I'll grant that this movie was not as bad as I expected. I greatly admire Dutcher's making a movie on his own terms, because in these PC times, the typical response to movie stereotypes is to complain about them and not do anything. Making your own movie as an answer to them must have taken great guts. But as a rationalist, I have to say this movie is just propaganda. Dutcher also gets credit for bringing up some of the logical criticisms of the book of Mormon, but then he just dismisses them with hand waving and ridiculous justifications ("sometimes I think God gives us a few hundred reasons to believe, and just throws in a couple not to, so that we can choose for ourselves"). Ultimately, the movie decides that the issues that Elder Kinegar brings up don't really matter, as far as rational discussion - all that matters is when you want to believe so bad, go through so much mental anguish about it, until you experience a moment of insanity when you just "know" you're right. The movie also helped me realize how seemingly intelligent people can continue to not only believe in the religion, not only go on a mission, but even PAY the church to go on your mission: when you sacrifice so much.. so much of yourself, so much of your freedom, so much of your dignity, so much of your rational skepticism, then you just HAVE to believe in it to avoid the heart wrenching disappointment that would come when you realized your entire set of beliefs is absurd. Of course, you cannot deny this.. you can pretend to, you can never mention your doubts to other people, you can try to turn your brain off - that's why Utah is the Prozac capital of the world. At the end of the movie, the main character says he never found out what happened to Elder Kinegar. I know what happened to him, the same thing that happened to all my friends who are recovering Mormons - he felt a huge weight lifted from his shoulders when he left the church, then he went on to enjoy life, and wondered how he could ever have deluded himself so much as to waste so many years of his life in the church.
Review of God's Army
