Reviewed by Paul Christian Glenn
Director: Brian Dannelly
Release: 2004
Rating: PG-13
Saved! is a teen-angst film with a twist: it’s set in a modern Christian high-school. Writer-director Brian Dannelly has been making the rounds on talk shows, explaining that while the film is, indeed, a satire of the evangelical Christian subculture, he believes it is an affectionate knock, and that his film ultimately portrays faith in a positive light.
Most of the story takes place within the hallowed halls of American Eagle high school. Mary is a Perfect Christian Girl, with a Perfect Christian Boyfriend, and an honored position as one of the “Christian Jewels,” the school’s all-girl praise and worship band. One day Mary’s boyfriend admits to her that he’s gay, and she gets the idea that in order to help him overcome this problem, she needs to sacrifice her viriginity. Jesus, she believes, will forgive her, because it’s for the greater good.
Her plan doesn’t work. The boyfriend gets shipped off to “Mercy House” for de-gayification,” and Mary ends up pregnant. Finding herself suddenly on the outs with her perfect Christian friends, she hooks up with the school’s requisite gang of lost sheep, who smoke, drink, have sex, and smirk at the religious antics of their peers.
Mary’s trip to the dark side, however, is antagonized by Hilary Faye, leader of the Christian Jewels, and Holy Bitch Supreme. Hilary Faye is the school’s self-anointed keeper of souls, and she makes it her mission to bring the lost sheep back into the fold. She’s the sort of person who will angrily throw a Bible at someone and scream “Jesus wants to forgive you!”
There are a few peripheral stories as well. Hilary Faye’s wheelchair-bound brother Roland falls head-over-wheels for Cassandra, the school’s token Jew. Mary’s mother, a widowed interior decorator, tries her darndest to have an affair with Pastor Skip, the tragically un-hip principal of the high school. And Pastor Skip’s son, recently returned from a Christian skateboarding tour, tries to woo the secretly-pregnant Mary.
Having grown up in the church, and having attended a school not unlike America Eagle, I was most curious about this film, and how it would portray the modern evangelical teenager. As I watched, I felt confident that while the director may have done some research, he obviously didn’t know what it really felt like to grow up in that environment. It came, then, as quite a shock to learn that Danelly did, indeed, go to a Christian high school when he was growing up. Much less shocking was the revelation that he was eventually thrown out of the school for demerits.
What’s missing in this film is a genuine understanding of the faith. No matter that the filmmaker went to a Christian school - this story is from an outsider’s point-of-view. Dannelly knows what it’s like to be around these people, but he doesn’t know what it’s like to be these people. And, of course, that’s evidenced in the
way the film treats its characters - the more they reject formal Christianity, the more sympathetically they’re portrayed. How easily Mary rejects her lifelong faith! Where is the agonizing sense of betrayal? Where is the ponderous moral wandering that so often afflicts those who stray? Where are the long, philosophical conversations that naturally ensue when someone finds that they no longer identify with their faith? Dannelly has no feel for the rhythm in which Christians speak their Christian-ese; the “Praise the Lord’s” in this film
are just a bit too well-placed. These Christians never quite sound genuine.
I realize it’s “just” a satire, but Dannelly is presenting this as some sort of message movie, and, as such, it just doesn’t hold up. I found the movie to be extremely patronizing: “Christianity is perfectly wonderful,as long as it feels good, and you don’t actually believe anything!”
In the closing narration, the film’s thesis is revealed. As Mary holds her new baby in her arms, she thinks to herself, “There must be a god…or something…out there. You just have to feel it.” Um, right. The same sentiment is echoed by Mary’s mother when she’s putting the moves on the married Pastor Skip: “I don’t think God would give us these feelings of happiness if what we were doing was wrong!” Poor repressed Pastor Skip, of course, eventually sees the light.
Cinematically, the film is a mixed bag. The tone is all over the place; I kept trying to figure out if this was a thoughtful satire, an after-school special, or a John Hughes revival. The end of the film gets completely out of hand, relying on every cliche possible, and by the time Hillary Faye has her big come-uppance, things have degenerated to the dramatic level of Saturday morning cartoons. On the positive side, there are some lovely
performances. Macauley Culkin strikes just the right note as Roland, Hilary Faye’s disabled brother, and Patrick Fugit plays cool here with the same ease that he played uncool in Almost Famous. Mandy Moore, whose character is as one-dimensional as they come, has fun with Hilary Faye, and almost even lets us sympathize with her. But not quite.