Mormon Cinema Is Back On Track
"Return With Honor" (formerly "The Return") has been creating some interesting buzz the past year or so as it's played the film festival circuit, and it's picked up some major prizes at WorldFest and the New York Film and Video Festival. Finally it has been scheduled for theatrical release this September.
Like a lot of people, I've been hearing about this movie for some time and was anxious to see it. Last night I was privileged to view an advance screening of the film, and I'm happy to report that everything you've heard about it is true: for one thing, it pulls Mormon Cinema back from the brink and gives hope that there's still at least one more filmmaker out there willing to treat the genre with respect.
Having said that, "Return With Honor" does not necessarily have to be seen as a "Mormon" Movie; indeed, many non-LDS reviewers have said they don't even see it as such. In my opinion, this film has great cross-over potential; you no more have to be a Latter-day Saint to enjoy this movie than you would have to be Amish to enjoy "Witness".
The film's protagonist is a by-the-numbers missionary just released from his mission, but on his way home the cab he's in is hit by a truck and he has a near-death experience. Wishing he'd had a chance to convert his own mother before he died, he's granted sixty days back on earth, and wakes up in the hospital bruised, but alive. He tells no one about his NDE.
He had a girlfriend waiting for him, and she enthusiastically proceeds with plans for their wedding which he knows will never take place. Released from the hospital, he's chagrined to find his best friend is now a pierced and tattooed punker and his mother has taken up with an unsavory character and is making a living in a way that would definitely be frowned upon by his fellow ward members.
Writer/Producer Tracy Garner has a more germane understanding of LDS doctrine than many contemporary Mormons I know, but the movie is far from a sunday school lesson. It's characters are real people with real failings and real feelings. "Return With Honor" is ultimately a film about unconditional love. The lesson of this movie is that by being judgemental of our fellow beings, we've been getting it all wrong; That's not how heaven works. Like the song says, "In the end, only kindness matters".
This film moved me. It's the kind of experience where you don't want to get up immediately when it's over, but just stay quietly in your seat for a few minutes.
After five years of mostly silly farces and embarrasing flops, good Mormon Cinema is back. Tracy Garner has reset the bar.
Rock Waterman
Sacramento, California