In adapting Don Piper’s autobiographical, inspirational best-seller, director Michael Polish has crafted something that actually feels like a movie instead of a sermon; it’s just not a particularly
good movie. The story deals with a car crash in January 1989 that left Texas minister Don (Hayden Christensen) clinically dead. But he returns to the living, and then has to deal both with his painful, slow recovery from his injuries and the conviction that he actually was in heaven during the time he was “dead.” Much of the movie deals with the harrowing real-world aftermath of the accident, with Kate Bosworth doing a solid job as Don’s wife, Eva, left to deal with parenting, hospital bills and an emotionally-distant Don largely on her own. Yet there’s also the huge problem of Christensen’s limp performance at the center—his drawled narration is pointless at best, laughable at worst—and pacing that makes it feel like we’re watching Don’s months-long recovery in real time. And while there are fine, restrained moments exploring faith as both comfort and struggle, there’s almost no way to portray a vision of Heaven literally—complete with giant gates—that doesn’t feel like somebody’s telling us exactly what he thinks we want to hear.
By
Scott Renshaw