Rock 'n roller Samuel Allen (Max Ehrich) is in jail, the result of an anger-filled youth and hatred toward organized religion have led him down a dark road of rebellion. Yet in a moment of what can only be divine intervention, a judge dismisses the drug charges against him as long as Samuel speaks to local schools and churches about the dangers of drugs.

Now that he's been given a second chance, Samuel starts to follow in his father's footsteps, overcoming the influence of a powerful church leader with a personal vendetta against Samuel's father Pastor Joe (Gary Weeks). Then, he decides to become a preacher himself, despite the challenge, and wins the heart of Julie (Katelyn Nacon).

Directed and written by Jeffrey A. Smith, who also plays Pastor Clayborn, this 60s set faith-based movie doesn't shy away from the fact that staying on the right side is filled with temptation. Samuel Allen is the founder of Dream Church and really did walk the path shown in Southern Gospel. There's even a tragic drowning, the idea that electric guitars are tools of Satan and how the elders of the church fight more to keep their power than to help save sinners.

I'm not a lover of too many faith-based movies -- outside of the films of Ron Ormond and Donald W. Thompson -- but even I can recognize the lessons in this movie.

... but, until that story is written someday in the far future, this will do nicely. A tale of a young man with a talent for music but also has a passion for faith. Who carries his Bible with him everywhere. And has many adventures along the way, but ultimately returns to what he loves best. Preaching. To tell the truth, the absolute highest compliment you can give to a faith-based movie is that it does not make a fuss about its roots. This project from writer/director Jeff Smith has an almost two hour run-length, and it fills the time quite nicely. (And passes the Roger Ebert test, you don't look at your watch even once.) As an indie project, it is above average in every aspect. Tight script, solid casting, acting, and direction. Even the music is solid. In fact, you might even wish there was more of it. Recommended. And very under-appreciated. ((Designated "IMDb Top Reviewer." Please check out my list "167+ Nearly-Perfect Movies (with the occasional Anime or TV miniseries) you can/should see again and again (1932 to the present))

I was raised in a catholic family. I was baptized when I was almost three months old, I did my First Holy Communion when I was 11, but I grew up and paved my own path. Today I consider myself an atheist. My father was a Minister of the God's Word for years, and his "masses" (he wasn't a priest, if he was I wouldn't be even born) were the only ones where I felt something. But this something was not connection to God, it was pride of my dad. He loved doing that and maybe he still loves, and THAT was one of the points that strongly connected me to this film.

There are a lot of religion films that are absolutely restricted to people of that specific religion, and not all of them, but the most practitioners; and when they are aiming on people outside of that religion, it's a movie that usually tries to unnaturally convert its audience. "Southern Gospel" doesn't do that.

From the first scene, it criticizes the structure of the Church and the people who are in it. The movie clearly says "cathechesis is useless" (I wanted to use another word but it would not be appropriate here), it's something that draws you away from God more than it brings you closer. Another crucial thing here is the Holy Bible. The way it's used, interpreted in different manners by different characters, maintains the millenary debate about it open, allows the audience to interprete it freely, and for non-religious people, reinforces that "it's just a book".

In a nutshell, the religion here is, more than anything, the character's background. The story is not about religion, it's about a man trying to achieve his dreams. Max Ehrich (who reminded me of Andrew Garfield all the time) surprised me a lot, he seems to believe in every single word of what he's saying, and these compliments can be extended to J. Alphone Nicholson (who reminded me of Jonathan Majors all the time). The friendship between them seems genuine, and is the heart of this project. The rest of the cast is operant, except for Emma Myers. She is not a bad actress, but number one: Enid Sinclair, her character on "Wednesday", is too fresh in my head and she has the same posturing here; and numer two: Emma was definitely the wrong actress to that role, it was a grosser casting error than Sadie Sink in "The Whale", and what was that wig?

Also, despite the script hitting the bullseye on how it treats the audience on the religious aspect, it fails on telling its story properly, especially on the second half of the second act and the first half of the third act. Two essential informations are not well treated. I'm not talking about disrespect, it's far from the case, but about superficiality. Nicholson and Katelyn Nacon's characters deserved a bit more of attention (20 more minutes would help a lot). But I must be honest, I liked the ending. It's kind of a strange comparison, but it reminded me of "Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris". It almost had the intention of being "inspirational", so it was not surprising that it took this way. And predictable is quite different from bad.

I came from this film skeptical, but even being far from the target audience (yes, even being more accessible, it's still aiming on religious people), the film conquered me, dissolved my cinism and proved that not all religious movies are bad.