Saved! Review
by Harvey S. Karten (harveycritic AT cs DOT com)May 25th, 2004
SAVED!
Reviewed by Harvey S. Karten
United Artists/Single Cell Picture/Infinity Media
Grade: B
Directed by: Brian Dannelly
Written by: Brian Dannelly, Michael Urban
Cast: Jena Malone, Mandy Moore, Macaulay Culkin, Patrick Fugit, Heather Matarazzo, Eva Amurri, Martin Donovan, Mary- Louise Parker
Screened at: MGM, NYC, 5/10/04
There's a saying: "The last Christian died on the cross." Whoever made enunciated that aphorism was apparently unaware of the historical inaccuracy, by never mind: The idea is that people today who consider themselves intense followers of Jesus' teachings are likely to be guilty of hypocrisies, large or small. If you doubt that, just go to the highest reaches of the U.S. government where our president, who runs prayer meetings in the morning with some of his cabinet members, cares little about the environment and thinks nothing of Matthew's idea (19:24) that "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God."
Director Brian Dannelly is the chap whose film, "Saved!", is a parody not of religion (there is little that's sacrilegious in this entertaining if repetitious comedy) but of those who profess to be mighty serious believers called Jesus freaks by those who see through them but who transgress the very words they claim to embody. In the script which the director co-wrote with Michael Urban, we find one True Believer who gets pregnant out of wedlock; the head of a Christian school who doesn't talk to his wife but who dallies with an unwed mother, and an intensely religious young woman who defaces her school with graffiti intending the authorities to pin the blame on someone she hates.
The story is centered on the American Christian High School, which presumably would send many of its graduates to colleges like the Bob Jones University. A large, kitschy status of Jesus overlooks the students, inspiring them to dedicate their souls to God or, in one case, to drive a van right into it as though the car were toppling yet another statue of Saddam Hussein. This is not a Catholic school, a place that has its students in blazers and plaid skirts but one in which the kids dress modern with hip- hugging shorts and open blouses, the better to turn on to Christian rock bands. When Mary (Jena Malone) finds herself pregnant after her unsuccessful attempt to "cure" her boyfriend of his newly-discovered homosexuality, she provides the biggest target yet for the school's bitch, Hilary Faye (Mandy Moore), an eighteen-year-old filled with the fires of Jesus who is to mock the Lord's teachings by her blazing intolerance of Mary, of the school's one Jewish student (Cassandra (Eva Amurri), and the wheelchair-bound Roland (Macaulay Culkin) who has thrown his moral support to the students rebelling against the school's religious authoritarianism.
Despite the intrusive music, a prolix and annoying opening narration, and the metaphoric machine-gunning of the hypocritical Jesus freaks (like shooting a fish out of a pond), "Saved!" is an enjoyable film featuring strong performances especially from Martin Donovan as Pastor Skip, Mandy Moore as the fiery Hilary, and the adorable Jena Malone as the catalyst who exposes the two-faced tyrants.
Rated PG-13. 92 minutes. Copyright 2004 by Harvey Karten
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