You probably didn’t see Saved! It pretty much tanked at the box office, and didn’t play in the cinema for very long. I think it failed to attract both a Christian or a non-Christian audience. You should watch Saved! on DVD, though.
I just watched it last night, and was really surprised (I love it when a film surprises me) and impressed. I expected a vicious, anti-religious screed, but instead I watched a clever, funny, subversive movie about teens growing up Christian. On one level, it’s just a teen movie in the tradition of John Hughes and American Pie. On another, the film explores how modern, American Christianity deals with difference.
The cast is full of odd-balls–Macaulay Culkin’s in a wheelchair, Mandy Moore has a mullet and Mary-Louise Parker is somebody’s mom. The cast also includes the excellent Patrick Fugit and Jena Malone. We first saw the former smirking his way through Almost Famous, and I think I’ve only seen Malone briefly, getting shot in Cold Mountain.
Watching the movie, I kept waiting for it to devolve into cheap and easy shots at the Christian Right. Instead, it frequently chose a more complicated take and a subtler argument against religious rigidity. Ultimately, the film is God-positive without being didactic or offensive. Here’s Roger Ebert:
Now if the film were all pitched on this one note, it would be tiresome and unfair. But having surprised us with its outspoken first act, it gets religion of its own sort in the second and third acts, arguing not against fundamentalism but against intolerance…By the end of the movie, mainstream Christian values have not been overthrown, but demonstrated and embraced. Those who think Christianity is just a matter of enforcing their rulebook have been, well, enlightened.
It’s a complicated film whose most seditious line is “I know in my heart that Jesus still loves me”.
After checking out Metacritic, I went looking for some Christian reviews of the movie. Predictably, many sites didn’t get it. They focus not on the anti-fanaticism, pro-tolerance message, but on things like the likely untruth that “most of the Saved! production staff is [sic] homosexuals or homosexual advocates?”. This one is more thoughtful, but (like nearly every Christian movie review site) tends to obsess about the details of the film’s language, violent and sexual content (it’s extremely PG in all three categories). The emphasis of this review is on who will and will not be offended, and draws a hilariously Catholic conclusion:
And though the film ends on an ambiguously pro-faith note, the spirituality proposed is more of the fluffy-feel-good, nondogmatic brand than a costly grace which places moral demands on the believer.
Finally, I found this rambling page of review and discussion that comes from a ‘liberal’ Christian review site.
One footnote: Saved! was shot in Vancouver (mostly at this high school), but I didn’t really recognize it as such. Usually, locals can recognize locally-produced films by the diffuse grayness of the natural light. This film enjoyed a lot of sunny autumn days, and I think they tweaked the tone of the exterior shots in post-production. The light’s colour temperature feels a little too hot and white for a Vancouver production.
DarrenBarefoot.com 
I was *really* pleasantly surprised with the movie. I watched it because the school band is “Day Theory” — a now defunct, but previously wonderful local band. I adored Macaulay Culkin’s role — I think I may have finally forgiven him for being an annoying child star, right along with Wil Wheaton only without the blog. The hiatus he took was well worth it.
I also recognized most of the shots — the high school is half a mile from my parents place (And would have been my school, were I 3 years younger) and most of the locations are also in Cloverdale, where I grew up. To any Cloverdalian, it’s *very* recognizable. But to anyone else, it makes the perfect random suburban nightmare.
Anyhoo. Well worth a watch. Amazingly good for a teen movie, not bad for a regular movie. 🙂
this is nearly exacly like a certain high school in Abbotsford, it’s hilarious.
Great review, Darren. Some Christian friends of mine recommended it and it was well worth the watch. People have been raised in or know people from legalistic or evangelical churches will get the maximum laughs, as there are some subtle in-jokes.
Did you know that the girl who played the slut is Susan Sarandon’s daughter?
There were a lot of good things about this movie. This was the only movie I could think of with a character in a wheelchair. The movie wasn’t about the character and his struggle in the wheelchair, he was simply just a character in a wheelchair.
I liked all the stars, and this movie was just plain funny. Jena Malone is a fantastic actress. If you like her, watch “The Dangerous lives of altar boys.” This a fascinating, but dark and depressing movie. It also stars Kieran Culkin. If you watch it, please blog about it, as I am interested to discuss it with you.
My main problem with “saved!” was the way it dealt with teen pregnancy. I felt that teen pregnancy was glossed over and that if you had a baby, everything was great and you were loved. I think this might have been my personal issue, but my mom deals with teen mothers all the time, and a lot of them become pregnant because they don’t understand birth control. So this bugged me. Otherwise, I really enjoyed it.
I also thought the movie was excellent. I’ve seen it twice, once in theatre and once on DVD. I’d highly recommend it.