mall’s multiplex (as I did often back then) and seeing a poster for Captain America. The one-sheet was comprised of little more than a close-up of Cap’s iconic shield and a promise to arrive next summer.
05/16/2013 | Comments 0

Dark Circles

With the Broken Lizard comedy troupe becoming increasingly broken, member Paul Soter has branched off to write and direct something about as far away as one can get from the likes of Super Troopers and Beerfest: a horror film. Now that I've seen it, I'm thinking maybe he should stay on his own.
05/16/2013 | Comments 0

Die! Die! My Darling!

File 1965's Die! Die! My Darling! under that now-dead subgenre dubbed "Grande Dame Guignol." The Hammer Films production may lack the dueling duo of two twilight-era titans of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? and the others, but truth be told, Tallulah Bankhead is fierce enough to provide all the fire it needs.
05/14/2013 | Comments 0
Home · Articles · Movies · Drama · Higher Ground
Drama

Higher Ground


Can she get an 'Amen'?

Rod Lott September 14th, 2011  

Many Christians’ condemnation of Hollywood is that Hollywood output often condemns Christianity. “Higher Ground,” the directorial debut of actress Vera Farmiga (“Source Code”), is not one of those movies.

Nor is it “The Passion of the Christ,” but it’s an honest study about one person’s lifelong, in-andout struggle with issues of her faith, from die-hard believer to doubting Thomas. The indie drama opens soon at AMC Quail Springs Mall 24, 2501 W. Memorial.

Based on a true story, the film finds Farmiga playing the central character, Corrine. Brought up in a fundamentalist community where reading “Lord of the Flies” and wearing a shoulder-baring maternity dress are big “no-no”s, her faith is rock-solid during her marriage to longtime boyfriend Ethan (Joshua Leonard, “Shark Night 3D”), but fractures form once tragedy strikes a dear friend.

When Corrine questions why she feels like she’s “wrestling something nameless,” she encounters not answers, but admonitions that run counter to the kindness she’s long lived. Alone, she prays aloud, “Lord, help me. I can’t feel you. I feel nothing. Draw near to me. Where are you?” His location may not be what every moviegoer prays she’ll find, but through Farmiga’s hands, Corrine’s journey seems earnest and real, without casting judgment on either side.

No one’s a caricature to be ridiculed.

Naturally, Corrine’s the most fleshed-out character of them all, and Farmiga is excellent, even if the movie is just OK (the “Precious”-esque dream sequences do some credibility damage). It’s worth seeing simply for her final-scene speech — can she get an “Amen”?

 
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