Mainstream Christian films risk losing their audience if they proselytize too much or focus on narrow themes. "God's Army" managed to be informative and entertaining because it avoided those traps. "Left Behind", based upon the book, unfortunately invests so much time on the Biblical foretelling of the end of the world and the return of the Anti-Christ that only ardent believers would understand the significance of what transpires in the film. As such, the average moviegoer is about one step behind the confusing events that are only explained later. Take the State of Israel about to be annihilated by circling warplanes only to be magically saved. Or people who vanish with only their clothes as reminders, or the restoration of the Temple of Israel, or the Eden project, or a worldwide conspiracy to control food, or the selected biblical references that trace mankind's demise. The concurrent theme of wayward people who find Christ in the midst of their dilemmas isn't enough to offset an assumption of biblical knowledge the filmmakers expect. There is also this dangerous implication that since only the devout have left, those remaining must redeem themselves in some way to be saved. Does that mean that the outstanding Jewish leader in the story and all others like him aren't going to be saved? Or are they really part of the conspiracy? Perhaps it was asking too much for the filmmakers to frame "Left Behind" in any other way than what is presented. After seeing the in your face approach of "Dogma" and the blatantly irreligious "The Rapture", and the slyly romanticized Ellen Burstyn film, "Resurrection", moviegoers clearly needed a more balance presentation of Christ. "Left Behind" however made more sense to a limited audience than it did to a wider one that either didn't know about the literal Apocalypse or weren't going to buy into it anyway.
Review of Left Behind: The Movie
