The story here is religious. The story here is faith. The story here is prodigal. So why does the story fall short?
Having experienced my best friend grand daughter (and a friend of Jamie Grace whose in this cast), this story rings more than a little hallow. The real story is that someone like Grace (the main character) is not likely because the self-centered ego of her would never even come close to making it in the music industry. The music industry is a rough and tumble world where even having the talent to sing, and play, and write the songs is not always enough. This script tries to show that instant stardom was easy to achieve when it was made in the music industry. Never is anything so false as that. Being one of the keys to the script, that is totally an unforgiveable error.
Jamie Grace in her first movie role is only a minor role, yet she is a more talent musician than anyone in the cast because she is the triple threat, she writes, sings and plays great inspirational music. Other than being here, she has very little to do in this film.
The cast does a good job. While a Christian singer might turn down a song with suggestive lyrics, Jesus would forgive someone for whatever they would sing, because he died for our sins. So once again, the question of faith in whether or not to sing a song is a little weak on principle here.
Then there is dad, and his arguements with his daughter, and his own personal issues he has to deal with. In a Prodigal situation, the daughter would have not argued with dad as much as try to learn everything he had to offer. This is not what the script suggests, as it suggests she can not write a song until after she is 18. Truly inspired prodigals who can write songs would have started long before that and the true talent would write some terrible songs and failed with them before learning to write good ones. Once again the script falls short here.
While the film has a solid cast, good acting, and good music, the script kind of lets this one fall short of being what could have been a better film. It's not the fault of the folks making the movie. Their effort is what keeps this film from falling entirely flat. Still, with a better script, this movie could have been much more.
I was glad to see in the making of documentary that everyone did their own singing and playing in this movie. That realism is another reason it plays well. I only wish someone had looked for a way to keep the script more realistic, like maybe finding a great talent like my friends grand daughter (or Jamie Grace) and doing their real story of faith. That would be a great movie. This fictional one falls short of that which should be the goal of a music film that has a story. This type of movie genre is difficult to pull off. That's why "A Star Is Born" is being made yet again. The story seems to hold up for every remake.
A remake or sequel of this one would not make it.
Having experienced my best friend grand daughter (and a friend of Jamie Grace whose in this cast), this story rings more than a little hallow. The real story is that someone like Grace (the main character) is not likely because the self-centered ego of her would never even come close to making it in the music industry. The music industry is a rough and tumble world where even having the talent to sing, and play, and write the songs is not always enough. This script tries to show that instant stardom was easy to achieve when it was made in the music industry. Never is anything so false as that. Being one of the keys to the script, that is totally an unforgiveable error.
Jamie Grace in her first movie role is only a minor role, yet she is a more talent musician than anyone in the cast because she is the triple threat, she writes, sings and plays great inspirational music. Other than being here, she has very little to do in this film.
The cast does a good job. While a Christian singer might turn down a song with suggestive lyrics, Jesus would forgive someone for whatever they would sing, because he died for our sins. So once again, the question of faith in whether or not to sing a song is a little weak on principle here.
Then there is dad, and his arguements with his daughter, and his own personal issues he has to deal with. In a Prodigal situation, the daughter would have not argued with dad as much as try to learn everything he had to offer. This is not what the script suggests, as it suggests she can not write a song until after she is 18. Truly inspired prodigals who can write songs would have started long before that and the true talent would write some terrible songs and failed with them before learning to write good ones. Once again the script falls short here.
While the film has a solid cast, good acting, and good music, the script kind of lets this one fall short of being what could have been a better film. It's not the fault of the folks making the movie. Their effort is what keeps this film from falling entirely flat. Still, with a better script, this movie could have been much more.
I was glad to see in the making of documentary that everyone did their own singing and playing in this movie. That realism is another reason it plays well. I only wish someone had looked for a way to keep the script more realistic, like maybe finding a great talent like my friends grand daughter (or Jamie Grace) and doing their real story of faith. That would be a great movie. This fictional one falls short of that which should be the goal of a music film that has a story. This type of movie genre is difficult to pull off. That's why "A Star Is Born" is being made yet again. The story seems to hold up for every remake.
A remake or sequel of this one would not make it.