Exclusive Clip: A Basketball Player Finds His Faith in “Midrange”
Posted on June 9, 2014 at 1:00 pm
I am delighted to have five copies of the new faith-based film “Midrange” to give away. If you’d like to enter, send an email to moviemom@moviemom.com with “Midrange” in the subject line and tell me your favorite athlete. Don’t forget your address! (US addresses only.) I’ll pick the winners at random on June 16.
Everyone deserves a second shot in the inspiring drama Midrange, available tomorrow, June 10, on DVD and Digital Platforms from Cinedigm. Jason Fields wrote and stars in this touching film that follows a superstar athlete’s journey to finding faith and accepting God into his life. The film, centered on the power of belief and the importance of second chances, has garnered the support of multiple former and current professional athletes with a strong Christian background including Corey Maggette, Allan Houston, Anthony Tolliver, Kelenna Azubuike, Jerome Williams, Austin Daye, Roger Powell Jr., Greivis Vasquez, Romel Beck, Wayne Simien and Andre Brown.
Fields plays Damon Sharp, a college basketball player destined for the pros. With his college career at an end, Damon returns to his hometown to find his brother Darrin (Sean Douglas, “Days Of Our Lives”) consumed with drugs and alcohol and his mother (Susan Grace, You Don’t Mess With The Zohan) depressed and helpless. Seeking a better life for his family and himself, Damon is forced to decide between saving his brother and following his dream . As Damon reexamines his choices, and his relationship with his brother, he turns to faith to find a new understanding of perseverance, loyalty and love. The film addresses a secular struggle of balancing faith, family and career, and ultimately the critical choices that define a man’s character and reveal what’s most important in life. Here’s an exclusive clip.
Interview: Candace Cameron Bure of ‘Truth Be Told’
Posted on April 13, 2011 at 8:00 am
“Family Movie Night,” sponsored by Proctor & Gamble and Walmart, has produced another fine film for all ages. Candace Cameron Bure (“Full House,” “Make It or Break It”) stars in “Truth Be Told,” the story of a marriage counselor who is not married. When she has a job opportunity that requires a husband, she tells a lie, and enlists an old friend and his children to pretend to be her family.
I spoke to Candace about the role and about her work and her ministry, speaking about her faith and giving back to the community.
Tell me about “Truth Be Told.”
I couldn’t have been more excited when I was sent this script. I had seen some of the Family Movie Night shows and said to myself, “I want to do one of those!” When I read the script, it was absolutely perfect. I fell in love with Annie Morgan, the character I play. She’s a family and marriage counselor. It was something I can totally relate to, and family and marriage are so important to me. I do a lot of speaking at conferences and churches about family and marriage, so it was a topic I am passionate about. The premise is that one little lie snowballs into this huge mess and honesty is always the best policy.
That’s what I love about this series. These are not kids’ films that adults can tolerate or movies directed at adults without offensive content but true family movies with characters and situations that everyone in the family can understand and will want to talk about later.
I appreciate it as a mom. I have 12, 11, and 9 year-olds. I loved the fact that Proctor & Gamble and Walmart teamed up to give us this time on a Friday night when we can sit down with our families and watch a movie that we don’t have to worry about. It gives us things to think about and to open up some conversations with the family. “What happens if you tell a lie?” Depending on the age of your kids it can be a very simple conversation but you can turn it to a situation you and your family have recently experienced. I can open the door for something else your child has been struggling with. You use it as a platform for whatever dialogue needs to be exposed in your family at this time.
What happens in the film?
My character is offered a job at a radio station and because she is a marriage counselor, they assume she is married. And family is very important to the man who owns the company. She is probably not going to get the job unless she has a husband. She runs into an old college friend who is a widower and convinces him and his children to pretend to be her family for the weekend. The relationship develops — it is definitely a romantic comedy.
What is your experience like as you speak to groups about your faith?
I’ve been speaking and sharing my Christian faith for seven or eight years, and now I am speaking to the bigger groups like Extraordinary Women and Women of Joy. I actually just got back from a conference with Extraordinary Women. Sometimes there’s anywhere from 1500-15,000 ladies I will speak to. It is an amazing opportunity for me to share my faith and what is important to me and ultimately the gospel of Jesus Christ. I think I am as encouraged or maybe even more to see that God allows me to be used in that sense. These ladies will tell me they are encouraged by hearing my story and yet I am in awe that I am just a person getting this opportunity so I feel very privileged. It’s a very different thing from being on television. Most people would think that you would automatically be comfortable if you’re an actress to go up on stage to speak but it is actually very different. It’s not the number of people that scares me. The more there are, the easier it is for me. But it is a very different thing to open your heart and share your heart and be exposed in that way, not reading a memorized script or acting a different character. I get much more nervous speaking live at an event. You throw a camera on me and I am comfortable!
I had an emotional attachment to food. I ran to food for comfort, to fill a void instead of realizing I had to run to God for those things. I learned to honor my body by eating healthily and exercising but really by putting my faith into the forefront of my relationship with food by honoring my body as a temple God gave me and learning to run to Him for those needs and not to turn to food for it. I don’t enjoy getting up at 5 am some mornings but I see it as a necessity to take care of my body. To eat healthy, that’s all about the choices I make whether in a restaurant or the grocery story. The food’s not making it for me. There are so many tools out there to get us on the right track and help us make better choices. We don’t value those choices as much as we should. One choice a day, one choice an hour. If you look at it this way, it’s not so overwhelming.
Do you have a favorite Bible passage?
I don’t like that question because there are so many good ones! But the one that’s been on my computer desktop recently is Philippians 1, Verse 6. I just go, “God’s good work is in all of us and He will carry that on.” I don’t need to worry about it, I don’t need to stress over it. I know God has a plan set before me and I need to obediently just follow the footsteps that he’s laid out and keep my eyes focused on Him and He will carry out that good work to completion. And whatever that is, it might not be my own expectation but He knows what that is.
It’s everything. We read the Bible together and we talk about verses that can help us focus for that day. If we have a need or a worry for that day we find verses where it talks about it. We go to church. My kids are involved in Awana and youth group. My daughter has started leading worship and singing at her chapel. They go to a Christian school. So it is in every aspect of our lives but most important, my husband and I try to be that example, to show them that it is not just words but by our own actions and what we do.
At first glance, it seems odd that a child-choking, beer-swilling glutton who has embodied all seven deadly sins could be considered a shining example of a man of faith. Then again, as the Vatican paper explained, the Simpson family “recites prayers before meals and, in their own way, believes in the life thereafter.” Even Melissa Henson, director of communications for the Parents Television Council, says, “The Simpsons is one of the more balanced treatments of faith-based characters that you’ll see. Flanders seems like a dork, but he’s sincere.”
Most prime-time elevision shows are designed to appeal to the broadest possible audience and producers worry that identifying characters with a particular religious faith will be controversial, offending both those who share that faith and those who do not. The result is a pervasive cynicism on television with regard to faith and people of faith.
A recent TV Guide Magazine poll found that 59 percent of readers believe religion and faith-based characters aren’t being treated fairly on prime time. As one respondent put it, “So often, religious people (read: Christians) are portrayed as crackpot, hypocritical, ultraconservative nutjobs.”
Thomashoff points to “Community’ as an example of inclusion and “The Middle,” “Lost,” and “The Good Wife” as shows that grapple with questions of faith in a sincere and respectful way. “Hellcats” has a Christian character whose faith leads her to decide not to have sex with her boyfriend. And Will Scheffer of the polygamous HBO drama “Big Love” says, “Faith is our main theme. All our characters will be struggling and questioning, but in a way that won’t be off-putting to viewers, whether they be atheists or true believers.” Stories — whether drama or comedy — are about conflict. When television writers and producers portray the struggles of their characters to find meaning and direction, questions of religion and spirituality provide an authenticity and connection to viewers.
Ricky Gervais has come up with a fresh and enticing premise but — I have to be honest — it is imperfectly executed. It has the gloss of a romantic comedy because it gives us the fun of knowing that the couple will end up together long before they figure it out for themselves. But it also takes on some very big issues and has some surprising insights.
Gervais has imagined a world that looks exactly like ours, except that the people can only tell the concrete, literal truth. That means that they always say exactly what is on their minds, most of which is, to be brutally frank, brutally frank. This is not a crowd you want to ask whether these pants make you look fat.
And so when Mark (Gervais, who also co-wrote and co-directed) goes out on a date with a woman he has had a crush on named Anna (Jennifer Garner), she tells him up front that he is not in her league. He is repeatedly told that he is fat, dull, and unappealing. And then he is fired from his job as a screenwriter. But since fiction is a form of lying, all of this world’s movies are merely footage of people sitting in chairs reading aloud text about historical events. Mark, assigned to the 13th century, is fired because the only thing he can write “movies” about is the black plague.
About to be evicted because he cannot pay the rent, Mark goes to the bank to close out his account and the movie’s title event occurs. He informs the teller that he has more money than the bank’s computers show. And since no lie has ever occurred in this world, the teller believes him. Mark is thrilled with this new power, especially when he discovers he can ease his mother’s passing at what our world would politely call a nursing home but in no-lie world is identified with a sign that reads “A Sad Place for Hopeless Old People.” She is upset because she does not know what happens after death, so he tells her that she will be in a place where everything is loving and plentiful and she will be reunited with everyone she has loved. She dies in peace and the doctor and nurses who overheard want to know more. And soon Mark’s new ability to imagine gets him his job back and everyone wants to hear all about heaven and the “Man in the Sky.”
Gervais is not as imaginative as a director as he is as a writer but we get to see what a subtle and even moving actor he has become. The flatness of delivery of the no-lie world is a challenge for the cast, including comedian Louis C.K., Jason Bateman, Rob Lowe (looking unnecessarily seedy), Tina Fey, the inescapable Jonah Hill, and John Hodgman, and the talented Nathan Corddry and Christopher Guest are on screen too briefly to make much of an impression. Jennifer Garner is a great pleasure, as always, giving us a chance to see the wistful longing for something she cannot define because it is beyond her ability to conceive.
Amid the jokes (just imagine what soda ads look like in a world without exaggeration and implication) there are some provocative and meaningful insights. Lies are impossible without abstraction and the ability to imagine. And so is fiction. And so is faith. And even love. Without the ability to conceive abstraction, marriage is only about genetic superiority. There is no kindness, no compassion, no real understanding.
Some audience members will be uncomfortable at the suggestion that God is portrayed as a lie but this underestimates the film. While Gervais is an acknowledged atheist, the movie does not have to be seen that way. The emptiness of the lives of the people in a world devoid of anything but the literal truth and the way they are enthralled with the concepts of faith and meaning argue just the opposite. Just because someone lies about something does not change the underlying reality. Watch Gervais’ face as Mark uses his new ability to depart from concrete truth to provide encouragement and inspiration, and enjoy a comedy that may be about the invention of lying but knows how to tell the truth.
In 2008, TED gave its annual award to Karen Armstrong, author of more than 20 books about what Islam, Judaism and Christianity have in common and their effect on world events. She is a former nun who now calls herself a “freelance monotheist.” Receipients of this prize receive $100,000 and “One Wish to Change the World.” Armstrong’s wish was for a compassion initiative:
“I wish that you would help with the creation, launch and propagation of a Charter for Compassion, crafted by a group of leading inspirational thinkers from the three Abrahamic traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and based on the fundamental principles of universal justice and respect.”
