So, in that sense, God Bless the Broken Road is a vast improvement for Cronk as a filmmaker. They are not movies, they are propaganda, and are embarrassingly acted, directed, and cobbled together. There are some wonderful moments shared by Amber and Bree, which instantly makes this a cut above most of the faith-based lectures, masquerading as feature films, we typically get in a given year.Ĭronk is the man behind the first two God’s Not Dead films, which are on record at Should I See It, individually, as being among the worst films of their respective years. Pulsipher is really solid here and develops a nice chemistry with Moss. There is A LOT going on here and had Cronk and Dornbush wrote the song this all somehow emanates from they would have likely crafted a 20-song concept album working through all this material. And then we also have Amber’s two best friends, Karena and Bridgette, ( Robin Givens, Jordin Sparks) popping in and out with faith-based platitudes and scripture, always at the ready. A soldier Darren served with ( Arthur Cartwright) has shown up in town. Amber and mother-in-law Patti ( Kim Delaney) despise one another for no real discernible reason. And he makes googly-eyes at Amber, who tries to fight against her instincts, out of deference to her late husband.Īnd it just continues. Seeking to restart his life from a troubled past, Cody is sent by Coach Gibbs (a reference repeatedly made about NASCAR owner and former NFL coach Joe Gibbs, though Gibbs is never actually in the film), to, well, a guy named Joe ( Gary Grubbs), a mechanic and race car sponsor in his own right.Ĭody is roped into being a youth activities coordinator at the local church and he has the boys and girls making go-karts.
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Walker), looking freshly plucked out of a romantic Lifetime or Hallmark Movie of the Week. Two years after his funeral, Amber has lost her connection to church, is estranged from her mother-in-law, and is working more and more shifts at the local diner to try and make ends meet.īree, though still active in church, is often dragged along to work with Amber or left at home, because Amber has no other options. One afternoon, as Amber is leading the church choir, soldiers arrive with news of Darren’s passing. The film revolves around Amber ( Lindsay Pulsipher) and her 8-year-old daughter Bree ( Makenzie Moss), living a life in rural Kentucky, while her husband, Darren ( Liam Matthews), is fighting in Afghanistan. Rather, it is how the movie deals with those realities that make the film a bit hard to take seriously. Their solution appears to be to take a half-dozen subplots, throw them at the wall, mention God constantly, and hope something sticks.Īnd before we move too much further along, the deficiencies within God Bless the Broken Road have nothing to do with the film being faith-based. Reportedly, the lyrics from the song served as the inspiration behind the screenplay, penned by Cronk and Jennifer Dornbush, and very quickly we see the difficulty in taking a four-minute song and stretching it into a 113-minute film. The first of two faith-based movies to be released in subsequent weeks by director Harold Cronk, God Bless the Broken Road takes its name from a chart-topping, Grammy winning country song, popularized by Rascal Flatts in 2004. Is that NFL Hall of Famer LaDainian Tomlinson playing a pastor?!?!?! Curious moviegoers may feel pushed away immediately. The beginning and end of this movie are hyperbolic and hackneyed in its storytelling. Wouldn’t you want a film like this to try and appeal to as diverse an audience as possible?
You would think this would be a movie that would try and cast a wide net to share its message however, this film is preaching merely to a choir of devoted followers. One reviewer called this “the movie we need for our troubled times.” So, I mean. Lindsay Pulsipher is a talented actress and makes the most out of an overstuffed script that, may veer off in a lot of different directions, but is a better movie when she is front and center. By: Mike Ward on Thursday, September 06 PG-13 Running Time: 113 mins SHOULD I SEE IT? YESįaith-based audiences often respond en masse to films targeting that demographic, and God Bless the Broken Road could be poised to have a nice weekend at the box office.
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