A Mixed Bag: I Saw Jesus Revolution

It was better than God's Not Dead or Left Behind with Nicholas Cage, but that's not saying much. (Both of those films deserve to be watched just to make fun of them. They're campy to the point of ironically entertaining). 

It was about the rise of Calvary Chapel and the Christian revival of the late 60s and early 70s. It primarily tells the story of a current prominent Evangelical pastor by the name of Greg Laurie. (Spoilers from here on out). 

First, a positive-- the costumes were amazing. Whoever did the costume design for that film had a blast and some of the looks they recreated were amazing. That part felt really authentic. (Hair and makeup felt off, with one or two exceptions, but I'll get to that in a second). They also did a good job nailing the aesthetics. The film felt like serious Boomer nostalgia, and not in a bad way. 

I really liked how it began with the story of Chuck Smith and Lonnie Frisbee. Quite frankly, I found THAT story to be the more interesting one (and Grammer and Roumie are darn good actors and it's fun to watch them work together). The film featured them a lot in the first act, but as it went on focused more on Laurie. Laurie's story isn't bad, but we've heard the story of conversion, struggle with unforseen difficulty, and then recommitment to Christ before. I was WAY more interested in the story of a straight laced pastor finding himself working with a gifted but eccentric and unstable hippie, and trying to figure out how to make room for that-- or IF he should make room for that. 

And that's where the movie lets me down. We get the setup for that story, but then the climax and resolution of it are reduced to glimpses, and used primarily as impetus for Laurie having his newfound faith tested. We see some fantastic scenes of Lonnie frantically trying to chase the "high" of those first days in ministry and undergoing his own crisis of faith and crisis in his marriage, both things Chuck can't seem to help with and sees as a threat to his new congregation. But they're reduced to snippets that Greg witnesses with puppy dog eyes and a growing sense of unease rather than fully fleshed out. That story deserved more than to be a foil for someone else's-- it touches on a lot that Christian ministry still deals with, and the reality that God often works and heals through very broken people who need pastoring and healing too. 

This leads me to my biggest gripe...I feel like Roumie got short shift. First was an arguably small thing- his hair and makeup were EXACTLY like it is in the other big project he's known for, The Chosen. He's got that short-ish natural rumpled beach wave thing going on when the real Lonnie wore his hair straight, flowing,  and smooth-- think Jesus from Ben Hur, not Jesus from The Chosen. 

 Between that, an in-joke about The Chosen in the film, and the fact that the early "happy" days of Lonnie's ministry are emphasized in the script, I feel like the director used Roumie primarily to get Chosen fans in the theatre. This annoys the ever living tar out of me, because it means he plays Jesus with a hippie California accent for most of the film and then we only get to see a tiny bit of emotional range from him towards the end of his screen time -- and it's FANTASTIC. The guy can act, and act well (and also has really good comedic timing when they let him bring it out...really wish that we could have seen him and Grammer play around with that a bit) and I feel like they hobbled him for marketing purposes. They don't even let his character kiss his wife (who was a great actress by the way. Really well cast, wish we could have seen more of her too). 

So, worth seeing? Maybe if you can find it free somewhere (the copy I watched came from the local library) and you're really into the 60s and 70s. There's redeeming value there, but also some serious flaws.