Courageous

Watching Courageous is like attending Christian bible-thumbing Jesus-loving church. It is so distasteful for non-Christians that I actually want to go back and pan Passion of the Christ all over again for empowering the makers of this hogwash.

A police staff sergeant briefs the troops before morning rounds. He shares a random email spouting statistics citing the likelihood of crime to occur in fatherless households. And that’s that. Really? Look, I’ve never been a police officer, but do all meetings consist of clearly unresearched and impersonal facts from anonymous sources? “Item #2 on the agenda: I have a letter here from a Nigerian prince…” The reactions tell it all. This isn’t a bad speech from a bad movie; this is a plot point. Courageous is going to teach us how to be better fathers. Um … thanks, I guess.

Courageous centers around five family men, four cops and a construction worker (not unlike the Village People), all ranked by how much they’ve given themselves to God. The group contains both a black and a Hispanic. It’s important that we appear sexist, but not bigoted; that would be wrong. They face various trials. Writer/director/star Alex Kendrick has the toughest role as a world-weary father who rediscovers faith after the death of his nine-year-old daughter. There is a stunning lack of emotion in the aftermath of the tragedy. Losing your nine-year-old daughter? That should be the saddest thing I ever heard. The emotion, however, is completely undermined by a plot which always resolves itself in the direction of “God’s plan.” That isn’t a movie. There are key elements missing, like plot and motivation. There’s also a weird antiseptic feeling to the objectionable elements. Dad isn’t close to his son because son likes to go out for runs. Ooooooh, what a rebel.

There isn’t room for the gray in Courageous; people are exactly divided into those who have had strong father figures and those who need discipline. This film has no acknowledgement of concepts like a bad seed or homosexuality. Every scene is geared towards reaching the exact conclusion that devotion to God is the superior choice. Naturally, this leads to stunning screen action like the “slow dancing with myself in the park” scene, the “communal increased faith document singing” climax and my personal favorite when a father takes his teen daughter out to dinner alone and gives her a promise ring. The overtones of incest in the latter are so thick as to invoke a gag reflex. Let me ask you this, Mr. Kendrick, in all earnestness: do you truly believe that a father giving his teen daughter a promise ring is a good idea?

Let me be clear here – I do not object to this film on religious grounds. And for all I know, I could be the Pope’s fourth cousin. I object because the impetus of the film was not to entertain, teach, or make art. There wasn’t an honest attempt here at doing anything other than spout bile from the pulpit. “Life got you down? Give yourself to God. Oh, and make sure you’re a man, too. They’re more important.” If all you care about is making sure a very masculine interpretation of Jesus gets filtered into every home, this is the film for you. Normally I’d have rated Courageous zero stars. Not only dull, it is almost cynical in the pretense that sermonizing needs another venue. However, I do see a good heart behind this film. It’s a very biased and chauvinistic heart, but it is a good one … and there’s the off-chance that one day a mushy-headed father figure will turn his act around as a result of this film. The half star is for him.

Rated PG-13, 129 Minutes
D: Alex Kendrick
W: Stephen Kendrick, Alex Kendrick
Genre: Sermon
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: People who confuse religion with entertainment
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Fans of evolution