This movie should be banned!

If you've read the book, you'd know that not all the immigrants are welsh. In fact, not all of the characters are immigrants.

In their community, only the oldest folks are the actual immigrants. The adults (parents) and all the children were born in America. Some of the immigrants are Scottish, some are Welsh. The reason their children would not have a "pure" welsh accent would be because of the mixing of the Welsh and Scottish people, and the differences in their accents being what their children (the parents/adults) would hear and adopt for themselves, and subsequently, their children (the children) would have even more muddled accents.

Again if you read the book, you would know that the oldest folks in their community had a vague understanding of who Jesus is, but had not had formal church or studying of the Bible, and it was only because of one man, Laochailand Kai, that they even adopted the pagan ritual of a sin eater. And since they've been away from their homeland for so long, it is hard for them to remember what their parents might have said concerning Jesus. However, as Cadi and Fagan hear more and more from the man of God, they begin sharing it with some of the people like Ms. Elda, and Bletsung Macleod, and the sin eater.

[deleted]

On the offset, I would say that some aspects of this film could be a bit controversial...but I also think this is a good thing: It causes the viewer's mind to be stimulated into thinking about what it's taking in.

Because the storyline is about a small group of people who came to America a couple hundred years ago, I believe large parts of this story are plausible.

The Welsh, Scottish and Irish are the groups that filled the southern states in America originally (after they took the land from the Natives). This is why our cooking here has even been adapted from the traditional recipes in the countries these people groups came from.

These were hard-working people groups that came here to fulfill their dreams in a land where there was a chance to become anybody they wanted to be. It was a land of opportunity and these people saved up all they had to get here to chase their dreams.

Now, in most cultures - the people who tend to hold most tightly to superstition tend to be the people of lower classes in society. This isn't a slur upon them, I'm descended from them as well! :)

How far-fetched is it for a group of people who came from the same country to dwell in an area that isolates them from any outside influence to forget about a religion they'd held from the old country in favor of the day to day superstition they had been taught hand-in-hand with their religion?

It's like cutting the legs off of a turkey because the whole unit couldn't fit into your roaster turning into "I don't know, Grandma just did it that way. It's a family tradition." -- Grandma just wanted you to enjoy the baked turkey, while we think it's some secret about preparation.

Superstition is a form of an "I can take care of myself" mindset - and as such, it's more pleasing to mankind than to trust a God that they trust without seeing. That is, until they need a God beyond what man can supply himself; which is where this story takes place in young Cadi Forbes' life.

I don't think we see non-religious people in this film; what we are observing is a people who had lost their way, and needed to be reminded.

The people from the old country (in the film) had a knowledge of God, but not in a day-to-day life sort of way. The "feel" of the God they mention and talk about is a far away God who only steps in from time to time when He's most needed (if He chooses to show up at all)...which is not the God you can read about in scripture.

They trusted their God to show them who should be chosen in the lot they had with the chicken bones, and they had a respect for the "Man of God"...but their religion was not the kind that saves.

It's possible that the older generation of the people in this story had once known or at least heard Gospel message, but they hadn't taken it into their hearts and made it their own - so they hadn't passed it on to their children.

Without a regular diet of meetings with fellow believers and a reading of God's Word, we can't expect our faith to flourish -- and without that, how are we to share a message of life with our children when our own faith is dead?

How many people in this village would have felt compelled to hold church services after they had massacred an entire Native American village, anyway?

It's not really hard to see how such a people could exist -- especially when their leader kept so much guilt and shame within himself. The leader's own father had thought he was too sinful at the end of his life to save and had to implement the Sin Eater to start with!

So.. the accents.

Most people here in the U.S. wouldn't even know those weren't convincing Welsh accents...and again, after 20 years of living in an isolated area - the group could have easily established their own dialect. 20 years is a long time to be away from their mother country. My own family that moved here from Mexico now has a little difficulty using their mother tongue because they have acclimated and formed their own dialect based on the culture they now live in.

It's like the difference between German and Pennsylvania Dutch.

So, if you're Welsh -- I am terribly sorry if the accents in this film may annoy you..but try immigrating to another country and living in an isolated area for twenty years with no outside influence.. then come back and we'll talk.

Either way.. it's just a film!

Also, I'm sorry this got so long. I just like thinking things out in a written process.

Try to look past any imperfections to truly see this story as it unfolds: the redemption of a young girl who was seeking forgiveness, an amazingly beautiful love story, and an group of people finding forgiveness of their sin.

And... if that's not enough, Peter Wingfield totally shines like an undiscovered star found in the night sky in his role!