Movie Review - Passage to Zarahemla

So, I've never reviewed a movie before, but I had the opportunity to receive a copy of Passage to Zarahemla this past week and watch it as an uninformed critic. I'll do my best, but don't expect an amazing display of verbiage and flowery language.

Now, first of all, this movie title was based upon the name of a city in the Book of Mormon. This isn't necessarily a Mormon movie, but is based upon some of the details you would only know if you had read from the Book of Mormon at some point in your life. This made me a little leery at first because there have been some cheez-y films that have come out of Utah in the past. I'm not sure why either. There are some extremely talented Mormons out there. Sometimes, however, there can be a problem if you are surrounded by too much of your own kind.

But, I digress.

The film started out a little slow with a random hunter shooting at a buck that escapes wounded and the hunter takes after it to put it out of it's misery. The story then flips over to California to a teenage girl (Kerra) and her younger brother (Brock - an unconvincing gang member) that have just witnessed their mother's funeral. Instead of being placed in child custody they hit the road headed for Utah to find one of their relatives (aunt) that they apparently spent time with in their past. It turns out the aunt lives in a little farm town that somehow flip flops between the present and the past. The past being an area that includes the ancient outskirts of the city of Zarehemla.

The main character, Kerra, had stayed at this farm in her youth and had an "imaginary" friend (Kiddoni) that she meets again as an adult - who is apparently alive and protecting Zarahemla from robbers.

The movie was a little bit sci-fi/religious since the characters can cross in and out of the present and past (is this called teleporting? no, something else maybe) just by entering different portions of the forest all while sneaking in little excerpts about faith in God and living the commandments. At first it felt a little hokie, but then it became more realistic as the characters seemed to feel more comfortable in their roles. Kerra gains a true desire to learn more about this ancient civilization enough to read from the Book of Mormon in the present to learn what is going to happen to the city of Zarehemla. Through her reading she seems to honestly gain faith as well as gain courage to warn Kiddoni of the impending doom of the Gadianton robbers trying to overthrow the city.

I felt that this was a perfect movie for the teenage crowd. The characters were played by noticeably attractive individuals that also stood by their values (Kiddoni), were basically good people (Kerra) that wanted to learn more about God and the commandments of the gospel of Jesus Christ and those that knew the gospel of Christ (Kerra's aunt), but decided to not push too much on her niece (Kerra) and nephew(Brock). Messages always seem to get through when attractive people are involved, right? Especially in those teenage years.

It was a cute movie.

Will I watch it again? Probably not, but I typically don't watch movies a second time. I'm a pretty harsh critic of movies. Rarely do I enjoy them, but I at least keep my eye out for family and friends that might appreciate the experience.

So, in the end these are the real questions that must be answered:

Will I share a link to it to others? Yes, especially to the teenage crowd.

Will I buy a CD and share it with my nieces and nephews? Yes, I think I will. I might even buy a couple of copies.

And it's those last two answers that makes all the difference.