So God’s Not Dead 3: A Light in the Darkness came out… I guess rounding out the God’s Not Dead cinematic universe or something. Or maybe it’ll keep going, Marvel-style. Hard to say. But the first two God’s Not Dead movies were faith-based films largely centered around straw-man, sanctimonious, finger-waving, flimsy arguments that were only really preaching to the choir. They were sometimes ugly, smug, and tailored to the self-righteous, allegedly persecuted Christians in the audience. Doesn’t mean they were all bad, but they could be trying to watch unless you are dedicated to believing everything Fox News tells you about Christianity in the US (especially around Christmas and, more importantly, the decoration of Starbucks cups at that time of year).
That’s why I’m surprised – shocked even – that God’s Not Dead 3 is actually a smart, even-handed film that even takes the opportunity to blast people with a Christian persecution complex. And while it also blasts atheists who throws rocks through Church windows, it also gives us Christians who throw rocks through Atheist windows. It’s surprisingly even-handed in its approach to religious subject matter. It’s as though the people making these movies were either replaced or started listening to the criticism of them.
So God’s Not Dead 3’s basic story is that there’s a church on the grounds of a state college. When the college was built, it was Christian but it changed hands and became a state-run school. No there’s strife between the religious in the community who wants the church and the separation of church and state folk who think it should go. And there’s a contingent (mainly in the campus administration) who just want the headache to go away before it affects new student registrations. Into this political mess, an angry student throws a rock through the church’s window which inadvertently causes a fire and kills a priest. Now, with a burned down church, the pastor must enter a legal fight to rebuild his church or have it torn down and replaced with a much-needed student center.
The pastor is played by David AR White who is mainly known for acting in these faith-based movies. He’s not been terrible in the past but he’s pretty good in this one… partly because he’s matched up with John Corbett who plays his (atheist) lawyer brother. Corbett is always likable and he’s good here… but also really good at playing off White. You can believe – due to the acting and the writing – that these two are brothers with a long history. The movie partly works because of these two.
It also works because you don’t spend all your time picking at the holes in the movie’s logic or pointing out the straw man arguments. This movie gives us a pastor who is angry about the violence done to his church… not angry at god, but angry at the situation and the man who did the vandalism. It’s not the usual crisis-of-faith “can he find his way back to god” type scenario. But it’s also looks at Corbett’s character who is angry at his religious family for shunning him when he started having doubts and questions as a teenager.
Look, whether you’d ever see a movie that’s “just” about a church and the political and legal fight over it is up to you. I’m of the opinion any kind of movie can be good if it’s written, acted, and directed well and this movie was. I’d actually recommend it as a smart, even-handed approach to a delicate topic that one (along with politics) is not supposed to talk about in polite company. I’m genuinely surprised.
Score: 86